Born: 1841, Canada
Died: 5 September 1898
Country most active: United States
Also known as: Sarah Emma Evelyn Edmondson, Sarah Seelye, Franklin Flint Thompson
The following is republished from the Library of Congress. This piece falls under under public domain, as copyright does not apply to “any work of the U.S. Government” where “a work prepared by an officer or employee of the U.S. Government as part of that person’s official duties” (See, 17 U.S.C. §§ 101, 105).
In 1857, Sarah Emma Edmonds left rural New Brunswick, Canada to escape her abusive father and an arranged marriage. At age 16, she took a job as a travelling book salesman under the alias Franklin Thompson and found that customers readily accepted her disguised as a man. She later landed in Hartford, Connecticut and was hired by the American Publishing Company selling book subscriptions. In December 1860, when the country was on the brink of civil war, the company sent her west to Flint, Michigan. When war was declared in 1861, Edmonds enlisted in the Union army and she joined the Second Michigan Volunteer Infantry as Franklin Thompson. She was at the First Battle of Bull Run and at the Battle of Williamsburg. In 1862, Edmonds contracted malaria and began experiencing recurrent health issues. She decided she would need to desert in order to be treated without revealing her identity. She had originally planned to return to her regiment once she had recovered, but left her male disguise behind forever once “Wanted” posters appeared for Private Franklin Thompson for desertion. Edmonds eventually moved to Washington, DC and worked as a nurse at a military hospital. In 1865, she published a memoir of her adventures in which she claimed to have been a spy for Union army and that she carried out eleven missions behind enemy lines.