From the Abingdon Virginian, 12/25/1863, p. 1, c. 1

A Female Soldier.

Yesterday a rather prepossessing looking lass was discovered on Belle Isle disguised among the prisoners of war held there. She gave her real name as Mary Jane Johnson, belonging to the Sixteenth Maine regiment, and has been a prisoner for some time. She gave as an excuse for adopting her soldier toggery, that she was following her lover, to shield and protect him when in danger. He had been killed in battle, and now she would have no objection to return to the more peaceful sphere for which nature, by her sex, had better fitted her.

This heroine of a novel yet to be written in Yankeedom, was considerably sunburned and roughened by the hardships she had encountered, but still retained marks of some womanly comeliness, which would be heightened by a calico frock and crinoline. Upon the discovery of her sex, Miss Johnson was removed from Belle Isle, and is now confined at Castle Thunder. She will probably go North by the next flag of truce. She is about nineteen years of age.

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