Description: "Examining the relationship between middle- and planter-class white women who supported the Confederacy, this book demonstrates that elite and middle-class white Southern women--active at home and abroad--played an integral role in the construction of Confederate nationalism as both actors and symbols, and it traces the impact of and the memories surrounding these women's wartime activism into the twentieth century"--
Review Quotes:
The Weaker Sex in War makes a welcome and valuable contribution to our understanding of the gendered nature of Confederate nationalism. Through the stories of middle-class and planter women, Kristen Brill explores how nationalism proved a two-way street-both shaped by and projected onto Confederate women. She reminds us that these women were more than just devoted wives or daughters; they were powerful symbols of the short-lived Confederate nation.
--Caroline E. Janney, University of Virginia, author of Ends of War: The Unfinished Fight of Lee's Army after Appomattox