A Female Husband

Background: Stories about “female husbands,” individuals who were white, assigned female at birth, married women, and assumed a male role, were reported frequently by newspapers in the United States and the United Kingdom, starting in the 1740s. This article reported the discovery of “James Walker,” the first known female husband living in the United States (and subsequently identified as George Moore Wilson). Accounts of Walker’s case were printed numerous times in American newspapers, some offering new (and unsubstantiated) details. The practice of having another prisoner physically inspect Walker to determine their gender, described here, was unusual.

A few nights since one of the New York Police Officers saw a person lying at the corner of Pearl and Chatham streets intoxicated. The person appeared to be a sailor, and called his name James Walker. From the softness of his voice the officer suspected that he had caught a female in man’s attire, although she was sunburnt and appeared somewhat masculine. At the watch house the officer found a female brought in for the night, and requested her to examine the sailor. She spoke to the prisoner, and by some sort of freemasonry known only to the ladies, she pronounced the tar a member of the softer sex….Walker was then further questioned by the magistrates... she said her real name was Geo. Moore Wilson, a native of Liverpool, and that George is a name often given to females in England; that both her parents died when she was very young; that when 12 years old, in consequence of being ill-treated by her friends, she ran away, put on boys clothes, made her way to Scotland, the native place of her parents, and went to work in a factory, continuing to wear male clothing; and when arrived to manhood, she married a Miss Eliza Cummings, and two days after sailed for Quebec. In a few days she imparted the secret of her sex to her wife, notwithstanding which they have lived together fifteen years as man and wife, experiencing during the time a variety of fortune, and kept the secret to themselves, so that her wife’s father, who had lived with them for some time, never suspected the character of his daughter’s husband. A marriage certificate found on Walker’s person, agreeing with his story as to time and place...it would not be at all surprising if this marvellous marriage should turn out to be a sham affair got up within a few days past, in order to prosecute some villainy with the greater security. If a gentleman should immediately be transformed into a female after committing theft, robbery, or swindling, it might puzzle [anyone] to ferret out and detect the guilty person. Tricks in trade are increasing in this age of improvement.

Source: Female Husband,” Columbia Register, New Haven, CT, August 20, 1836, Digital Transgender Archive, https://www.digitaltransgenderarchive.net/files/js956f94r.