12. Albert Cashier: The Heroic and Tragic Union Solider who fought 40 battles in the American Civil war, but was born a woman
In 1859, sixteen-year-old Irish girl Jennie Irene Hodgers left her home in the Irish fishing village of Clogherhead. Jennie’s destination was New York. However, by the time she arrived in America, Jennie had adopted a new name- and a different gender. For Jennie stepped off the boat in New York as Albert Cashier– a role she claimed in later life she adopted to find work. In 1862, Albert took this male lifestyle to a whole new level when he enlisted in the 95th Illinois Infantry of Abraham Lincoln’s Union army to fight in the American Civil War.
Albert fought in approximately 40 battles. He was known as a brave soldier, who would taunt the enemy into action and who escaped a Confederate soldier who captured him, by knocking the man out and running back to camp. After the war, Cashier continued to live and work as a man. However, an accident revealed his female identity physique. As a result, Cashier had to fight to retain his army pension. He won his case but a decline in his mental health to force him into a mental asylum where he died in 1915. The hospital forced Cashier to live as a woman, and the distressed former soldier tried to fashion his skirts into pants using safety pins. It was a cruel end to a courageous life.