Frances Hook
Frances and her brother were living in Chicago when the Civil War began. She was 14 years old when her brother announced that he was going to enlist in the Union Army. Since her brother was her only living relative, and she didn’t want to be left alone, she decided to disguise herself as a man and accompany him.
Frances cut her hair short and told the recruiting officer she was 22 years old. On April 30 1861, she enlisted in the 11th Illinois Infantry Regiment as Private Frank Miller. She and her brother served their 90-day enlistment without her gender being discovered.
They then re-enlisted in the 11th Illinois for 3 more years on July 30 1861. Their regiment fought at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson. Her brother was killed during the Battle of Shiloh, and his death had such a devastating effect on her that she couldn’t continue serving with the 11th Illinois, where everything reminded her of her brother.
But Frances was determined to continue her service with the Union Army. She assumed a new alias, Frank Henderson, and enlisted in the 33rd Illinois Infantry. She had served only a few months when she was wounded in the shoulder at the Battle of Frederickstown, Missouri. It wasn’t a life-threatening wound, but one that needed immediate medical attention.
While she was being cared for in the regimental hospital, the doctor discovered that she was a woman, more accurately, a teenager. Union officials discharged her and made her promise to go home, but she had no home nor any living relatives. Army life was all she knew.
Frances soon found the 90th Illinois Infantry, a new regiment that hadn’t yet seen battle. In the summer of 1863, while marching through Alabama, she got permission to enter an empty house to look for food and medicine. She found several items and began to pack them in her bag, when two Confederate soldiers came out of hiding and took her prisoner.
She was imprisoned in Atlanta, Georgia. Soon thereafter, she made a desperate attempt to escape. A guard saw her and ordered her to stop, but she kept running. He fired at her, wounding her in the thigh. She was carried into the prison hospital, where the doctor dressing her wound discovered her gender.
She was assigned a separate room at the prison, and authorities put her on the list of prisoners to be exchanged. On February 17 1864, Frances was one of 27 Union prisoners who were transferred to the Union lines that day. She was transported to a Nashville hospital, where she remained until she had recovered from her wound.
Frances Hook was discharged and sent North in June 1864. She very well may have reenlisted and served the rest of the war with another regiment, but I could find no record of her life beyond that point.
Copyright © 2007 Maggie MacLean
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