Books like Warrior Women by Robert B. Edgerton

A woman in the Civil War deserts her farm life to enlist as a Union soldier, facing battle, betrayal, and the struggle to return home.

Global in its focus and pan-historical in its scope, Women Warriors includes the stories of scores of women leaders, soldiers, pirates, outlaws, terrorists, cavalry leaders, and more. In first-century Britain, Boudicea, Queen of the Iceni, led her followers in the destruction of the Roman towns of Colchester and London, leaving up to one hundred thousand dead in her wake. In the third century A.D., Queen Bat Zabbai of Palmyra (modern Syria) rode through the deserts with nomads, wore armor, and hunted with zeal. She also conquered Egypt and extended her domain from the Mediterranean to India - for a time making her the de facto ruler of the eastern Roman Empire. And of course there is Joan of Arc, the sainted French patriot who led her nation's forces in the siege of Orleans, driving back the English. Although their exact numbers are unknown, hundreds of women fought in the American Civil War on both sides of the conflict, often disguised as men. Women have also served in the ranks and even formed their own combat units. The legendary Amazons, who probably lived in Northern Europe, rode through ancient Greece. The African kingdom of Dahomey had an elite army of five thousand women. In World War II, 8 percent of the Soviet military was female, and in 1942 the Yugoslav partisans formed a women's platoon. Nicaraguan women constituted about 30 percent of the fighting force in the Sandinistas' final offensive in the 1970s. Not only soldiers, women have also been marauders and gangsters. In the early 1800s in China, Hsi Kai Ching commanded a pirate fleet of two thousand vessels and more than seventy thousand buccaneers. In the American West, Etta Place joined the infamous Butch Cassidy and Harry Longabaugh, "the Sundance Kid," on a train raid. After looting just fifty dollars, she took charge and their next project, a bank holdup, earned them thirty thousand dollars. This compelling book challenges the notion that only men are capable of fighting in or leading battle. Qualitatively, women are shown to have been equal warriors with men. Providing the most complete, comprehensive account of the female martial heritage available, Women Warriors is a comment on the nature of gender, on the power of the warrior image, and on its source in history. It is a history that women can also claim as theirs.

Chris Beck played high school football. He bought a motorcycle, much to his mother's dismay, at age 17. He grew up to become a U.S. Navy SEAL, serving our country for twenty years on thirteen deployments, including seven combat deployments, and ultimately earned a Purple Heart and the Bronze Star. To everyone who saw him, he was a hero. A warrior. A man. But underneath his burly beard, Chris had a secret, one that had been buried deep inside his heart since he was a little boy-one as hidden as the panty hose in the back of his drawer. He was transgender, and the woman inside needed to get out. This is the journey of a girl in a man's body and her road to self-actualization as a woman amidst the PTSD of war, family rejection and our society's strict gender rules and perceptions. It is about a fight to be free inside one's own body, a fight that requires the strength of a Warrior Princess. Kristin's story of boy to woman explores the tangled emotions of the transgender experience and opens up a new dialogue about being male or female: Is gender merely between your legs or is it something much bigger?

In this panoramic work of history, Fraser looks at women who led armies, empires and rebellions: Cleopatra, Tamara of Georgia, Isabella of Spain, Elizabeth I, Catherine the Great, Jinga Mbandi of Angola, the Rani of Jhansi, and the 20th-century "iron ladies" Margaret Thatcher, Golda Meir and Indira Gandhi, among others. Her touchstone is Boadicea, the first-century Briton who led 120,000 compatriots in a revolt that temporarily shook the Roman hold on her country. With her as a vibrant centerpiece, Fraser brings forward a constellation of 17 women who, through accidents of fate or descent, or sheer genius for power, have been cast in the role of Warrior Queen--seen by her contemporaries as (often simultaneously) monster, angel, honorary male, one who shames men into bravery--and seen, long after her reign, as the focus of a golden age.--From publisher description.

This study analyzes the anonymous Tractatus De Mulieribus, a brief, virtually unknown Greek work, telling of fourteen outstanding women, Greek and barbarian, notable for their intelligence, initiative and courage. The first part of the book is a comprehensive introduction to the treatise and includes - in addition to the original text and an English translation - an examination of both the content and form of De Mulieribus, particularly as a catalogue of women. The times, methods, and purposes of the anonymous author are also investigated. Commentary-essays on the individual women then follow. A wide variety of sources are utilized in order to sketch the fullest possible portrait of each of these lively women. . This book, the very first study of De Mulieribus, is a useful introduction to a remarkable treatise.