2nd Dragoon
Corporal
- Joined
- Oct 4, 2016
- Location
- San Diego, Ca
Digging deeper into the government archives
Did you use the online application form to get the documents from NARA? I had the opportunity to go to Washington D.C. a few years back and was able to obtain my 2nd great grandfather's Mexican War pension application documents. Now I am researching my husband's 2nd great grandfather, Uriah McDonald, and would like to get the documents his widow filed for a pension in 1902. Apparently, he was married five times and the widow had to provide proof of death or divorce in each of the four previous marriages. Up until finding this snippet in a local newspaper I had no idea he was married that many times! t may also help me trace any of his descendants from those marriages.
Regarding how to order from the Archives:
Last year I researched all the CW veterans buried in the historic cemetery where I'm a volunteer. There are thirty six and about a third of them had pension files. Initially I used the on-line system but had difficulties. Twice they somehow lost my order due to "system malfunctions" and I had to email them (the directions for that are not real easy to find) and ended up waiting several months. Two other times they sent me a form saying the records I ordered didn't exist. In those cases I then used the snail mail option because I could include a copy of the pension record application (you can't include attachments with the on-line system). In both cases I got the files about a month after I mailed in my order.
So, maybe you'll be lucky and the system will work for you but for the price of a stamp you can be sure of it. Ya know, sometimes you really do just need a horse.
Do get the file though. They contain a lot of interesting personal history. There are questions about marriages and children and if those got filled in completely you'll find the names of all the wives, the marriage dates, and the places where the marriages took place. If there were children there's a place to list their names, birth dates, and places of birth. There's other useful questions, too, such as what jobs the applicant did up to the time of application and that can reveal where they lived and how long. If the one for your guy is completely filled out it could be a gold mine. In your case, though, if it was the widow who initially filed she might have just said she didn't know to the personal history questions. Still, for $25 it's a must have.