wuzreb
Private
- Joined
- Jun 11, 2026
- Location
- Northern Nevada
Dear ladies and gentlemen,
I'm here with hat in hand to ask...
Help?
Some while back I came across the attached photo and found it uniquely endearing. There are probably thousands of Civil War "bro photos" out there, but generally they're very formal, very awkward, mildly weird, or reenactors want to look as badass as them.
These boys look like they probably struck this pose at least once a week, usually when their frustrated mother demanded, "What were you two thinking!?" I decided to find out who this pair of Huckleberry Finns are.
Probably everyone but me knew they were brothers William and Hiram Gripman of Company I, 3rd Minnesota Infantry. They were born just over a year apart, enlisted just over a week apart, and got out of the army around the same time.
The 3rd Minnesota seems to have an interesting history, including a reputation for discipline and spit & polish, an apparently-premature surrender to Nathan Bedford Forrest, (their CO, Colonel Lester, was later dismissed from service,) and a subsequent battle with the Dakota Indians back home, which might have been triggered by some of their boys tripping over hidden warriors while foraging. There's a book about the 3rd MN, "The Hardest Lot of Men," that I'm going to buy.
Meanwhile, I've been trying to figure out the lives of these two kids. They served together from Oct 1861 to Jan 1863, when William, the little fella, was discharged with an unspecified disability. Hiram remained with the 3rd MN. In Oct 1864, William reenlisted in the 1st MN Heavy Artillery, posted in Chattanooga. He and Hiram both mustered out in September of '65.
Sadly, later pension records show the war followed them home. Chronic diarrhea, malaria, scurvy, rheumatism, Hiram was mostly deaf; these Minnesota boys didn't do so well in the south.
I can't locate them in 1870, but from 1880 on, they are sharing a household, living together, even when William was married with kids. I kind of picture two beat up little soldiers trying to help each other get by.
Now I'm attempting, without success, to find monthly muster rolls - or something - that would show a closer record of their enlistment. I would especially like to see if records indicated absences, for either soldier, from their company due to illnesses, wounds or whatever.
William received a medical discharge, but the paperwork I found does not specify the nature of the disability. He was out of service for over a year before he joined the artillery, so it must have been significant. I don't expect muster rolls to say what was wrong with him, but maybe it would indicate how often or how long he was absent in hospital, before discharge.
I've been taking a pitchfork and a shovel to Ancestry, Fold3 and even Newspapers .com with a fair bit of success. But I've hit a dead end. And that's where I need guidance.
Is there somewhere else I should look for those type of service records? I had great luck with Fold3 when researching my own 2 family soldiers. Cousin John S Poindexter generated something like 53 pages.
But I'm not finding that sort of information for either of the Gripman boys. Either Fold3 bounces me back to Ancestry, or it just shows me an index card.
Where should I be looking? And how do I get there?
The last time I tried to recover anything from National Archives was probably in 1996 and when I poke at the website online, I get lost. Can anyone suggest where and how I can look to find those sort of muster roll details? Or is it likely that those records simply don't exist, if Fold3 doesn't have it?
Take me by the hand and talk to me like I'm 5 years old, because that's how I feel right now!
Thank you in advance,
Respectfully &c
I'm here with hat in hand to ask...
Help?
Some while back I came across the attached photo and found it uniquely endearing. There are probably thousands of Civil War "bro photos" out there, but generally they're very formal, very awkward, mildly weird, or reenactors want to look as badass as them.
These boys look like they probably struck this pose at least once a week, usually when their frustrated mother demanded, "What were you two thinking!?" I decided to find out who this pair of Huckleberry Finns are.
Probably everyone but me knew they were brothers William and Hiram Gripman of Company I, 3rd Minnesota Infantry. They were born just over a year apart, enlisted just over a week apart, and got out of the army around the same time.
The 3rd Minnesota seems to have an interesting history, including a reputation for discipline and spit & polish, an apparently-premature surrender to Nathan Bedford Forrest, (their CO, Colonel Lester, was later dismissed from service,) and a subsequent battle with the Dakota Indians back home, which might have been triggered by some of their boys tripping over hidden warriors while foraging. There's a book about the 3rd MN, "The Hardest Lot of Men," that I'm going to buy.
Meanwhile, I've been trying to figure out the lives of these two kids. They served together from Oct 1861 to Jan 1863, when William, the little fella, was discharged with an unspecified disability. Hiram remained with the 3rd MN. In Oct 1864, William reenlisted in the 1st MN Heavy Artillery, posted in Chattanooga. He and Hiram both mustered out in September of '65.
Sadly, later pension records show the war followed them home. Chronic diarrhea, malaria, scurvy, rheumatism, Hiram was mostly deaf; these Minnesota boys didn't do so well in the south.
I can't locate them in 1870, but from 1880 on, they are sharing a household, living together, even when William was married with kids. I kind of picture two beat up little soldiers trying to help each other get by.
Now I'm attempting, without success, to find monthly muster rolls - or something - that would show a closer record of their enlistment. I would especially like to see if records indicated absences, for either soldier, from their company due to illnesses, wounds or whatever.
William received a medical discharge, but the paperwork I found does not specify the nature of the disability. He was out of service for over a year before he joined the artillery, so it must have been significant. I don't expect muster rolls to say what was wrong with him, but maybe it would indicate how often or how long he was absent in hospital, before discharge.
I've been taking a pitchfork and a shovel to Ancestry, Fold3 and even Newspapers .com with a fair bit of success. But I've hit a dead end. And that's where I need guidance.
Is there somewhere else I should look for those type of service records? I had great luck with Fold3 when researching my own 2 family soldiers. Cousin John S Poindexter generated something like 53 pages.
But I'm not finding that sort of information for either of the Gripman boys. Either Fold3 bounces me back to Ancestry, or it just shows me an index card.
Where should I be looking? And how do I get there?
The last time I tried to recover anything from National Archives was probably in 1996 and when I poke at the website online, I get lost. Can anyone suggest where and how I can look to find those sort of muster roll details? Or is it likely that those records simply don't exist, if Fold3 doesn't have it?
Take me by the hand and talk to me like I'm 5 years old, because that's how I feel right now!
Thank you in advance,
Respectfully &c
Last edited:
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