Margaret (Foley) Cowhey's husband had died in a train accident and she was left with finding a way to care for and support their seven youngest children. Why had she or William not applied for a military pension for his service in the Civil War? I couldn't understand why I could not find a pension file for William. His brother Thomas had one, and I'm sure that he appreciated the income, even though he had no wife or children. It perplexed me that I could not find any proof of William's pension.
Now, thanks to Footnote, I've found it. And I breathed a sigh of relief for my great-great-grandmother Margaret. Thank goodness she had at least one source of income to help support her large family.
It's interesting how different databases and other indexes can turn up different information. I had looked several places before - who knows why I never found this information? But there it was this time - William Cowhey's pension file information.
Another lesson learned about the search for family history - a lesson that surely Margaret (Foley) Cowhey could relate to:
Never give up.
1 comment:
Hi, Lisa! I've finally gotten around to reading Small-Leaved Shamrock. I just love your blogs! I had the same situation with looking for a Civil War pension file for my 3rd-great-grandfather's brother-in-law, Joseph Phelps. I could not find it on Ancestry.com, but there it was at Footnote all along. Strange.
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