Smithsonian

During the Civil War, the Union Army put more than 100 prostitutes onto a boat leaving Nashville, as a way to prevent troops from contracting syphilis and gonorrhea:

“It took a week for the Idahoe to reach Louisville, but word of the unusual manifest list had reached that city’s law enforcement. Newcomb was forbidden from docking there and ordered on to Cincinnati instead. Ohio, too, was uneager to accept Nashville’s prostitutes, and the ship was forced to dock across the river in Kentucky—with all inmates required to stay on board.”


Nashville under Union occupation, c. 1863. Library of Congress