Mary Logan: A Distinguished American Woman

Mary Logan
A Distinguished American Woman

Leah Sheffer
Carbondale Community High School, Carbondale

The Civil War divided not only our country, but also the families of our nation. Women played an influential role in shaping the stances taken by these families and communities. They also held the families together while members were at war. One woman who contributed greatly in these ways was Mary Simmerson Cunningham Logan, the wife of General John A. Logan. The Logans shared a mutual respect for each other, and Mary Logan influenced all aspects of her husband's career. She was also an active leader in the southern Illinois area.

Mary Logan was tutored in the social aspects of politics by Mrs. Stephen A. Douglas in 1858, after John Logan had been elected to the U. S. House of Representatives. This background in education enabled Mary Logan to freely join in discussions with her husband and other political figures. Mary Logan, Mrs. Douglas, and Mrs. Ulysses S. Grant often met to discuss social issues and exchange perspectives on current issues of their time.

Mary Logan was educated about political issues when she studied at the Convent of St. Vincent. It was here she first took her stand against slavery, even though she was raised in a slave-owning home. Her attitude was formed in part when she witnessed the separation of a black slave family. She saw the way the family was affected without its father. Upon receiving a slave in 1855 as a wedding gift, Mary Logan witnessed the family separation while living with her isolated slave. She granted the slave her freedom. This experience strengthened her position against slavery.

With this education in politics and philosophy on slavery, Mary Logan played a prominent role in her husband's political decisions. She copied many of his documents, researched much of his work, and relieved him of his correspondence. She also kept him informed of the attitudes and feelings of the people in southern Illinois while he was in Washington, D.C. Mary Logan

took an active role in politics and often took part in debates with other politicians. They recognized and respected her opinions. She was the only person that Logan trusted to handle the dispatches that were being sent to Washington. She was the voice of Logan's opinion to the people of southern Illinois.
This became an extremely important role when her twenty-year-old brother, Hilbert Cunningham, joined the Confederacy. This caused resentment and suspicion towards the Logans. The action that her brother took also divided Mary Logan's family. Mary Logan did not understand why he chose to do this; she said, "He was devoted to Mr. Logan and to me; yet in a moment of mad impulse, characteristic of the time, he placed himself in the attitude of the enemy to his own kindred." When her brother joined the Confederacy, Mary Logan began to write to her husband urging him to come to Marion, Illinois. In one letter she wrote, "I fear there will be some excitement and trouble growing out of those men leaving here." She then indicated to her husband the hostility towards the war and also towards President Lincoln that had formed in southern Illinois. Her information prompted him to seek permission to begin a new regiment. He then traveled to Marion, Illinois, to try to persuade the people to join the Union cause.
Prior to John A. Logan's speech in Marion in 1860, Mary Logan and he discussed many things, including possible conflicts, supporters, and what
Mary Logan worked tirelessly on behalf of wounded Union soldiers. She secured supplies for a makeshift hospital in Cairo and improved the sanitary conditions of the facility.

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line of action he was to take the following day. "The unknown was before us. A more or less reckless people surrounded us; all of them unreasonable in their expectation of what Mr. Logan could do." With these rising tensions, both of the Logans feared that there might be trouble at the meeting in Marion.

Mary Logan had been asked by her husband not to attend his speech the following day, because he would be unnerved if a riot started in the crowd while she was there. In his presence she agreed, but then later disguised herself and followed him into Marion. She felt that she had to be there to protect Logan. If she saw any threatening actions, she promised to scream a warning to her husband. However, no warning was necessary and she was able to keep her presence concealed. She later commented, "This was the most eloquent speech of his life, as it was the great crisis of his career." It is here where John A. Logan declared his loyalty for the Union.

Prior to Logan's speech, Mary Logan had arranged for influential men to come and volunteer for his regiment. John A. Logan had no knowledge of this, and after the plan was accomplished, he momentarily lost full control of his emotions. Mary Logan wept with happiness, "for my husband had won, and my bit of stage managing had succeeded." With this initial success, Logan set out recruiting volunteers throughout the district for his newly formed Thirty-first Regiment. He then took his regiment to Cairo, Illinois. Mary Logan joined her husband shortly after.

The conditions in Cairo were unsanitary, causing disease and epidemics to spread quickly. There was no hospital facility. John A. Logan seized a small hotel for hospital purposes. Mary traveled to Carbondale and Marion to obtain furnishings for the hospital. Upon her arrival, she appealed to friends and families of the soldiers and secured everything that was necessary for the hospital. Within thirty-six hours she succeeded in collecting carloads of luxuries, including brightly colored handmade quilts. These quilts attracted so much attention nationwide that the hospital itself became known as the "Striped Hospital of the Thirty-first Regiment." The government then provided the hospital with tents and a regular pavillion. Nothing of its kind had yet been developed in the West.

Mary Logan played a prominent role in her husband's life and successes. She dealt with pressure from her family, which was split in supporting the Confederacy and the Union. She played an important part in the formation of the Thirty-first Regiment alongside her husband. She has been credited with the success of the Striped Hospital. Mary Logan was well known and respected as an educated woman, rare for her time. A contemporary commented, "Mrs. Logan is almost the model of an American woman . . . she has been her husband's success."—[From James P. Jones, "Black Jack;" Helen W. Linsenmeyer-Keyser, "Mary Logan: An Extraordinary Illinoisan," Illinois Magazine (Nov-Dec 1986); Helen W. Linsenmeyer, "Meet Mary S. Logan, the General's Lady," Southern Illinoisan (Aug. 8, 1984); Mary Logan, "Franklin County, Illinois, and How I Came to Know and Love Its People," Franklin County, Illinois War History 1832-1920; Mary Logan, "Recollections of a Soldier's Wife," Cosmopolitan (Feb.-July 1913); Mary Logan Reminiscences of the Civil War and Reconstruction; Virginia C. McAndrew, "Idols of Egypt, Mrs. John A. Logan," Egyptian Key, (Oct. 1943); Philadelphia Record, Feb. 28, 1879; Tony Stevens, "Mary Logan: One Darned Smart Woman," Southern Illinoisan (Aug. 8, 1984); Mary Logan Tucker, address to Dames of the Loyal Legion, Washington, D.C., Feb. 9, 1929.]

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