WOMEN AND THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION REVOLUTIONARY HEROINES

LYDIA BARRINGTON DARRAGH  Married William Darragh and settled in Philadelphia, Penn.  Worked as a nurse and midwife.  Credited with saving General George Washington’s army.  British General William Howe used Lydia Darragh’s home as headquarters when British troops invaded Philadelphia.  She overheard the British plan to attack General Washington at Whitemarsh eight miles away.  She got permission to go to the next town to purchase flour but, she went to warn George Washington.

NANCY HART  Served as a confederate scout, guide and spy carrying messages between the southern armies.  Twenty years old when she was caught and became prisoner of war.  Nancy gained the trust of one of her guards, got his weapon from him, shot him and escaped.  After the war Nancy married Joshua Douglas and settled in Virginia.

SARAH BRADLEE FULTON  Attended to the wounded soldiers during the American Revolution.  Removed a bullet from the cheek of the wounded soldiers.  Delivered a message inside enemy's line to General George Washington.  Sometimes referred to as the mother of the Boston Tea Party.

ANN TROTTER BAILEY  Ann (or Nancy) Bailey enlisted as Samuel Gay on February 14, in Company of the 1st Massachusetts Regiment.  She quickly rose to the rank of corporal. Sergeant/corporal.  She deserted for reasons unknown.  Capt. Hunt put out warrant for her arrest because he discovered she was female on March 3, The court fined her L 50 and she was given two years in prison for "appearing in men's cloths". There was a second trial at which she was fined L 16 to the state. After this she disappears from the records.

BETSY ROSS  When we view the flag, we think of liberty, freedom, pride, and Betsy Ross.  Betsy Ross sewed the first American flag.  She was disowned by the Quakers.  She lost one husband to an explosion at a munitions depot that he was guarding.  Her second husband died in a British prison.  She survived her third husband, who was sick for many years.  She had seven daughters, two of whom died in infancy. She maintained a business through it all.  Her pew was next to George Washington's at Christ Church.

MOLLY PITCHER  An Artillery wife, Mary Hays McCauly (better known as Molly Pitcher) shared the rigors of Valley Forge with her husband, William Hays.  Mary Hays McCauly was earned her nickname "Molly Pitcher" by bringing pitcher after pitcher of cool spring water to the exhausted and thirsty men.  She found her artilleryman husband back with the guns again, replacing a casualty. While she watched, Hays fell wounded.  Without hesitation, Molly stepped forward and took the rammer staff from her fallen husband’s hands. For the second time on an American battlefield, a woman manned a gun. (The first was Margaret Corbin during the defense of Fort Washington in 1776.)  Resolutely, she stayed at her post in the face of heavy enemy fire, ably acting as a matross (gunner).  For her heroic role, General Washington himself issued her a warrant as a noncommissioned officer. Thereafter, she was widely hailed as "Sergeant Molly."

DAUGHTERS OF LIBERTY  In spite of the fact that women were not allowed to take part in political life in the eighteenth century, they found ways of making themselves felt in public affairs.  At the time of the Stamp Act crisis, some young women who called themselves "Daughters of Liberty" announced that they would accept the attentions of only those young men who were willing to fight against the act "to the last extremity."  During the non-importation campaign (when colonists refused to buy British goods imported from England), women in organized groups worked with great zeal to provide for the colonies cloth and other articles which had formerly come from England.  Women also invented all kinds of concoctions made from local plants to take the place of tea.  In at least one seaport they had their own tea party. On October 24, 1774, fifty- one women in Edenton, North Carolina, signed a resolution in support of the provincial deputies of North Carolina who had pledged not to drink tea or to wear British cloth.  Women in Newport, Rhode Island, announced their intention to do without luxuries imported from England and asked men to forego "their dearer and more beloved 'Punch,' and renounce going so often to Taverns."