Sarah Edmonds Seelye a.k.a. Frank Thompson (1841–1898)

On her first mission for Gen. George McClellan, Edmonds used silver nitrate to darken her skin, adopted the alias “Cuff,” and slipped behind Confederate lines disguised as a Black man.

She managed to have herself assigned to a kitchen detail, which allowed her to glean a great deal of information about the number and morale of the Confederate troops and their available weapons, including which of their artillery pieces were actually “Quaker guns” (logs painted black to look like cannons from afar).

Other guises Edmonds adopted for her espionage work included “Bridget O’Shea,” a fat Irish peddler, and a Black laundress. In total, she completed 11 missions, all successful.

“Small Part in so Great a Work”

Between missions, Edmonds would resume her guise as “Thompson” and return to work as a nurse. Of course, what she practiced was not nursing as we understand it today. In her 1865 memoir, she wrote that Army nurses “spend much of their time in digging drains around the tents, planting evergreens, and putting up awnings, all which add much to the coolness and comfort of the hospital.”

Nonetheless, Edmonds exemplified nurses’ dedication to duty even in the era before licensure. Although her hours were long and grueling, she viewed tasks like treating soldiers suffering from typhoid fever as a rare honor. “How thankful I was that it was my privilege to take some small part in so great a work,” she wrote.

Correcting the Record

Edmonds’ military career came to an end after she contracted malaria. Knowing that her real identity would be quickly revealed in a military hospital, she left the camp and sought treatment as a civilian woman. She planned to return, but found that in her absence, “Frank Thompson” had been branded a deserter. Edmonds abandoned her disguise and traveled to Washington, D.C., where she worked as nurse until the end of the war.

After the conflict, Edmonds wrote her memoir, entitled Nurse and Spy in the Union Army. Although full of creative embellishments, it was very successful, selling 175,000 copies. She donated the profits to the War Relief Fund.

In 1867, Edmonds married Linus Seeyle, with whom she eventually had three sons. Although happy in her new life, the charge of desertion haunted her. She petitioned the War Department for a review of her case, and in 1884 was granted an honorable discharge from the Army, plus a bonus and a veteran’s pension of $12 a month. She was the only female member of the Grand Army of the Republic, a fraternal organization formed after the war by veterans of the Union Army.

She died in 1898 and was buried in the military section of Washington Cemetery in Houston, Texas.

In this Article: Civil War, Historical Nurses