It’s April, it is finally Opening Day, and there’s snow
on the ground…what in the world?
Pension File: 785618, 196657
P.O.: Kirkwood, Ohio
Service: nurse with the 22nd Illinois from
July 13, 1861
Applied: 1890 (SA)
Status: Accepted
Not too much in this file, unfortunately—as usual,
special acts have next to no paperwork, so less for me to work with. The upside should have been that Bissell was
a regimental nurse, and sometimes examining letters and diaries from the
regiment turns something up, but I haven’t found anything so far. So far, we know that Lucy Bissell was a nurse
attached to the 22nd Illinois in July 13, 1861. Since there aren’t any Bissells on the roster
though, I don’t know what her connection to the regiment was. She appears to have stayed with the regiment
for at least the first year—the colonel of the regiment, Henry Dougherty, gave
her a recommendation in 1862. In 1863,
the assistant surgeon at General Hospital No. 3 in Paducah also wrote her a
recommendation, so by now she may have left the regiment. She’d certainly left it in February, 1864, when
she returned to Missouri (I say that because the 22nd Illinois was raised in Belleville, just the other side of St. Louis from her later address) and was given a position at Benton Barracks by James Yeatman (USSC), then
transferred to Jefferson Barracks in July (her original commissions are
included in the file). She never
received pay. The next we hear of her,
Bissell was living in Kirkwood, Missouri, just outside St. Louis.
She applied for her pension in February, 1890, via special act of
Congress, which was approved that July.
The pension was dropped in August, 1896, after “failure to claim for
three years.” At best guess, Bissell
never married—the special acts refer to her as “Miss Bissell,” but they have
been known to be wrong before. I'll update if I find anything, but if anyone knows something about the 22nd IL, please let me know!
