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Rose O'Neal Greenhow (1813 or 1814〔– October 1, 1864) was a renowned Confederate spy during the American Civil War. A socialite in Washington, D.C. during the period before the war, she moved in important political circles and cultivated friendships with presidents, generals, senators, and high-ranking military officers. She used her connections to pass along key military information to the Confederacy at the start of the war. In early 1861, she was given control of a pro-Southern spy network in Washington, DC by her handler, Thomas Jordan, then a captain in the Confederate Army. She was credited by Jefferson Davis, the Confederate president, with ensuring the South's victory at the First Battle of Bull Run in late July 1861. Captured in August, Greenhow was subject to house arrest; found to have continued her activities, in 1862 after an espionage hearing, she was imprisoned for nearly five months in Washington, DC. Deported to the Confederate States, she traveled to Richmond, Virginia and new tasks. Running the blockade, she sailed to Europe to represent the Confederacy in a diplomatic mission to France and Britain from 1863 to 1864. In 1863, she also wrote and published her memoir in London, which was popular in Britain. After her returning ship ran aground in 1864 off Wilmington, North Carolina, she drowned when her rowboat overturned as she tried to escape a Union gunboat. She was honored with a Confederate military funeral. In 1993, the women's auxiliary of the Sons of Confederate Veterans changed its name to the Order of the Confederate Rose in Greenhow's honor, following publicity about her exploits in a TV movie the previous year. A new biography of her was published in 2005. ==Early life== She was born in 1813 as Maria Rosetta O'Neale on a small plantation in Montgomery County, Maryland, northwest of Washington, DC.〔(Blackman, Ann. ''Wild Rose: The True Story of a Civil War Spy'' ), New York: Random House Digital, 2006, p. 58. Note: Blackman notes her parents were married in 1810 and had five children by 1817.〕〔Fishel (1998), ''Secret War'', p. 59 (Note: Confirms birth location.)〕 (Note: The biographical note on Greenhow at the National Archives and Record Administration, which holds a collection of her papers, says that O'Neal was born in 1817 in Port Tobacco, Maryland, but it is unclear what the documentation is for this.)〔 She was the third of five daughters of John O'Neale, a planter and slaveholder, and his wife Eliza Henrietta Hamilton, who were Roman Catholic.〔 Called Rose as a child, O'Neal was the third born and close to her next older sister Ellen (Mary Eleanor)〔 and the final "e" was dropped off the family name in Rose's early childhood.〔Ross, Ishbel, Rebel Rose: Life of Rose O'Neal Greenhow, Confederate Spy. 1954, pg. 3〕 Their father died in 1817,〔 murdered by unknown assailant(s). His widow, Eliza O'Neal, had four daughters to support and a cash-poor farm. After being orphaned as children, Rose and her sister Ellen were invited to live with their aunt in Washington, D.C. about 1830. Their aunt, Mrs. Maria Ann Hill, ran a stylish boarding house at the Old Capitol Building (later the Old Capitol Prison) and the girls met many important figures in the Washington area. Her olive skin "delicately flushed with color" earned her the nickname "Wild Rose."〔Ross, Ishbel, Rebel Rose: Life of Rose O'Neal Greenhow, Confederate Spy. 1954, pg. 4〕 In the 1830s, she met Robert Greenhow Jr., a prominent doctor, lawyer, and linguist〔 from Virginia.〔 Their courtship was well received by Washington society, including famed society matron Dolley Madison. In 1833, Rose's sister Ellen O'Neal married Dolley's nephew James Madison Cutts. In 1856 their daughter Adele Cutts married the widower Stephen A. Douglas, the senator from Illinois.〔Clinton, Anita Watkins. "Stephen Arnold Douglas - His Mississippi Experience," ''Journal of Mississippi History'' 1988 50(2): 56-88〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Rose O'Neal Greenhow」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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