Women Who Fought: Camp Followers

Women who stayed behind while their husbands went to war were in charge of managing the households, children, and farms all by themselves. Other women made the choice to follow their husbands to war.

Camp follower was the American term for the women and children who traveled with the army during the war. While no official count exists for camp followers, some historians estimate that there may have been as many as 20,000 over the course of the war (others think that the number was much smaller).

What is known is that life as a camp follower was very difficult. Most camp followers were the wives or daughters of soldiers. They were paid small wages to cook, sew, and do laundry for the troops. They nursed the wounded and sick, washed clothing, cooked, gathered supplies, and encouraged their husbands to stay with the army. They received meals from the army’s rations and slept in the army’s camps.

Some of these women, like Margaret Cochran Corbin, ended up fighting alongside their husbands. Other women, like Deborah Sampson, became heroes of the American Revolution when they disguised themselves as men and joined the Patriot forces.

Deborah Sampson

Deborah Sampson was the only woman to earn a full military pension for her participation in the American Revolution. She enlisted as a man named Robert Shurtliff in the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment of the Continental Army. She spent most of her service fighting in the Hudson Valley. Fearing that her identity would be discovered if she sought medical attention after she was shot in the thigh during a skirmish, she cut a musket ball out of her leg herself.