Emerging Civil War

(NOT an authentic Civil War era scale… Illustrative and theme purposes only.)

“You stated that you had been weighed, what is your weight?”[i] asked Private Walter Dunn in a letter to his fiancée. It’s a little shocking to modern readers! There are a few questions that are usually considered taboo to ask a woman: her age and her weight.

However, Walter Dunn is not the only mid-19^th Century correspondent to talk or ask about bodily weight, leading to the question: why? Was it just a matter of curiosity? Or was there something more significant behind the questions or journaled entries of weight?

Over the years of reading primary sources, I seen various references to bodily weight and almost always in positive context. Some young women even happily recorded those details in their private diaries. Walter’s straight forward question, though, was the first time I’d noticed such a topic under discussion between an unmarried couple and I decided to pull out other references and see if the context and social view could be clarified. Continue reading →