Fifth in a series on how I found my Civil War ancestor Arthur Bull.
In early February 1996, I opened my mailbox to discover an envelope from the National Archives and Records Administration.
“At last!” I thought. I had waited two months for copies of documents from the pension file of my Union Army ancestor Arthur Bull.
Carefully unsealing the envelope, I took out the papers — eight pages in all — and studied each new nugget of information about my great, great grandfather and his family.
The first document was pure gold: an 1883 report from the War Department Adjutant General’s office listing Private Arthur Bull’s presence, or absence due to illness, during his Civil War service with 6th New York Heavy Artillery.
There was also an 1888 declaration, completed when Arthur applied for a pension increase due to war-related debility, giving his residence as Salamanca, Cattaraugus County, N. Y. — an entirely new location.
“How did he end up in western New York?” I wondered.
An application for a widow’s pension by Mary E. (Blakeslee) Bull said she married Arthur on 11 August 1856 in Brookdale, Pennsylvania — cornfirming earlier research. Sadly, she also provided the date of Arthur’s death — 30 January 1890.
A general affidavit signed by Mary in 1890 said she had two children under age 16, both born in Moose River, Lewis County, N.Y. — Alice I. Bull in 1876 and Waples H. Bull in 1878. A “family record is hereto attached,” she said, but there was no copy of it.
Mrs. Carrie A. Graff, identifying herself as “a daughter” of Mary, signed a supporting affidavit saying she was present at the birth of her two young siblings — they were delivered by a midwife who had since passed away.
I spread the contents of the enlightening envelope across my kitchen table and sat back to absorb their message.
They outlined Arthur’s Union Army service in the Civil War, his wartime illness, his declining health, and his death at age 56 — leaving Mary a widow with two minor children.
But they also spoke of happier times — my ancestors’ marriage, the growth of their family — as well as their geographic mobility.
Wouldn’t Arthur’s complete Civil War pension file tell me even more? There was only one way to find out. I would have to travel to the National Archives and see it for myself.
To be continued.
© 2014 Molly Charboneau. All rights reserved.
