Helen M. Bull

Pension File: 1131633
P.O.: State Center, Marshall Co., Iowa
Service: Regimental nurse in the 33rd IL
Applied: 1892
Status: Abandoned

Today's post is a little early, but I hope you guys find it as interesting as I do.  There wasn't much in the file to begin with.  Helen Bull enlisted as a regimental nurse in the 33rd Illinois in January, 1862 and served until August.  We know she applied for a pension in September, 1892, at which point she was living in Iowa and starting to feel the effects of old age.  The rest of the file is standard fare: the Bureau couldn't find any record of service, so they asked her to provide documentation, and Bull asked for the addresses of the regiment's colonel and of three musicians, so that they could testify on her behalf.  There's literally nothing after that.
So, what's a girl to do? Poke around and see what she can find.  'Soldiers and Sailors' is still down--which is incredibly frustrating--but I managed to find the Adjutant General's Report of the muster sheet of the 33rd to lead through.  And everything just clicked into place after that.
A previous Ancestry search told me that there were two Helen Bulls living in Illinois in 1860 who were around the right age.  Both were married and had children.  The only real difference between the two was where they lived.  The muster roll, however, told me that one Elisha Bull was a third class musician in the 33rd IL Regimental Band, who had enlisted in Lyndon, and mustered out in August, 1862, after Congress ordered all regimental bands disbanded--they were costing the government too much money to equip.  Lest my dear readers think that all Civil War bands disappeared after that, brigades and divisions still had bands, and some regiments privately funded their own bands, but it doesn't seem that Elisha Bull ever joined one of them.
Anyway, Elisha mustered out in August, 1862--so did Helen.  Elisha was also from Lyndon, the location of one of my potential Ancestry Helen Bulls.  And the majority of the people Helen requested addresses for were musicians.  I'd call that a little too coincidental to be true, wouldn't you?
What does this file add to my thesis though?  Honestly, very little.  But it raises a few questions, like what did Bull do with her two children when she joined her husband in the field?  And it confirms a pattern I've been picking up, that many regimental nurses (though not all) had a husband in that regiment.  I say husband specifically because I have yet to find a regimental nurse who has a brother or a father in a regiment, though I wouldn't bet on it staying like that.  I'm sure that by the time I'm done with these women, I'll have proved myself wrong.