Many writers and artists have focused on the overwhelming total loss of life during the Civil War — an estimated 1.5 million casualties of all ages, ethnicities, and genders. Less visible and documented is the conflict’s specific impact on Black women and children.  

Historian Thavolia Glymph draws on her research, centered on slavery, emancipation, Reconstruction, labor, and women in the U.S. South, to discuss what’s been overlooked in contemporary and historical accounts.   

A professor of history and law at Duke University, Glymph is the author of two books, including The Women’s Fight: The Civil War’s Battles for Home, Freedom, and Nation. She’s published numerous articles and essays and served as co-editor of two volumes of Freedom: A Documentary History of Emancipation, 1861-1867.  

Glymph is also the past president of the American Historical Association and the Southern Historical Association, and an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.