Writer, War Strategist, Enigma

Writer, War Strategist, Enigma. A Strong Woman in a Turbulent Time. , Anna Ella Carroll, sometimes called an unofficial member of Abraham Lincoln's cabinet, is buried in the Old Trinity Church graveyard. Carroll, born on Maryland's Eastern Shore in 1815, remains an enigma, but there is no question that she refused to stay within the societal boundaries that limited the roles of 19th-century women., Before the Civil War, Carroll, a wealthy slave-owning daughter of a Maryland governor, helped manage her father's estate and also worked as a publicist. In the 1950s, she embraced anti-immigrant beliefs and wrote a book attacking Roman Catholicism., Her adamant support of Lincoln after his 1860 election, however, prompted Carroll to free her enslaved workers, and to work to keep Maryland in the Union. She argued against secession in her book, The War Powers of the General Government (1861)., In 1861, War Department contacts asked her to tour the upper Mississippi River. In St. Louis, river pilot Charles Scott explained the river and its major tributaries to her, and Carroll used Scott's information to development a strategy that used the Tennessee River as an avenue of invasion., She sent the plan to the War Department, giving Scott credit. In 1862, Gen. Ulysses S. Grant used the Tennessee River to capture several key forts and transportation junctions., In the postwar years, Carroll claimed that she, not Scott, had developed the Tennessee River concept, but was not given credit because she was a woman. Carroll never married and eventually received a small Federal pension, but still struggled financially. Shunned by her family due to her Union loyalty, Carroll died on February 19, 1894., [Captions:] , Anna Ella Carroll's great-grandfather, Charles Carroll, was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Despite this famous lineage, and her own active life, Anna died largely forgotten. The Maryland Historical Society erected her current grave marker in 1958., While her exact role remains murky, Anna Carroll did play a part in the United States' strategy for conquering the vast Western Theater of the Confederacy.