France

Women have held all civic privileges (in voting, holding office, etc.) in France since the Revolution; in 1793, several (somewhat irregular) female military units were formed by the Committee of Public Safety, to counter Austrian, Dutch, German and British forces. Lazare Carnot, as head of the national conscription effort, showed great enthusiasm for the female soldiers. After the fall of Robespierre in the summer of 1794, the female units were somewhat neglected (being seen as somewhat too dedicated to Robespierre's revolutionary principles), and disbanded a year later when the Directory came into power. In November of 1799, when Napoleon Bonaparte overthrew the Directory and became First Consul, he named Carnot as his War Minister. Carnot soon again raised several female artillery units; over the next fourteen years, many units in the military train, and a few combat units, were formed fully or partially of women. After Napoleon's ascendance to the Imperial crown in 1804, even a few vessels of the French Navy were crewed by women. A few female brigadiers and naval captains were created during the war, though none achieved great military fame.

After the return of the monarchy, most of the female military units were dissolved -- not so much from any tender sentiments about their gender, but due to their staunch Bonapartism; other civil rights remained unchanged. With the rise of the Second Republic in the convulsions that rocked Europe in 1848, female military service was again permitted on a limited basis. The creation of the Second Empire under Napoleon III saw a steady rise in military women's status in France, with women theoretically able to serve in all arms -- although practically only the infantry and cavalry actually have any female combatants. By now, most women's regiments have female commanders; two women have been promoted to general, but only one (Gen. Marie Belpaire) has had an opportunity to command troops in battle - against Mexican rebels.

The 101st, 102nd, and 103rd Regiments des Femmes de Ligne, the Gendarmerie des Femmes, the Zouaves Amazonique, and the Garde Infanterie des Femmes are the most noted female military units; the 101st saw some action in Mexico ten years ago. No French naval vessels carry female crew, although proposals have been made to do so; the Maritime Law, which drafts sailors and fishermen to serve two years with the Navy, has not proved so popular that women want to be included. In theory, military conscription can be extended to women; this has never happened yet.

Practical female equality in educational opportunity has existed since 1848. Progress in actual political participation has been slower; except for some minor ministries during the Second Republic, few women have held major political office. Of course, the Emperor Napoleon III held all power of appointment to high office; perhaps his son will prove more liberal. Within France, there are several Utopian movements, such as the Fourierists, who believe in utter and total equality for men and women; the Fourieran 'phalansteries' are a sort of Utopian commune. Divorce and birth control are both fully legal in France; divorce, however, is still rare.

Great Britain

In the late 18th Century, a great deal of discussion of ‘women’s equality’ took place among the educated classes in England. Mary Wollstonecroft wrote several famous and moving books on the subject, and stood for Parliament -- but conservative Britain was not yet ready. The English reaction to female military service in revolutionary France was one of shock and outrage; it must be added that the earliest female units in France, during the Terror, were fanatically and ruthlessly motivated revolutionists. The term "viragoes" and "amazons" were much used in England at the time. William Pitt included the "unnatural recruitment of women to terrible acts" as one of Napoleon's crimes in his famous speech of 1800 rejecting a peace proposal. No practical attempts have been made since then for women to serve in the British military. Within some of the colonies, a more relaxed attitude holds. A few female "Amazonian" militia units exist in Canada, and several of the dependent Principalities in India field military units containing women - though not always because of advanced political development. While women won the right to hold office by the Qualification of Women Act in 1857 (partly in response to the heroic efforts of Florence Nightingale and her nurses), it was not until 1863 that propertied women won the franchise in England, due in part to the efforts of the Women's Suffrage Committee. It should be noted that only about 20% of the adult populace qualifies to vote for Parliamentary representation due to property qualifications, etc. The Married Women's Property Act (1872) placed wives in the same regard to her property as if she were unmarried; London University was opened to women in 1848. Since 1871 Newnham College has existed for women within Cambridge University; Girton College was added in 1872. Oxford University does not yet admit women. Divorce has been available in England since the separation from the Catholic church; socially, though, divorced women (and to an extent, men) are at a social disadvantage. For example, the Queen refuses to meet anyone, man or woman, who has been party to a divorce suit (that is, husband, wife, or any, ahem, third party). Birth control has not yet become legal in England; supporters of female equality are campaigning for the right to distribute and discuss methods of contraception, as well as pressing for the closure of brothels.

United States of America

In America, Aaron Burr argued forcibly for the rights of women; his daughter, Theodosia, was one of the more famous sorceresses of her day. Later, the efforts of abolitionists such as Wendell Phillips and William Lloyd Garrison, and women's rights activists like Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Lucy Stone, Lucretia Mott, Susan B. Anthony, and Amelia Bloomer were combined to form a single movement, urging freedom for slaves and women alike. Eventually the Fifteenth Amendment, passed in 1870, gave the vote to all citizens of the United States, without regard to "sex, race, color, or previous condition of servitude." While some female volunteer units were raised in the North during the Civil War, no serious consideration was ever given to sending them into combat. Most saw only limited duty guarding docks, warehouses, etc. against Rebel saboteurs. After the end of the war, with 95% of the Army being discharged, no women remain on active duty in the United States; several militia units in Ohio and Massachusetts are partly or wholly female. The Confederate States never considered placing women in uniform; however, a number of female agents of the Confederate Secret Service Corps (under Captain James Courtnay) saw hazardous duty, sabotaging Federal vessels and establishments. Two of the hundreds of privately-raised blockade runners were owned and captained by women. No American naval vessels were ever manned by women; a proposal to do so was made in Congress near the end of the war, but came to nothing. The Republican Party remains officially committed to female equality. Birth control is illegal in some states, legal in others. Divorce is available in all states, but with varying difficulty. A few colleges for women exist, including a medical program leading to the Doctor of Medicine degree at Wells College.

Prussia

The various nations of central Europe were subjugated by Napoleon's Empire in the early Nineteenth Century; with this subjugation came a certain amount of French law and attitudes. Fortunately for women, peasants, Jews, and other persons with less than full legal rights, Prince Karl August von Hardenberg became Chancellor of Prussia in 1810, and was committed to a program of reform. In 1812, women were granted the vote on the same grounds as men (based on a property and education qualification), and were free to attend universities, occupy civil offices, travel without their father's or husband's permission, etc. Even so, women's roles in Prussia and most of the German states remain effectively restricted to the 'Three K's': Kinder, Kirche und Kueche (children, church, and kitchen); no female military units currently exist in Prussia. Further, the men of the Prussian upper classes are among the most patriarchical-minded of Europe. Divorce and birth control methods are legal although rarely seen outside of the cities; abortion is illegal. Princess Victoria (b. 1840), British-born wife of Crown Prince Frederick Wilhelm, is a strong proponent of liberal values; when her husband becomes King many expect a loosening of some of the social restrictions upon women.

Italy

Among the states making up the Kingdom of Italy, only Venice has a history of female participation in martial activity. In the time of their struggles with King Louis I "the Great" of Hungary, the depletion of male soldiery from battle and disease led the Doge to recruit several female garrisons for coastal towns along the Dalmatian coast. By the 15th Century, such troops were common in the Venetian forces; several galleys were crewed partly or completely by women also. After Venice's losses to Turkey in the early 18th Century, her armed forces declined greatly; female units declined faster, in the face of Papal pressure. By the time Napoleon suppressed the Republic in 1797, Venice's remaining female units were purely social groups, composed almost entirely of officers, with no military training.

The Kingdom of Naples, under Franz II, formed several well-trained and disciplined female combat units just a few years before the Garibaldian revolt; they were famously led by his young wife, Marie (sister of the Austrian Empress, Elizabeth) at the siege of Gaeta in 1860. This battle was one of the few in modern times where women faced women in combat, as some part of Garibaldi's "Thousand Red Shirts" irregular force were female.

The Italian army has two female line infantry regiments, plus a battalion of female Alpini within the 3rd Alpini Regiment, a single female light cavalry regiment, the 27th Cavalleggieri, and several artillery "mobile militia batteries" crewed by women. A number of women serve in supporting service units, as well (railway, medical, and veterinary services, mostly).

Female legal equality is theoretically complete in Italy since the Declaration of Turin in 1861, arranged by Count Cavour to placate Garibaldi; of course, social and political practice lag quite a bit behind. Divorce and birth control are both illegal, and access to higher education is difficult for women.

Russia

While still a very patriarchal society, Imperial Russia offers some freedoms to aristocratic women -- more liberty, in fact, than enjoyed by any of the peasant population, male or female, in that backwards, superstitious land. Peasants were chattel slaves -- serfs -- until 1861; the culture of the peasants still knows little of social progress, and is largely xenophobic. Women of this class largely fall into the categories of daughters (awaiting marriage), wives, and widows. Some few find relative freedom in service to the aristocratic estates, in convents, or as witches. The small urban middle class (artists, doctors, academics, etc.) prides itself on being "sophisticated;" even so, their daughters and wives have little legal protection from their fathers and husbands. Education is prized but limited -- by expense, and by subject to "women's work."

Among the aristocracy, rank at court and family wealth depend on appointment to state service (and the rewards that flow from state service). Even hereditary titles (prince, count, baron, etc.) mean little unless accompanied by Imperial favor. Protocol is governed by family status (determined by the service rank of the highest-ranked member of the family), and the order of birth within the family. The Tsar offers land, money, and peasants (though no longer as property), to those who do well; to offend the Tsar means ruin. The Russian nobility has long had a tradition, still practiced, of dividing estates among all heirs -- including women, which has resulted in a long history of independent female landowners.

Since Peter the Great's reforms, beginning in 1701, noblewomen began to appear at court, and take part in governing the nation. In 1722, his "Table of Ranks" made lifelong service to the state a compulsory precondition for noble status; although birth, wealth and education bring one into the elite, service to the Empire confirms one's presence there. One of the three (civil, military, and court) service ladders, court, was open to women from the start; only by progressing along the grades of this ladder are the (masculine) nobility allowed to marry, inherit land, or (before 1861) own serfs. The current service requirement for the male nobility is 25 years, starting from about age 18.

The Tsarinas Catherine (reigned 1725-1727), Anna, Duchess of Courland (reigned 1730-1740), Elizabeth (reigned 1741-1762), and Catherine II "the Great" (reigned 1762-1796) preserved and extended Peter's policies, and gave aristocratic women greater scope for power and glory. In her Charter of Nobility (issued 1785), Catherine II gave firm legal status to noble women, allowing them access to the civil ladder of public service; they may also serve as the provincial "marshals of the nobility" if so elected by their peers.

Anyone of talent might aspire to join the aristocracy, but the expense of education serves to keep the nobility a select group. Initially, noble youths, boys and girls, are raised at home by peasant nannies, who teach religion, custom (and superstition), and the Russian language. At about the age of six or seven, foreign tutors and governesses begin educating the children in art, languages, music, literature, history and arithmetic, while priests provide formal religious instruction. At the age of 13 or so the boys are usually sent to a cadet corps school, to be prepared for a civil, military, or court career. Girls choosing a civil or court career can attend a school for noblewomen, such as the Smolny Institute in St. Petersburg, to prepare for a career. Military careers remain barred to women, despite such examples as Nedezhda Andreevna Durova, the "Cavalry Maiden" (who disguised herself as a man and enlisted as an uhlan, later earning a promotion to officer and several decorations during Napoleon's invasion; she retired after a ten year career).

Under Tsar Nicholas (grandson of Catherine II, reigned 1825-1855), Russia became (again) a Francophile country; among the French fashions imitated by the nobility was the equality of women -- to a degree. The Law Code was modified in 1836 to permit divorce, and gave some legal rights to even middle class women. Women are now often in charge of running noble family estates, as (up to about the age of 43) their brothers or husbands are likely to be off in Imperial service. Even after the men "retire" from Imperial service, they are more apt to spend time at hunting wild animals and unpleasant faeries than keeping the books for a vast estate. Even so, men and women are usually segregated within the palaces of the nobility, with a "men's" and a "women's" side, each ruled by the senior male or female member of the family. Feminists such as Maria Tsebrikova note that, despite legal protections, the treatment of women by their fathers and husbands remains largely grounded in dependence, and in demonstrations of obedience, service, and Orthodox piety. Divorce remains rare, always opposed by the Church and granted only by the Tsar; birth control is legal probably through ignorance alone.

Note that, for both men and women, sorcerous studies are much restricted in Russia, and no foreign orders are tolerated by the Government. Most magical talent is found in convents, monasteries, and among peasant witches and wizards.