ABSTRACT
The American Army of the frontier west was for the most part an all-male institution. Although many units paid for the services of a civilian laundress (often the wife of an enlisted soldier), they did not employ signifi cant numbers of female nurses. The only women connected to these frontier units were the wives and family members of the soldiers and offi cers. Because offi cers’ wives were more likely to be literate, theirs form the bulk of published letters and memoirs of life with the frontier Army. The majority of offi cers’ wives, however, did not choose to accompany their husbands to the far fl ung, primitive and desolate frontier forts to which they were assigned. Much like the wives of today’s deploying soldiers, they remained home with their families back East, saw their absent husbands only on furloughs, and hoped that they would be able to accompany their husbands on the next assignment. Only a relatively small number of women experienced life in the frontier forts. Many of those whose letters survived have been published, and together they paint a vivid if somewhat skewed (due to inherent prejudices of class) picture of every-day life in the Frontier Army. Certain themes appear in almost all these women’s letters, diaries and memoirs; the diffi culty of the journey, the isolation of the post, the poor quality of the quarters, the lack of skilled household help, and above all the lack of congenial companionship due to the scarcity of other wives. Numerous women were unable to adapt to this spartan lifestyle and returned to their families back East. Those who remained used imagination, ingenuity, and adaptability to create homes for their husbands and families, and thrived on the challenge.
