Panchita Sánchez Miot, Confederate Spy

During the US Civil War at the Battle at Horse Landing on May 22, 1864, Confederate soldiers were assisted by Cuban-born immigrant Panchita Sánchez Miot.  Sánchez and her sisters spied for the Confederacy, and the local Union intelligence never suspected that the little brown women were outwitting them.  On a balmy night in May, Union officers visited the Sánchez family home in Palatka, Florida.  Sánchez overheard them discussing a raid against the Confederacy.  She hiked over to the Confederate camp, and warned Captain John Jackson Dickison of the raid.  The Confederates defeated the Union soldiers in a surprise attack, and also captured the USS Columbine, a Union ship.  The Confederates named a pontoon for Sánchez and her sisters, christening the vessel as “The Three Sisters”.  After the Civil War, Sánchez married a Confederate officer and lived in South Carolina.