This thesis examines the ways in which definitions and perceptions of refugees in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia evolved over the course of the American Civil War. It investigates perspectives from individuals in both the United States and Confederate States to illustrate how misconceptions about refugees—who they were, what they wanted, and how they could benefit each side—dominated how displaced people were discussed. I argue that despite significant attention to refugees in newspapers, military reports, and among the public, both sides failed to adequately assist refugees who were displaced as a result of the war. Utilizing a broadly chronological approach allows greater insight into how the situation in the Shenandoah Valley escalated over time with the addition of various refugee demographic groups, including white Unionists, Black self-emancipated people, deserters, and pro-Confederate civilians. This thesis discusses how each of these groups challenged Americans' culturally-constructed definition of the word "refugee." It also demonstrates how military commanders made use of refugees as sources of military intelligence who directly influenced the events of several military campaigns. This thesis argues that misconceptions about refugees hindered an effective and meaningful response to the Valley's refugee crisis among government officials, military officers, and the general populaces of the North and the South. / Master of Arts / The devastation wrought by the American Civil War in the Shenandoah Valley of western Virginia sparked a refugee crisis that grew in size over the course of the war. From the earliest days of the conflict in 1861, Americans correctly predicted that the war would displace many people. However, mistaken ideas about who qualified as a refugee and what to do with or for refugees prevented an effective response that could have alleviated the suffering of many of these people. This thesis examines how Americans struggled to understand refugees as matters of gender, race, and loyalty appeared to complicate the subject. It offers insight into not only how Americans perceived refugees, but also explores refugee experiences in order to illuminate voices that were overlooked both in the 1860s and in the decades since the war.

"Unforgetting the Dakota 38" projects a nuanced light onto the history and memory of the mass hanging of thirty-eight Dakota men on December 26, 1862 following the U.S.-Dakota War in Southcentral Minnesota. This thesis investigates the competing narratives between Santee Dakota peoples (a mixture of Wahpeton and Mdewakanton Dakota) and white Minnesotan citizens in Mankato, Minnesota—the town of the hanging—between 1862 and 2012. By using settler colonialism as an analytical framework, I argue that the erasing of Dakotas by white historical memory has actively and routinely removed Dakotas from the mainstream historical narrative following the U.S.-Dakota War through today. This episodic history examines three phases of remembrance in which the rival interpretations of 1862 took different forms, and although the Dakota-centered interpretations were always present in some way, they became more visible to the non-Dakota society over time. Adopting a thematic approach, this thesis covers events that overlap in time, yet provide useful insights into the shaping and reshaping of memory that surrounds the mass hanging. White Minnesotans routinely wrote Dakota peoples out of their own history, a key element of settler colonial policies that set out to eradicate Indigenous peoples from the Minnesota landscape and replace them with white settlers. While this thesis demonstrates how white memories form, it also focuses on Dakota responses to the structures associated with settler colonialism. In so doing, this thesis argues that Dakota peoples actively participated in the memory-making process in Mankato between 1862 and 2012, even though most historical scholarship considered Mankato devoid of Dakota peoples and an Indigenous history. / Master of Arts / The U.S.-Dakota War wracked the Minnesota River Valley region of Southcentral Minnesota. Following a bloody and destructive six weeks in late-Summer 1862, President Abraham Lincoln ordered the mass execution of thirty-eight Mdewakanton Dakota men as punishment for their participation. This controversial moment in American history produced unique and divergent memories of the Dakota War, the hanging, and the Mdewakanton Dakota place in white American society. This thesis examines the memories that formed between 1862 and 2012, highlighting Dakota perspective and memories to shed new light on the history of this deeply contested event. By doing so, we gain new understandings of Mankato, the U.S.-Dakota War, and the mass hanging, but also a realization that Dakota peoples were always active in the memory-making process even though many have considered their participation nonexistent.

The Ohio constitutional convention in 1802 established Ohio's status as a free state, marking the Ohio River as the border between slavery and freedom. However, slaveholder influence continued to permeate the region as questions over fugitive slaves, Black migration, and the rights of free African Americans created a hostile political climate for African Americans. Despite anti-Black legislation and the fragility of freedom along Ohio's southern border, African Americans continued moving into Southeast Ohio, forming small communities across the rural landscape. As they formed communities, they built institutions and began to challenge the limitations posed by the white supremacist society in which they lived. I argue that Southeast Ohio's self-sufficient Black communities were the core of activism surrounding Black freedom and citizenship rights. They constructed their American citizenship to encompass the rights to mobility, education, and self-determination. African Americans within the rural landscape turned to self-determination through separatist agrarian communities, Black institutions, and regional political alliances to pursue racial uplift and to press for their right to citizenship. Using newspapers, government documents, court documents, I examine the strategies employed by Black activists, as well as the attitudes held by white Southeast Ohioans. This thesis challenges Black histories of Ohio to elaborate on the role of interstate politics and the local political landscape in Black activists' fight for freedom and citizenship in a rural Midwestern community. / Master of Arts / When Ohio became a state in 1803, the state constitution prohibited slavery. However, the introduction of new laws limited the rights of African Americans in response to Black migration from neighboring Virginia. Black Ohioans in Southeast Ohio faced both the discrimination of local and state laws and the danger of slave catchers from across the Ohio River. This thesis investigates the strategies employed by African Americans in their fight for freedom and citizenship rights, including the rights to free movement, voting, and education. African Americans communities organized and petitioned against unjust laws and to form institutions to provide for their needs when the law failed to do so. I argue that self-sufficient Black communities formed by free African Americans were the foundation to the fight for citizenship in Southeast Ohio. In asserting their right to citizenship, African Americans drastically changed ideas about freedom and citizenship in the region.