Kate Cumming

Kate Cumming
Born1830
Edinburgh, Scotland
DiedJune 5, 1909
Birmingham, Alabama
NationalityScottish, Confederate
Occupation(s)Nurse in the Confederate States Medical Corps, Teacher

Kate Cumming (1830 – June 5, 1909) was a Confederate Civil War nurse.[1][2]

Early life

Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, her family emigrated to the United States when Cumming was young, and settled in Mobile, Alabama.[2][3] At the outbreak of the Civil War, Cumming's mother and two sisters left for England, leaving Cumming behind with her father and brother.[1] Against her family's wishes, in April 1862, Cumming volunteered as a nurse in a Confederate hospital located in Corinth, Mississippi, near the location of the Battle of Shiloh after her brother enlisted in the 21st Alabama Infantry.[4][5] She was inspired to serve by Florence Nightingale as well as Reverend Benjamin M. Miller, who called women specifically to aid the Confederacy.[2]

Civil War service

Cumming began her service at the Mississippi/Tennessee border at the Battle of Shiloh.[2] The Confederacy did not have an organized medical force at the war's inception, making the efforts of nurses like Cumming crucial for Confederate survival.[1] As the medical department became more organized, Cumming occupied a matron position, and traveled with the mobile hospitals of Dr. Samuel Stout.[1] Cumming was an active nurse throughout the war, which was unusual as nurses usually served temporarily.[2] Cumming eventually became the head of food and housekeeping departments in multiple hospitals in Georgia.[6]

"I could fill whole people with descriptions of the scenes I had," wrote Cumming of her battlefield experience.[5] It is clear in her writings that Cumming knew nurses to be vital to the war effort.[5] Cumming maintained a diary throughout her wartime experience, offering readers insight into life of a woman nurse in the war effort.[1] Cumming's diary was published in 1866 under the title A Journal of Hospital Life in the Confederate Army of Tennessee.[6]

Post-war life

At the end of the war, Cumming returned home to Mobile. She published her wartime experiences in 1866, titled A Journal of Hospital Life in the Confederate Army of Tennessee from the Battle of Shiloh to the End of the War.[2] This journal has become one of the few primary sources regarding the work of Confederate nurses.[7] In 1874, she moved to Birmingham, Alabama, with her father, where she worked with a teacher and was an active member of the United Daughters of the Confederacy.[2] She died in Birmingham on June 5, 1909. She is buried in Georgia.[2]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e "Kate Cumming". Encyclopedia of Alabama. Retrieved 2017-02-20.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h "Kate Cumming". New Georgia Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2017-02-19.
  3. ^ Hall, Richard H. (2006). Women on the Civil War Battlefront. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas. p. 232. ISBN 9780700614370.
  4. ^ Hall, Richard H. (2006). Women on the Civil War Battlefront. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas. p. 235. ISBN 9780700614370.
  5. ^ a b c Tsui, Bonnie (2006). She Went to the Field: Women Soldiers of the Civil War. Guilford: TwoDot. p. 119. ISBN 0762743840.
  6. ^ a b Tsui, Bonnie (2006). She Went to the Field: Women Soldiers of the Civil War. Guilford: TwoDot. p. 120. ISBN 0762743840.
  7. ^ "Cumming, Kate (1828-1909)". UAB Libraries. Retrieved 2017-02-20.