A Revolutionary War history lesson about women, by women, comes to Shirley

When cultural historian Diane Schwindt finishes leading demonstrations of Colonial-era cooking, she is drenched in sweat and covered in grime. 

That's what happens when you stand for an hour over a hot stove while wearing heavy clothes of that period made from linen and wool, she tells her visitors.  

And that's what daily life was like for Long Island women during the Revolutionary War, said Schwindt, director of Brookhaven Town's Longwood Estate in Ridge.

“I stink at the end of my performances," Schwindt said in a phone interview last week. "I’m dirty, I’m exhausted.”

Life during wartime is the subject of a conference on Friday, "Women and the American Revolution on Long Island," at Mastics-Moriches-Shirley Community Library.

Schwindt will be one of four local historians — all women — discussing topics such as slavery, Long Island Quakers, pacifism and the daily struggles and indignities faced by wives and mothers thrust by the war into nontraditional roles.

Like women during World War II, Colonial-era Rosie the Riveters took over farms and businesses while husbands, brothers and fathers went to battle, said conference organizer Maura Feeney.

And there was another hazard, she said: The Island was Loyalist territory, as British troops occupied the region.

“I think we tend to believe the whole Molly Pitcher trope of us-against-them. It was 'We won the war,' " said Feeney, a librarian in the Shirley library's reference and adult services department. "I think they forget that there was a lot of ugliness during the war. There was a lot of food deprivation. There also was a lot of distrust. It was difficult to understand who to trust.”

Women held down the fort

Melanie Cardone-Leathers, who will discuss labor and slavery at the conference, said the role of women during the Revolution often is overlooked.

“When we talk about the Revolution, we talk about battlefields and the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, but we forget about the women who literally held down the fort," said Cardone-Leathers, a historian at Longwood Public Library in Middle Island. "They suffered just as much as men did.”

Slavery was not as common on Long Island as in Southern states, she said, but surveys from the time show every other household kept slaves. Among the Island's slaveholders was Continental Congress delegate William Floyd at his Mastic Beach estate.

"New York was at one time the largest slaveholding colony,” Cardone-Leathers said. “If you weren’t a slaveholder, your neighbor or your family were.” 

Sweet treats in trying times

Other speakers at the conference include retired Hofstra University historian Natalie Naylor and Karly Hoenzsch, an information resources director at Friends Academy, a Quaker school in Locust Valley.

Conference attendees will be able to sample 18th-century treats prepared by Schwindt. Her specialties include a cake that she said uses a recipe from George Washington's home, Mount Vernon.

The cake — served with a Parmesan ice cream that was popular in that era — includes ingredients such as candied rinds of oranges, bourbon, almonds, coconuts, raisins, ginger, olive oil and apricots, Schwindt said.

 “It’s a very rich cake,” she added.

But she doesn't want listeners to think that life was rich during the war. Amid food shortages and rations — women typically were allowed less food than their husbands and fathers — wartime was "really kind of gross," she said. 

“My talk is about getting it real," Schwindt said. "I want you to feel their pain and what it was like to walk in Colonial times."