Episode Details

Born Jennie Irene Hodgers in Clogherhead, Ireland, on December 25, 1843, Albert Cashier crossed the Atlantic as a stowaway and reached Belvidere, Illinois, where a relative dressed him in boys' clothing to work in a shoe factory. He kept that identity. In August 1862, at 19, five foot three and 110 pounds, he signed with an X to join Company G of the 95th Illinois Infantry. The regiment marched about 9,000 miles and fought roughly 40 engagements, including the siege of Vicksburg, the Red River Campaign, Brice's Crossroads and Nashville, and Cashier served until the August 1865 discharge.

Unlike most of the hundreds of soldiers assigned female at birth who served disguised as men, Cashier went on living as a man. In Saunemin, Illinois, he lit street lamps, cleaned the church, voted, and drew a veteran's pension from 1907. A state senator's car broke his leg in 1911, and in 1914 dementia moved him to the Watertown State Hospital, where staff forced him into women's clothing and the pension board investigated fraud. His old comrades testified for him, and the board ruled in February 1915 that his pension would continue. Many historians now understand him as a trans man.

• At Vicksburg he was captured on a reconnaissance, overpowered a guard and made it back to his regiment.
• He refused tent mates and never bathed with the others, and a cursory enlistment exam never exposed him.
• The neighboring Lannon family and the doctor who set his leg both learned his secret and kept it.
• He died in October 1915 at 71 and was buried in uniform with Grand Army of the Republic honors.
• His one-room house was moved eight times and was nearly burned in a firefighter training exercise before Betty Estes saved it.