Charlotte Elizabeth McKay

Charlotte Elizabeth McKay (née Johnson; August 2, 1818 – April 10, 1894) was an American editor, Union Army nurse, and an anti-suffragist. She worked as a field nurse during the American Civil War, receiving a Kearny Cross from the 17th Maine Volunteer Infantry Regiment, whom she had cared for after the Battle of Chancellorsville. She was the first woman who protested against the suffrage movement, and she was the editor of the first American anti-suffrage periodical, The True Woman.

Early years

Charlotte Elizabeth Johnson was born in Waterford, Maine, on August 2, 1818. Her father was Dr. Abner Johnson, inventor of Johnson's Anodyne Liniment, and there were six siblings. In 1854, she married William P. McKay (died April 10, 1856), and their only child, Julia, died May 1861, in South Reading.

Career

McKay accepted an appointment under Dorothea Dix as a hospital nurse, and commenced her hospital life in Frederick, Maryland, in March 1862, where she was entrusted with the care of a large number of wounded from the First Battle of Winchester. In September 1862, the city was filled for two or three days with Stonewall Jackson's Corps on their way to South Mountain and Antietam. The rebels took possession of the hospital, and filled it for the time with their sick and wounded men.