Albert Cashier

From Vero - Wikipedia
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Infobox military person Albert D. J. Cashier (December 25, 1843 – October 10, 1915), born Jennie Irene Hodgers, was an Irish-born American soldier who served in the Union Army during the American Civil War. Cashier adopted the identity of a man before enlisting, and maintained it until death. Cashier became famous as one of at least 250 soldiers who were assigned female at birth and enlisted as men to fight in the Civil War.<ref name="Righthand">Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> The consistent and nearly lifelong (at least 53 years) commitment to a male identity has prompted some historians to believe that Cashier was a trans man.<ref name = Cromwell /><ref name = Bronski /><ref name = Teich /><ref name = Cronn-Mills /><ref name="Irishstory">Template:Cite web</ref>

Early life

According to a later investigation by the administrator of Cashier's estate, Albert Cashier was born Jennie Hodgers in Clogherhead,Template:Notetag County Louth, Ireland, on December 25, 1843,<ref name="Tsui-2006">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Rp<ref name="Blanton & Cook"/> to Sallie and Patrick Hodgers.<ref name="Blanton & Cook"/> Typically, the youth's uncle or stepfather was said to have dressed his charge in male clothing in order to find work in an all-male shoe factory in Illinois. Even before the advent of the war, Hodgers adopted the identity of Albert Cashier in order to live independently.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp Sallie Hodgers, Cashier's mother, was known to have died prior to 1862, by which time her child had traveled as a stowaway to Belvidere, Illinois, and was working as a farmhand to a man named Avery.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="McClellan McAndrew">Template:Cite news</ref>

Cashier was elderly and suffering from dementia<ref name="Irishstory" /> when interviewed about immigrating to the United States and enlisting in the army, and had always been evasive about early life; therefore, the available narratives about his early life are often contradictory.

Enlistment

Cashier first enlisted in July 1862 after President Lincoln's call for soldiers.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp As time passed, the need for soldiers only increased. On August 6, 1862, the eighteen-year-old enlisted in the 95th Illinois Infantry for a three-year term using the name "Albert D.J. Cashier" and was assigned to Company G.<ref name="Hicks-Bartlett">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="Blanton">Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp The Company Descriptive Book of the 95th shows the entry for Cashier, a 5'3" soldier, nineteen years old with blue eyes and auburn hair, weighing 110 pounds.Template:Notetag Cashier easily passed the medical examination because it consisted of showing one's hands and feet. During the Civil War, many soldiers were young boys.<ref name="hw-nelson">Template:Cite news</ref> Albert could not read or write and instead marked an X on the enlistment papers.<ref name = Irishstory /> Cashier's fellow soldiers recalled that Cashier was reserved and preferred not to share a tent.<ref name="hw-nelson"/>

Many soldiers from Belvidere participated in the Battle of Shiloh as members of the Fifteenth Illinois Volunteers, where the Union had suffered heavy losses. Cashier took the train with others from Belvidere to Rockford in order to enlist, in answer to the call for more soldiers.<ref name=Clausius-1958>Template:Cite journal</ref>Template:Rp Along with others from Boone and McHenry counties, Cashier was trained to be an infantryman of the 95th Regiment at Camp Fuller in Rockford. After being shipped out by steamer and rail to Confederate strongholds in Columbus, Kentucky and Jackson, Tennessee, the 95th was ordered to Grand Junction where the regiment became part of the Army of the Tennessee under General Ulysses S. Grant.<ref name=Clausius-1958 />Template:Rp

During the war

The regiment was part of the Army of the Tennessee under Ulysses S. Grant and fought in approximately forty battles,<ref name="Blanton"/> including the Siege of Vicksburg.<ref name=Clausius-1958 />Template:Rp During this campaign, Cashier was captured while performing reconnaissance,<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp but managed to escape and return to the regiment. In June 1863, still during the siege, Cashier contracted chronic diarrhea and entered a military hospital, somehow managing to evade detection.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp

In the second quarter of 1864, the regiment was also present at the Red River Campaign under General Nathaniel Banks, and in June 1864 at the Battle of Brice's Crossroads in Guntown, Mississippi, where they suffered heavy casualties.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp<ref name=Clausius-1958 />Template:Rp

Following a period to recuperate and regroup following the debacle at Brice, the 95th, now a seasoned and battle-hardened regiment, saw additional action in late 1864 through early 1865 in the Franklin–Nashville Campaign, at the battles of Spring Hill and Franklin, the defense of Nashville, and the pursuit of General Hood.<ref name=Clausius-1958 />Template:Rp

During the war, the regiment traveled a total of about 9,000 miles.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:RpTemplate:Notetag Other soldiers thought that Cashier was small and preferred to be alone, which were not uncommon characteristics for soldiers. Cashier fought with the regiment through the war in over 40 battles until honorably discharged on August 17, 1865, when all the soldiers were mustered out.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp<ref name = Irishstory />

Postwar

Cashier's postwar residence, since moved to Saunemin

After the war, Cashier returned to Belvidere, Illinois, for a time, working for Samuel Pepper and continuing to live as a man.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp<ref name="Blanton-Himes">Template:Cite web</ref> Settling in Saunemin, Illinois, in 1869, Cashier worked as a farmhand as well as performing odd jobs around the town, and can be found in the town payroll records.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp Cashier lived with employer Joshua Chesbro and his family in exchange for work, and had also slept for a time in the Cording Hardware store in exchange for labor. In 1885, the Chesbro family had a small house built for Cashier.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> For over forty years, Cashier lived in Saunemin and was a church janitor, cemetery worker, and street lamplighter. Living as a man allowed Cashier to vote in elections and to later claim a veteran's pension under the same name.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp Pension payments started in 1907.<ref name="eHistory, Ohio State University">Template:Cite web</ref>

In later years, Cashier ate with the neighboring Lannon family. The Lannons discovered their friend's sex when Cashier fell ill, but decided not to make their discovery public.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp

In 1911, Cashier, who was working for State Senator Ira Lish, was hit by the senator's car, resulting in a broken leg.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp A physician found out Cashier's secret in the hospital, but did not disclose the information. No longer able to work, Cashier was moved to the Soldiers and Sailors home in Quincy, Illinois, on May 5, 1911. Many friends and fellow soldiers from the Ninety-fifth Regiment visited.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp Cashier lived there until an obvious deterioration of mind began to take place, and was subsequently moved to the Watertown State Hospital for the Insane in East Moline, Illinois, in March 1914.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp Attendants at the Watertown State Hospital discovered Cashier's sex, at which point Cashier was made to wear women's clothes again after presumably more than fifty years of dressing as male.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp In 1914, Cashier was investigated for fraud by the veterans' pension board; former comrades confirmed that Cashier was in fact the person who had fought in the Civil War and the board decided in February 1915 that payments should continue for life.<ref name="Blanton & Cook"/>

Death and legacy

Albert Cashier died on October 10, 1915, and was buried in uniform. The government supplied the typical small gravestone used to mark a veteran's resting place which was inscribed "Albert D. J. Cashier, Co. G, 95 Ill. Inf."<ref name="Hicks-Bartlett"/><ref name="chicagotribune.com">Template:Cite web</ref> Cashier was given an official Grand Army of the Republic funerary service, and was buried with full military honors.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp It took W. J. Singleton (executor of Cashier's estate) nine years to track Cashier's identity back to the birth name of Jennie Hodgers. None of the would-be heirs proved convincing, and the estate of about $282 (after payment of funeral expenses)<ref name="Blanton & Cook"/><ref name="eHistory, Ohio State University"/> was deposited in the Adams County, Illinois, treasury. In 1977 local residents erected a larger second headstone, inscribed with both names, on the same plot at Sunny Slope cemetery in Saunemin, Illinois.<ref name="chicagotribune.com"/>

Cashier is listed on the internal wall of the Illinois memorial at Vicksburg National Military Park.<ref name="Tsui-2006"/>Template:Rp

A musical entitled The Civility of Albert Cashier has been produced based on Cashier's life; the work was described by the Chicago Tribune as "A timely musical about a trans soldier".<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Also Known As Albert D. J. Cashier: The Jennie Hodgers Story is a biography written by veteran Lon P. Dawson, who lived at the Illinois Veterans Home where Cashier once lived. The novel My Last Skirt, by Lynda Durrant, is based on Cashier's life. Cashier was mentioned in a collection of essays called Nine Irish Lives, in which Cashier's biography was written by Jill McDonough.<ref name = McDonough>Template:Cite book</ref>

In Michael Leali's 2022 young adult novel, The Civil War of Amos Abernathy, Cashier stands in for a pen pal.<ref name="Chowder 2022">Template:Cite web</ref>

Cashier's one-room house is now a historic site. The house served as a tool shed and nursery for hatchling chickens at one point and was relocated eight times in 137 years.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> In 1982, members of the local Women's Club moved it back to Saunemin with plans to display it that never fully materialized. After this it was so dilapidated that local firefighters planned to burn it down as a training exercise. Former Pontiac tourism director Betty Estes rescued it in 1996 hours before the firefighters could set it ablaze. She relocated the house to Pontiac, and utilized it as a streets department shed. Later on, volunteers such as local historian and village board member Al Arnolts meticulously restored the house. "We built a new framework and put it back together," Arnolts said. "The shake shingles that are on the roof came from a cedar tree right here in town." The newly restored home was dedicated in a ceremony in August 2011.<ref name="Freedom">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name="chicagotribune.com"/>

Authors including Michael Bronski, Jason Cromwell, Kirstin Cronn-Mills, and Nicholas Teich have suggested or argued that Cashier was a trans man due to living as a man for at least 53 years.<ref name = Cromwell>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name = Bronski>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name = Teich>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name = Cronn-Mills>Template:Cite book</ref>

See also

Notes

Template:Notefoot

References

Template:Reflist

Further reading

  • Bradford, Martin J. (2015). A Velvet Fist in an Iron Glove: The Curious Case of Albert Cashier. Kindle Ebooks @ Amazon. Historical/fiction novel account of the life of Jennie Hodgers/Albert Cashier.
  • Durant, Lynda. (2006). My Last Skirt: the Story of Jennie Hodgers, Union Soldier. New York: Clarion Books. Template:ISBN Historical fiction account of Jennie Hodgers' life.
  • Eggleston, Larry G. (2003). Women in the Civil War: Extraordinary Stories of Soldiers, Spies, Nurses, Doctors, Crusaders, and Others. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc. Template:ISBN

Template:Authority control Template:American Civil War

Retrieved from "https://wiki.sarg.dev/index.php?title=Albert_Cashier&oldid=580786"