Until recently, we did not really know or focus on the behavior of Southern women during the war. From what we know, they faced food shortages, crime, and increasing death tolls. These women had to abandon everything they knew to become heads of households. Little is known about slave and poor women at this time. These women did what they could to survive in dangerous times because of war. These women became more vulnerable because they were victims of men during the war. The Confederacy begins trying to control these enslaved and impoverished women rather than trying to gain their support. Women began to be charged with new crimes, including theft, burglary, and rioting. This Confederate opposition appears to be the most successful form of disorderly conduct by women. Bynum asserts that women “significantly shift the balance of power among men in war” (p. 149). Many poor white women took to the streets. There were crowds of women in every county in North Carolina. These attacks were focused on Confederate merchants and agents; both of whom were extremely hateful to these poor women. The poor people began to fear famine more than the law, and in the months before the end of the war, a crowd composed mainly of women descended on Granville.