Riley Sutherland (she/her) is interested in memory, trauma, archival power, and state-building in the nineteenth-century United States, especially as these themes relate to military women and Revolutionary War widow pensions. Her M.A. thesis examined how Revolutionary War widows deployed family archives as partisan tools to claim pensions—and, especially, how widow pension applicants excited debates about tariffs, banks, executive powers, and federal entitlements.

Riley is also passionate about public history and the digital humanities. She worked as an assistant for the Pinckney Papers Project and curated exhibits for the Clay County (Missouri) Historical Society and Museum. She currently works with the Salus Populi Pension Project, a digital editing project that transcribes and contextualizes Missouri United States Colored Troops (USCT) pension files. 

She entered the Harvard History Ph.D. program in Autumn 2023, after graduating from the University of South Carolina with a B.A. in History, American Studies, and Memory (2022) and an M.A. in History (2023). Beyond her research, Riley is an avid tree enthusiast who enjoys maple sugaring, as well as playing the violin and gardening.