Belle Edmondson - Confederate Spy and Smuggler

Isabella Buchanan Edmondson, born in Mississippi in 1840, began smuggling supplies and funds to the Confederate army in 1862, after the fall of Memphis. She served as a Confederate agent throughout the war. In July 1864, she fled south, because the United States had issued a warrant for her arrest.

Edmondson's diary documents her daily routine from January through November 1864. Most of her short entries are simple reports about daily events, while occasionally she expresses her devotion to the Confederate cause. Edmondson also records contemporary news from the front, the activities of her family and the family's slaves, and a trip to Mississippi, where she visited Generals Forrest and Chalmers.

We might not know the story of Belle Edmondson if not for her diary, which is available to read here.

The language is sometimes hard to take, and the picture of daily life is certainly not a pleasant one. But it is an interesting read. And the insight it gives into the mind of a young Southern woman during the dark, frightening days of the Civil War is both startling and sad.