Who was Mary Edwards Walker and why was she famous?

Mary Edwards Walker, M.D. (November 26, 1832 – February 21, 1919), commonly referred to as Dr. Mary Walker, was an American abolitionist, prohibitionist, prisoner of war and reformer, who is thought to have been the only woman surgeon formally engaged for the field of duty during the Civil War.

She is the only woman to ever receive the US Medal of Honor, and one of only eight civilians to receive it.

Graduating in 1855 from Syracuse Medical College in New York, she married and started a medical practice. At the outbreak of the American Civil War, she traveled to Washington, D.C., to offer her services. She worked as a volunteer nurse in the Patent Office Hospital there while attempting to gain a regular appointment to the army medical service. Eventually she served as a surgeon at a temporary hospital in Washington, D.C., even though at the time women physicians were considered unfit for the Union Army Examining Board.

She was captured by Confederate forces after crossing enemy lines to treat wounded civilians and arrested as a spy. She was sent as a prisoner of war to Richmond, Virginia until released in a prisoner exchange.

She wore full male attire, complete to wing collar, bow tie, and top hat. Often arrested for masquerading as a man, she claimed that she had been granted permission to dress so by Congress; no record of any such explicit action exists.

She was approved for the Medal of Honor, for her efforts to treat the wounded during the Civil War.