Why does everybody pick on Annabelle?

So many people dismiss Annabelle as an airhead, but I think she performed admirably. She was a total fish out of water, cast into a scary and unfamiliar situation. In spite of this, she was plucky, resourceful, and more than willing to be of any help she could.

When she was brought to the Union officers, she held in her emotions until she was alone -- she never let them see her cry. She was subjected to a lot of rough usage (stuffed into a sack, tossed unceremoniously into a box car, dumped out of the bag like she was a pile of dirty laundry, throttled for doing something Johnny the expert had instructed her to do) but she never raised a fuss or cried or got discouraged. She was right there by Johnny's side no matter how impatient he was or how badly he screwed up.

When Annabelle screwed up, it was because she was unfamiliar with what was expected of her. Okay, she threw tiny bits of wood into the fire. Since when did she get lessons in doing a fireman's job on a locomotive? Yeah, she knocked the burning brand down onto the bridge, but Johnny was the one that left it right where her hoop skirts would be swaying and Johnny was the one that started pouring oil close to the train then went around to the far side of the wood pile. Even after Johnny lobbed the stick at her, she kept right on doing her best to help him. And are we to look down on her for not knowing how to run the locomotive? Let's throw a modern woman into an airliner cockpit and then act like she's an airhead because she can't fly the darned thing! Annabelle persisted and figured out what to do. If Johnny had trusted her he would have saved himself some trouble.

I'd also like to point out that while Johnny scoffed at her rope-between-the-saplings delay tactic, it WORKED. The pursuers had to stop and disentangle the rope and trees from the locomotive. A guy who throws lumber OVER the tender has a lot of nerve scoffing at Annabelle's efforts!

Add to all of this the fact that she undertook a dangerous journey alone just to look after her wounded father.

I consider Annabelle to be a role model for movie women, and I wish she would get credit where credit was due.