Deborah Sampson puts her pants on one leg at a time just like every other man…I mean woman…wait, eighteenth-century women wore dresses…

I spend considerable time mulling over the question: “How outrageous was it that Sampson dressed as a man and fought in the American Revolution?”


Women as victims of violence in war and as perpetrators of violence in war were not new concepts to the fledgling nation. During the frontier days, many women settlers were killed or kidnapped by Native-Americans. Some kidnapped women even fought back against their captors, such as Hannah Dustan, who killed and scalped her Native-American captors (and has two statues to her credit).

From the opposite perspective, many Native-American women were killed by white settlers. There were also Native-American, women-warriors; for, example Weetamoo, of the Pocassets.

Therefore, if a woman committing violent acts in war is not a new concept, then, why do I find Herman Mann constantly apologizing and justifying Sampson’s enlistment in the Army?

The more I think about this, the more I realize he must be apologizing more for her cross-dressing and impersonation of a man.

Is the fact that Sampson fights as a man, like a man, and apparently just as good as a man—if we are to believe the scrolling title of the book—why Mann (ironic name for the author in this context) feels the need to spend so much of the text justifying why she is an American hero?

I shall continue to ponder this subject.

~Blake