Pension File: 745503
P.O.: Lowell, Massachusetts
Service: Nurse at Point Lookout and Washington hospitals
Applied: 1889
Status: Abandoned
There are three things that make Sarah Ingalls' file stand out to me. One: it's only five papers.
Two: The date Ingalls filed her application.
Three: The date Ingalls "abandoned" her claim.
Because Ingalls' file is so small, there's not a great deal of information in it, but enough to put together a brief sketch. Ingalls was a trained nurse, and served in that capacity at Capital Hospital, Cast Paris Hospital, and at Point Lookout from summer, 1862, to winter, 1862, when she caught malaria and left the service. The record's silent until 1888, when Ingalls filed for a pension. She altered a widows' claim, filled in as much pertinent information as possible, and sent it in.
Ingalls is the latest in a long line of women who filed for a pension prior to the 1892 Act--and the latest in a long line of women who felt they were entitled to a pension based on their service, whether or not there was a law explicitly allowing it. I haven't gone over my files in detail and starting putting together numbers and patterns, but it appears that there's no pattern to who applied for a pension before the Act. They simply applied because they needed the help the pension would give them.
True to form, the Pension Bureau rejected Ingalls' initial claim on the grounds that she had no title under present law. Ingalls re-opened her claim in October of 1892, just after the passage of the Act. The Pension Bureau didn't reply to her letter until October of 1893--and had the gall to begin its letter with "in response to your communication of recent date." The letter simply informed Ingalls that she could apply for a pension based on the '92 Act, and they were sending her a blank for her to fill out and return.
The last paper in the file is an envelope, which presumably contained the letter. A stamp says, Return to Writer, and a note scribbled on it reads, "This lady died last June...please correct your rolls."
And so, Sarah Ingalls claim was "abandoned."
I will say a lot of things against the Pension Bureau over the course of this project. I'm dealing with government here, and government policy. Government always offends someone. But waiting an entire year to respond to a woman, asking for a pension, only for her to die in the interm is completely unacceptable. I think I can safely say that I have never been more furious with the bureaucrats running that Bureau than I am now.
I'll try to find a happier pension file to write about for tomorrow. I have Dr. Mary E. Walker's papers waiting for me in the morning. Those should work.
Monday, June 25, 2012
Friday, June 22, 2012
Mary E. Hooker
Pension File: 907755
P.O.: Goshen, Indiana
Service: Private, Co. F, 26th Ohio
Applied: 1891
Status: Rejected
The first sign that this folder was going to be fun was the alias after Hooker's name: Charles E. Dewey, Co. K, 26th Ohio.
The second was the headline on the newspaper article I found tucked into this file read: "A Romance of the Late War Comes To Light Through An Application For Pension."
Did it live up to the hype?
Oh yeah.
The newspaper article explains it all. Mary E. Hooker, then Mary E. Dewey, was a young woman engaged to be married to Benjamin Brown. The date for the wedding was set, and then Lincoln issued his called for volunteers. "Benjamin's heart was filled with martial ardor," the article declared, "and insensible alike to his own safety and the protests of his sweetheart," he enlisted in the 26th Ohio. For Mary, well, "Benjamin might be happy without her, but she could not live away from her lover," so she disguised herself as a man and enlisted in the same company as Benjamin. They continued to fight side by side, even after Mary was wounded in the knee at Spottsylvania Courthouse. When the war ended, the pair returned home and were finally married. Benjamin died years later, and Mary married Mr. Hooker. Without access to a widow's pension, since she was a married woman, she applied for a pension based on her service as a soldier. Hence the newspaper article.
Sounds credible so far, right? From what I could make out of the surgeon's affidavit (the combination of technical terms and spidery hand-writing makes it almost impossible to make out), Hooker did have a scar on her left leg just below the knee, but apparently it was inflicted at Antietam.
So, was it Antietam or Spottsylvania?
Turns out, doesn't matter.
The next paper was a letter from Alexander Fraser, the lieutenant of Co. F, 26th Ohio, to the Pension Bureau stating that there was no such persons as Charles Dewey or Benjamin Brown in the 26th, nor did the regiment fight at Spottsylvania, or Antietam. In fact, the regiment was mustered out in June, 1862.
Oops.
Needless to say, Mary Hooker did not receive a pension for her service in the line of duty. That should be the end of it, but it leaves me with a question. Mary Hooker really had no chance of gaining a pension by lying about her service. The military records are complete enough to demolish her claims. For nurses, however, the records are practically non-existent. Almost every file has a letter from the Bureau to the War Department asking them to examine the records for a specific woman. The problem is, however, since these women were rarely considered actual military personnel, they're almost never in the records!
Mary Hooker couldn't put forward her fraudulent claim as a soldier, but a woman like Mary Hooker could put forward her fraudulent claim as a nurse with great ease. Here's the question now that's eating me: how do I tell the difference between a woman who really served, and a woman who's lying?
P.O.: Goshen, Indiana
Service: Private, Co. F, 26th Ohio
Applied: 1891
Status: Rejected
The first sign that this folder was going to be fun was the alias after Hooker's name: Charles E. Dewey, Co. K, 26th Ohio.
The second was the headline on the newspaper article I found tucked into this file read: "A Romance of the Late War Comes To Light Through An Application For Pension."
Did it live up to the hype?
Oh yeah.
The newspaper article explains it all. Mary E. Hooker, then Mary E. Dewey, was a young woman engaged to be married to Benjamin Brown. The date for the wedding was set, and then Lincoln issued his called for volunteers. "Benjamin's heart was filled with martial ardor," the article declared, "and insensible alike to his own safety and the protests of his sweetheart," he enlisted in the 26th Ohio. For Mary, well, "Benjamin might be happy without her, but she could not live away from her lover," so she disguised herself as a man and enlisted in the same company as Benjamin. They continued to fight side by side, even after Mary was wounded in the knee at Spottsylvania Courthouse. When the war ended, the pair returned home and were finally married. Benjamin died years later, and Mary married Mr. Hooker. Without access to a widow's pension, since she was a married woman, she applied for a pension based on her service as a soldier. Hence the newspaper article.
Sounds credible so far, right? From what I could make out of the surgeon's affidavit (the combination of technical terms and spidery hand-writing makes it almost impossible to make out), Hooker did have a scar on her left leg just below the knee, but apparently it was inflicted at Antietam.
So, was it Antietam or Spottsylvania?
Turns out, doesn't matter.
The next paper was a letter from Alexander Fraser, the lieutenant of Co. F, 26th Ohio, to the Pension Bureau stating that there was no such persons as Charles Dewey or Benjamin Brown in the 26th, nor did the regiment fight at Spottsylvania, or Antietam. In fact, the regiment was mustered out in June, 1862.
Oops.
Needless to say, Mary Hooker did not receive a pension for her service in the line of duty. That should be the end of it, but it leaves me with a question. Mary Hooker really had no chance of gaining a pension by lying about her service. The military records are complete enough to demolish her claims. For nurses, however, the records are practically non-existent. Almost every file has a letter from the Bureau to the War Department asking them to examine the records for a specific woman. The problem is, however, since these women were rarely considered actual military personnel, they're almost never in the records!
Mary Hooker couldn't put forward her fraudulent claim as a soldier, but a woman like Mary Hooker could put forward her fraudulent claim as a nurse with great ease. Here's the question now that's eating me: how do I tell the difference between a woman who really served, and a woman who's lying?
Thursday, June 21, 2012
Hannah Babb Hutchins
Pension File: 816506, 505146 (Special Act)
P.O.: Freeport, Maine
Service: one of Dix's nurses in Washington, D.C.
Applied: 1886
Status: Accepted
Hutchins was one of over twenty Special Acts I found today (let's hear it for the guys in legislation! I don't know how they find this stuff, but whatever they're doing, it's working!). Her story is simple enough compared to others I've described here: her husband and four children died just before the war began, and she enlisted as a nurse in June of 1862. Hutchins served for three years and three months in various hospitals in D.C., in particular Armory Square and Harewood Hospital, and (here's a rarity) was paid for her services, though all of it went to purchasing things for the soldiers. On New Years Day, 1865, Hutchins slipped on the steps between wards at Harewood Hospital and fractured her ribs. It was enough to keep her confined to her quarters for a month.
Hutchins was discharged in May, 1865 and went home to Maine. She married again, to one Solomon S. Hutchins, who died in 1880 and left her with no money to her name. By this time she was into her seventies, her injury kept her from supporting herself, and the chronic diarrhea she had also contracted from her wartime service was growing worse.
In 1886, Hutchins applied to Congress for a pension, believing "she is justly entitled to aid from the nation precisely as if she had been a soldier and been incapacitated from labor by injury received in the line of duty." Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decreed that since Hutchins was paid while enlisted as a nurse, she did not merit a pension larger than $12.
I give you an extract from one of many letters in the same vein sent from Hutchins to her friend Harriet Corts:
Anyway, back to Hutchins and the ANA. Corts rallied the troops, sent in evidence pertaining to Hutchins' desperate need for an increased pension, and wrote her own biting letter to the Chairman of the Pension Committee. The end result? Hutchins's pension was increased to $25 in 1888.
So, my question is: where is the ANA later on in the fight for the Pension Act? Why can't I find more on them? And what exactly is their angle?
So many questions!!!
P.O.: Freeport, Maine
Service: one of Dix's nurses in Washington, D.C.
Applied: 1886
Status: Accepted
Hutchins was one of over twenty Special Acts I found today (let's hear it for the guys in legislation! I don't know how they find this stuff, but whatever they're doing, it's working!). Her story is simple enough compared to others I've described here: her husband and four children died just before the war began, and she enlisted as a nurse in June of 1862. Hutchins served for three years and three months in various hospitals in D.C., in particular Armory Square and Harewood Hospital, and (here's a rarity) was paid for her services, though all of it went to purchasing things for the soldiers. On New Years Day, 1865, Hutchins slipped on the steps between wards at Harewood Hospital and fractured her ribs. It was enough to keep her confined to her quarters for a month.
Hutchins was discharged in May, 1865 and went home to Maine. She married again, to one Solomon S. Hutchins, who died in 1880 and left her with no money to her name. By this time she was into her seventies, her injury kept her from supporting herself, and the chronic diarrhea she had also contracted from her wartime service was growing worse.
In 1886, Hutchins applied to Congress for a pension, believing "she is justly entitled to aid from the nation precisely as if she had been a soldier and been incapacitated from labor by injury received in the line of duty." Congress, in its infinite wisdom, decreed that since Hutchins was paid while enlisted as a nurse, she did not merit a pension larger than $12.
I give you an extract from one of many letters in the same vein sent from Hutchins to her friend Harriet Corts:
"You, and also Mr. Reed, want to know my financial condition; --I got the 12 dollars pension last week, $36., paid $15 interest on mortgage; $14.33 to Gore & Davis, $5 to Dr. Burbank, I had $1.62 left; there are debts and must be paid. I never was rich, and surely never was in such straitened circumstances...This has been a very hard winter, it is so very col,d and coal $8 per ton. It seems as though I should perish, and this diarrhea,--up 4 and 6 times in a night; hardly get warm before i have to get up again. My living is mostly Graham crackers, it don't take any fuel toc ook them; it is not very luscious diet to live on! Hattie, you don't think I had better go to the poor-house now? I don't want to go there, it would not be anyt credit to the country. Oh dear! I don't know what to do, can you tell me? what in the world is there for me to do? Oh please let me hear from you soon...P.S. This is very humiliating to let anybody know how reduced I am; it makes me very nervous to think of it..."Luckily for Hutchins, she had a good friend in Harriet Corts. And Corts happened to be the Secretary for the Army Nurses Assocation. The ANA, as far as I can make out, was a Dix brainchild, an organization of women who had worked for her during the "last unpleasantness." It was also the other major organization mixed up in trying to get the Army Nurses Pension Act passed, and supporting various pension claims. Hutchins's pension file is the first time I've seen the ANA petitioning on behalf of a nurse. There's no fancy letterhead like the WRC, but from the little I've seen it's much more aggressive. There are a couple more nurses I pulled today who were also endorsed by the ANA--they're high on my list of nurses to go over.
Anyway, back to Hutchins and the ANA. Corts rallied the troops, sent in evidence pertaining to Hutchins' desperate need for an increased pension, and wrote her own biting letter to the Chairman of the Pension Committee. The end result? Hutchins's pension was increased to $25 in 1888.
So, my question is: where is the ANA later on in the fight for the Pension Act? Why can't I find more on them? And what exactly is their angle?
So many questions!!!
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Mary Dougherty
During spring semester, while Professor Sheriff and I were discussing different directions I could take this project, she mentioned looking into the women who worked at federal arsenals in the north, particularly Alleghany Arsenal. I didn't find any arsenal workers while I was putting together my list of pensioners, but today, I found Mrs. Mary Dougherty.
Mary Dougherty moved to Washington, D.C. with her family in 1863. Her husband, Daniel, enlisted in the 34th NJ Volunteers shortly after, and Dougherty landed a job at the Washington Arsenal. Then, on June 17, 1864, an explosion rocked the arsenal. The newspaper articles reporting the event paint a nauseating picture, though luckily it didn't reach the level of the Allegheny Explosion in '62: (http://www.congressionalcemetery.org/newspaper-clips-1860-1869#june20a). 19 women were killed, and dozens more severely burned. Dougherty herself was severely burned, and "internally injured, besides being mentally injured by the fall from the height to which I was thrown through the force of the explosion. My flesh was burned, as scars will show, and I inhaled the fire. My collar bone was also broken. I was unconscious when found and became insane from the injuries received" for four years. And Dougherty's problems did not end there. Her eldest son, who worked in the navy yard, was killed by machinery some time after. Her next son went missing on the third day of the grand review of the Army after the close of the war--Dougherty insisted he was "stolen by an officer of the Army." Then, her husband deserted her because of her injuries. Assuming that he was dead, Dougherty applied for and was granted a widow's pension in 1878. But a few months later, the pension was canceled because David was not, in fact, dead, and had just put in an application of his own.
Oi...
The one thing Dougherty seemed to have going for her was connections in high places. Those connections, including Admiral David Porter, Commodore Nicholson, Rev. Leonard, and George Bancroft, a former Sec. of the Navy., put together a petition to Congress on her behalf, testifying to her integrity and the merits of her claim as well as her crippled condition. Congress granted Dougherty a $12 pension on March 8, 1888 based on her service at the Arsenal and her injury in the line of duty. After all that woman went through, I think it was the least they could do.
Mary Dougherty moved to Washington, D.C. with her family in 1863. Her husband, Daniel, enlisted in the 34th NJ Volunteers shortly after, and Dougherty landed a job at the Washington Arsenal. Then, on June 17, 1864, an explosion rocked the arsenal. The newspaper articles reporting the event paint a nauseating picture, though luckily it didn't reach the level of the Allegheny Explosion in '62: (http://www.congressionalcemetery.org/newspaper-clips-1860-1869#june20a). 19 women were killed, and dozens more severely burned. Dougherty herself was severely burned, and "internally injured, besides being mentally injured by the fall from the height to which I was thrown through the force of the explosion. My flesh was burned, as scars will show, and I inhaled the fire. My collar bone was also broken. I was unconscious when found and became insane from the injuries received" for four years. And Dougherty's problems did not end there. Her eldest son, who worked in the navy yard, was killed by machinery some time after. Her next son went missing on the third day of the grand review of the Army after the close of the war--Dougherty insisted he was "stolen by an officer of the Army." Then, her husband deserted her because of her injuries. Assuming that he was dead, Dougherty applied for and was granted a widow's pension in 1878. But a few months later, the pension was canceled because David was not, in fact, dead, and had just put in an application of his own.
Oi...
The one thing Dougherty seemed to have going for her was connections in high places. Those connections, including Admiral David Porter, Commodore Nicholson, Rev. Leonard, and George Bancroft, a former Sec. of the Navy., put together a petition to Congress on her behalf, testifying to her integrity and the merits of her claim as well as her crippled condition. Congress granted Dougherty a $12 pension on March 8, 1888 based on her service at the Arsenal and her injury in the line of duty. After all that woman went through, I think it was the least they could do.
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
Adelia Ferris
Pension File: 1138500, 858128 (Special Act)
P.O.: Jackson, Michigan
Service: Nurse at Columbian and Mt. Pleasant Hospitals
Applied: 1891
Final Status: Accepted
There's nothing remarkable about Adelia Ferris' file. Ferris, nee Billings, was widowed in 1858. When war broke out, she volunteered for service as a nurse and was accepted by Dorothea Dix. Ferris served for three years until she was discharged in the fall of 1864. Apparently things did not go well after that. The Special Act report states that several decades after the war, what little property she had went up in smoke in the Great Chicago Fire--including her commission from Dix and whatever other papers she may have had to back her claim that she had, in fact, served as a nurse. Luckily for Ferris, the War Department records (for once) showed that she had been commissioned, and that she had been paid $12 a month. Ferris managed to get a Special Act granting her a $12 pension passed in July, 1892--just before the Army Nurses Pension Act was passed.
So, standard stuff so far, right?
Well, here's the thing I hadn't seen before: a very large certificate from the W.R.C. certifying that Ferris was enrolled as an Army Nurse from November 26, 1862, was commissioned by Dorothea Dix, and served for ten months until honorably discharged September, 1863.
The information on the certificate isn't new. It's the mere fact that the certificate itself exists, and that Ferris included this in her application that intrigues me. Not only is the WRC singlehandedly muscling the Army Nurses Pension Act through Congress, and supporting numerous pension claims, they're investigating these women themselves. This isn't Annie Wittenmyer anymore acting as attorney for the claimant, filing affidavits or what have you. And this isn't a nurse using the WRC to network and find other nurses she served with who can help her. This is full on institutional endorsement, with an investigation behind it.
To my wonderful, faithful readers: do any of you know where I can find documents relating to pensions issued by the WRC to its members, the investigations it launched into nurses' service (like Ferris), and/or its National Pension Committee? Bits and pieces are good for keeping a girl excited and motivated, but I'm going to need a broader picture if I want to do this properly. Let me know if you think of anything!
P.O.: Jackson, Michigan
Service: Nurse at Columbian and Mt. Pleasant Hospitals
Applied: 1891
Final Status: Accepted
There's nothing remarkable about Adelia Ferris' file. Ferris, nee Billings, was widowed in 1858. When war broke out, she volunteered for service as a nurse and was accepted by Dorothea Dix. Ferris served for three years until she was discharged in the fall of 1864. Apparently things did not go well after that. The Special Act report states that several decades after the war, what little property she had went up in smoke in the Great Chicago Fire--including her commission from Dix and whatever other papers she may have had to back her claim that she had, in fact, served as a nurse. Luckily for Ferris, the War Department records (for once) showed that she had been commissioned, and that she had been paid $12 a month. Ferris managed to get a Special Act granting her a $12 pension passed in July, 1892--just before the Army Nurses Pension Act was passed.
So, standard stuff so far, right?
Well, here's the thing I hadn't seen before: a very large certificate from the W.R.C. certifying that Ferris was enrolled as an Army Nurse from November 26, 1862, was commissioned by Dorothea Dix, and served for ten months until honorably discharged September, 1863.
The information on the certificate isn't new. It's the mere fact that the certificate itself exists, and that Ferris included this in her application that intrigues me. Not only is the WRC singlehandedly muscling the Army Nurses Pension Act through Congress, and supporting numerous pension claims, they're investigating these women themselves. This isn't Annie Wittenmyer anymore acting as attorney for the claimant, filing affidavits or what have you. And this isn't a nurse using the WRC to network and find other nurses she served with who can help her. This is full on institutional endorsement, with an investigation behind it.
To my wonderful, faithful readers: do any of you know where I can find documents relating to pensions issued by the WRC to its members, the investigations it launched into nurses' service (like Ferris), and/or its National Pension Committee? Bits and pieces are good for keeping a girl excited and motivated, but I'm going to need a broader picture if I want to do this properly. Let me know if you think of anything!
Monday, June 18, 2012
A Very Large Petition
Today was one of those days where almost everything seemed to go right.
Negatives: it rained, and they pulled two soldiers instead of my nurses--apparently they had the same file numbers...
Positives: My people in legislation came through for me again. Apparently, while pulling my nurses' files, he found two boxes on the Army Nurses Pension Act. What was in them, you ask?
Something that made me grin like a maniac when I opened up the folder.
Petitions. Hundreds of individual petitions sent out by the WRC to all its Corps to be signed, returned, and sent to Congress to demonstrate just how many people supported the Army Nurses Pension Act. The names are those of WRC members, GAR members, and "friends of the soldiers." So far, the vast majority of petitions are from Massachusetts, which, as a native, makes me extremely happy. There was even one from the West Acton WRC Corps--West Acton is essentially Boxborough, my hometown. There are also petitions from New Hampshire, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Kansas-there's a second box I haven't even touched so the list will grow. I found a reference to the petition in a letter written by a WRC officer: there are over 160,000 signatures on the petition. 160,000! Put this together with the 100,000 members of the WRC...I'm just going to let Sarah Fuller tell you. She's the genius that put all this together, anyway.
Negatives: it rained, and they pulled two soldiers instead of my nurses--apparently they had the same file numbers...
Positives: My people in legislation came through for me again. Apparently, while pulling my nurses' files, he found two boxes on the Army Nurses Pension Act. What was in them, you ask?
Something that made me grin like a maniac when I opened up the folder.
Petitions. Hundreds of individual petitions sent out by the WRC to all its Corps to be signed, returned, and sent to Congress to demonstrate just how many people supported the Army Nurses Pension Act. The names are those of WRC members, GAR members, and "friends of the soldiers." So far, the vast majority of petitions are from Massachusetts, which, as a native, makes me extremely happy. There was even one from the West Acton WRC Corps--West Acton is essentially Boxborough, my hometown. There are also petitions from New Hampshire, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Kansas-there's a second box I haven't even touched so the list will grow. I found a reference to the petition in a letter written by a WRC officer: there are over 160,000 signatures on the petition. 160,000! Put this together with the 100,000 members of the WRC...I'm just going to let Sarah Fuller tell you. She's the genius that put all this together, anyway.
"Our petition, 31,000 feet long, had the bonna fide signatures of 160,000 men and women of the different States, and the W.R.C. now numbers about 100,000 members, this with the endorsement of the National Pension Committee of the G.A.R. authorizing us to speak for the 500,000 comrades, gave us a backing of nearly 800,000 people. Will our legislators disregard that force?"Now, here's the thing. Several other letters I've found suggest that the G.A.R. withdrew its support at one point because the WRC was asking for $25 pensions, and the G.A.R. supported $12 pensions. The G.A.R was also rather hesitant to push for a pension for Mary Bickerdyke several years earier. So, what exactly is the role of the G.A.R in getting this act passed, and why do they seem so hesitant at times to give it their support?
Friday, June 15, 2012
Nellie E. Butler
Last week my friend Anthony came to the Archives to help me with my research. On top of the many abuses I heaped upon him, I also asked him to write a guest blog post about what he'd discovered. And for some strange reason he agreed to do it. Thanks, Anthony!
Coming to the National Archives for the first time, I was not quite sure to expect. I had a vague idea—I do family history research—but I had never been to an archive of comparable size and importance. At first I was nervous, but I forgot to be as I explored my first file. Sheer fascination bore all before it.
Today, I met seven women through letters, affidavits and the occasional heated argument. Each woman had a distinct and interesting story, but one particular woman transcended the merely interesting. The heading of the newspaper clipping in her file grabbed my attention: MYSTERY OF AN OLD ARMY NURSE.
The story sounded rather like a case for Holmes or Poirot. In the summer of 1898, a penniless old woman was deposited at a San Francisco hotel by two “friends”, neither of whom were ever heard from again. She was described by the hotel’s proprietor as “not wholly rational”, and it is obvious that she was senile. According to the author of the article,
“She talks in a rambling manner and makes many references to people, but no sense can be made of her remarks. This afternoon she seemed brighter than usual and talked considerably of Bar Harbor, but she could not answer any direct questions about places or people.”
 |
| Nellie E. Butler (Pension File 1138434, 864505 at the National Archives) |
Enough information could be teased from her incoherent conversation to identify her as one Nellie Butler, a widowed former army nurse. Her husband had been killed at Fort Donelson, and her service had left her permanently injured in one leg. Apart from these few facts, as the author rather melodramatically put it, “her past [was] shrouded in mystery”. Only one acquaintance could be found, a woman who had known Mrs. Butler a year. She knew nothing of Mrs. Butler’s past. “Her residence previous to coming here is unknown and her purpose is no better understood,” the author wrote.
In poor health, Mrs. Butler was moved to the local hospital, where she was “near to death”. According to the other records in her pension file, Nellie Butler died within three months of the newspaper article’s appearance.
Reading this, one is left with the same set of questions asked 114 years ago by the San Francisco newspaper. Who was Nellie Butler? Why did she come to San Francisco? Most importantly, how did she come to die alone?
The first is answered easily enough, though certain facts escape the record. Mrs. Butler’s maiden name is notably absent (she was already a widow when she became a nurse), as is her place of birth. Born in 1839, her first husband was Howard Martin, the man killed at Fort Donelson. She also lost a brother in the war. Elizabeth Martin, as she was called then, served as a nurse between 1863 and ’65, at the end of which time she was working at a hospital in Raleigh, North Carolina. She was a field nurse during some of this period, and received her leg wound at Cold Harbor. Two years after the war, she married her second husband, David Butler, in Contra Costa County, California, where she would spend most of the remainder of her life. In 1876, the Butlers suffered a house fire, in which Mrs. Butler lost vital evidence concerning her war service. This later created some difficulty for her in obtaining a pension. In the 1880s, Mr. Butler became an invalid, and by the time Mrs. Butler began her quest for a pension in 1892, they were close to destitution. After receiving a pension of $12 a month in 1894, the pension records are silent until the notice of her death in 1898.
That is who Nellie Butler was, as far as the pension records allow us to see. Little in them offers an explanation of the strange and sad end of her life. Mrs. Butler did not have children with either of her husbands, and apart from the brother who died in the war, there is no evidence she had any close relatives. No other aspect of the record sheds any light on Mrs. Butler’s isolation. We who read her story can only wonder, as the people of a century ago wondered, what led this brave and determined woman to wander witless from her home to die among strangers.
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