Civil War Women

Half of Iowa's men went to battle during the Civil War, 1861-1865. While they were away from home, women ran the farms and businesses back home in Iowa.

Nearly one half of Iowa’s men were involved in the war, so their younger sons, wives, mothers, daughters and sisters ran the farms and businesses back home. When the war began the women made the uniforms that were need by the new Iowa recruits and they continued to prepare bandages for the hospitals. In 1865 the war had ended, the North had won and the Nation went about the slow process of putting itself back together again.