Pauline of the Potomac, or General McClellan’s Spy.

Philadelphia: Barclay & Co., 1864. 8vo (9.5” x 6”), original printed wrappers. [2] 13, 100 pp., illus.

A sensational Civil War tale centering on the cross-dressing Union scout and spy Pauline D'Estraye—a female heroine with ready-access to Gen. McClellan.

On his deathbed, Pauline's father—"a distinguished French exile"—tells her that he wishes to "dedicate" her to a "glorious cause"—and symbolically drapes the American flag over her body "like a bridal veil." Exhorting her to tend to the wounded on the battlefield, he preemptively dismisses any criticism she may receive for her unfeminine role. He explains that "many might consider the course of Miss D'Estraye as rather masculine or at least out of the established line of conduct for a female and a refined lady," but remarks that she is French, and that “what would seem indecorous to American women, is by no means so regarded by the gentler sex in France."

Following her father's death, Pauline attaches herself as a nurse to a regiment of volunteers. Present at the Battle of Bull Run, she comments, "Oh, what a terrible, what a fearful day was yesterday; and yet its horrors were strangely blended with romance." Thirsting “for a more important part in the great drama than she had hitherto occupied,” she decides to visit the "newly appointed Commander in Chief of the Union Army, General M'Clellan [sic], and offer him her services as a scout or spy." McClellan accepts her "patriotic proposition" while cautioning her that the "office of a Scout or a Spy is one of the most responsible ones in the army"—and moreover, that it is "attended by innumerable and oftentimes insurmountable difficulties and dangers." In her subsequent adventures, Pauline is often compelled, "in the performance of this duty, to assume different costumes and even names." She impersonates a zouave, and also disguises herself as an officer of the Confederate Army, consistently "cool as she [is] courageous." She returns to McClellan following each adventure, and receives further assignments from him. By the end of the story, Pauline has found a soldier lover, and McLellan attends their wedding.

Wesley Bradshaw was the pseudonym of author and publisher Charles Wesley Alexander (1837-1927). During the Civil War he published Maud of the Mississippi (1864), a sequel to the present work, under his own imprint, in addition to a considerable number of other works.

OCLC records only eight copies.

REFERENCES: Cimbala, Paul Alan, Randall M. Miller, Editors. An Uncommon Time: The Civil War and the Northern Home Front. New York: Fordham University Press, 2002), pp. 48-51.

CONDITION: Tape repairs to spine, edges of wrappers along spine, and across lower edge of back wrapper, moderate soiling, contents good.