Her Mark: Black Women’s Voices from Union Pension Records

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, hundreds of thousands of African American women applied for US pensions based on the military service of their husbands during the American Civil War. Their incredible first-hand descriptions chronicling their day-to-day lives, financial struggles, family histories, local events, etc. provide a powerful commentary on the history of communities throughout the South Carolina Lowcountry during the Reconstruction Era.