Civil War Degrees of Separation

[john.vansickle]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

I have a G-Grandfather and several G-G Uncles who fought in Michigan units. My grandfather, who was born in 1906 told me about the vets who would come over to sit on the porch to tell each other war stories. I wonder how interesting that would have been since they all served together??? He and his brothers would play with CW relics and "surplus". Even when he was working in a Grand Rapids furniture factory in the 20's he said that just about every log they sawed that had been shipped from the South had iron and lead in it. In the historical time-line, it wasn't all that long ago.

I think it stems from the advances in technology in the past century. In many ways, technology has distanced us from each other as well as from our forebears because most people, especially kids, spend little time with their elders. This creates a gap in communication and continuity in human interaction and influence. In my family, there are only three generations which overlap to reach the Civil War. It seems that most kids today are more interested in video games than in what their ancestors did to build this nation.

John Van Sickle

[lambrew]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

I have blogged all about my family's Involvement in the war. Also my grandfather used to tell me about Mr. Woodard who lived in South Lyon MI when he was a kid. Mr. Woodard would tell him stories from the war and what life was like in general back then. My grand parents are gone now, and as it happens Mr. Woodard's grave is one row behind where they are burried. So when visit them I make sure I stop by to say hi to Mr. Woodard as well. I am 34, but the war was very much a living thing during my childhood. Whereas a lot of guys and gals I grew up with don't know very much about the war at all. So I did not think on it as a matter of degrees, but rather a thin veil that seperated then from now.
Nice topic.

Thanks for letting me ramble....
Sean Collicott

[Canebrake Rifle Guards]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

Just a few quick ones.

As a child I remember visiting my gr-grandfather. His father served in the 33rd AL Inf and was a veteran of Franklin. Unfortunately as a 4 year old I didn't think to ask Pawpaw anything about his father.

Over the last 5 years I made the acquaintance of the grandson of Gen. John McCausland. (he just passed away last year being 90+ years). He lived with and was raised by his grandfather, the General. I interviewed Alex McCausland twice and he told a few great stories about his grandfather, & RE Lee, Stonewall Jackson, etc. Alex spent time horseback riding with the General (who was a good rider and very athletic). He wrote a little book which I have called "I rode with the man who rode with Stonewall."

Another- There is an elderly man in my church, very sharp and lucid. He knew his grandfather well, that grandfather being a Confederate soldier and veteran of the Battle of Lynchburg (1864). The battle that saved the city and literally took place on the ground my house sits on.

I've attached a photo of Dr. Alex McCausland.

Greg Starbuck

[EVOC]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

My grandmother knew her grandparents from Dover, TN well. Aunt Mary, who is 10 years younger, told me several of their war stories, but MaMaw (born 1903) would not tell me anything. She even denied that she knew of any Confederate grandparents.

To me, it is logical that Southerners referred to the War as the Late Unpleasantness for an entire generation. The economy, growth potential and race relations in the South were wrecked by 14 years of war and occupation. "Sit down on my knee Sonny and let me tell you about the time the yankees burned down all but four buildings in Dover while your grandmother hid behind a log with a shotgun".

[Rebelkid01]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

I was fortunate to meet Frank Davis. Frank Davis was the great nephew of Famous Civil war hero Sam Davis. "The boy hero of the Confederacy" Frank's grandfather, Oscar Davis, helped bring Sam's body back home after he was hanged by the Federals at Pulaski, TN. Frank did tell me a few memories he had of his grandfather, however, at that time, Oscar was an elderly man and Frank was just a young youth so he didn't remember much.

[Rebelkid01]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

I am good friends with Shirley Davis, Frank's widow. If any of you are Sam Davis fans and are visiting Tennessee and would like a tour of the historic Sam Davis home. Please let me know

[yeoman]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

Sir, as a youngster growing up in 1950s Columbus Georgia I attended the funeral of a relative who passed at over ninty years. Today as I think when she was alive how her heart, eyes, mind and breath did span the years. When she was very small, how she was in touch with those loved ones who perhaps were alive in the1700s. This juxtaposition, I guess it's the instance of touching the hand that touched the hand (that touched the hand). Somehow this makes me feel close even up to now and feel this need to share. Hope this makes sense.

[Spinster]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

The geneological reality is that I am his great great granddaughter.

The physical reality is that the old man took his orphaned granddaughter, age 2 years, into his home, and raised her to adulthood on a piece of hardscrabble land more vertical than horizontal. My mother knew him, fed him in his last years, and kept him from wandering. My grandmother's bitterness about his poverty and his memories of a New York prison was a marked contrast in an otherwise kind heart. Today, he looks out at me, nearly a charicature of a southern soldier as he goes off to war, with his wild curling hair, long beard, piercing blue eyes, long pistol and longer knife brandished in his hands. Two years before the war, he posted a bastardy bond two counties away. Looking at those eyes, I can see why.

The geneological reality is that I am his great great niece.

The physical reality is that the old man lived with his great nephew, on a piece of hardscrabble land more vertical than horizontal. He was a quiet old man, on account of the Home Guard hung him off his mother's porch when he was 12 years old. His Mama cut him down, and sent him running for the North Carolina line where all the other Union men had gone. They trailed him with dogs and he stood in the water under a river bank on a January night, until they gave up and left. He whispered when he talked, and did not like dogs. He always had peppermints in his pocket.

The geneological reality is that I am his great great grandaughter.

The physical reality is that the old man lived with his grandson on a piece of hardscrabble land more vertical than horizontal. My mother knew him, fed him in his last years, and kept him from wandering. He drew a Union pension. My grandmother could not see the justice in it that one had money and the other did not and both lived under her roof.

They are all three buried in the same cemetary. One hand I have touched.

[Army30th]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

My family is either very young or very old, I haven't quite figured it out yet.

My great great grandfathers both fought in the Confederate Army. Both died at the turn of the 20th century (1900 and 1901 respectively) and my father's mother was born 14 years later.

Each veteran had a child who would grow up to marry one another. The widow of one of these men would wind up living in the house with her daughter and her children (my grandmother was one of those children). The widow would live until at least the mid to late 1940's, having only been 12 when the war started. My father, although he was only six or seven at the time, would remember her when she died.

All the information that I have ever learned about my 2 soldier ancestors, I gleaned from my Grandmother, and her memories of what her grandmother had told her. My Grandmother was 88 when she died, and I miss her. Her mother, the daughter of one of the veterans was still living when I was born in 1967 and passed in 1971. I have a blanket in my possession that she made for me.

Although I was born 67 years after their death, to have been touched in my life by one of their children, is a very special memory that I will always cherish.

[Brent6871]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

About two weeks ago, my wife and I met up with her second cousins that were in town and going through their father's personal effects after his death. While going through some boxes, they found an envelope with a hand-written manuscript from around 1900 entitled "The Lynchburg Campaign" along with two books written post-war about his service in the Confederate Army. After doing some research, they also found out that the writer of these items was their paternal great-grandfather, Milton Wiley Humphreys. Supposedly, he's been credited with "inventing" indirect fire during a campaign in present-day WV in 1862 while serving in the Monroe (VA) Light Artillery, Bryan's Battery.

[Lee Ragan]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

When I was about ten years old (this was the late 1950's), I can remember my Grandmother telling me all about how her Dad & his older brother ran off and joined the Confederate Army. He and his older brother served in the 8th Texas Infantry. My Great Granddad was 15 when he joined in 1862, but he survived the war and fathered about 8 kids before passing away in the mid 1920's.
I think it's kinda neat that Grandma was a "real daughter".

[claynpendleton]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

[QUOTE][...But in this day and age having a g-grandfather as a Civil War veteran is pretty rare I believe/QUOTE]

I guess I am one of those very rare examples as my great-grandfather, Henry Clay Pendleton, served as a Sgt. in the ANV (34th VA Co. K, I believe) and was wounded at the Wilderness in 1864.

How you might ask is this possible?:
My dad (b. 1930) was 50 when I was born, his dad (b. ca. 1880, a survivor of the 1906 San Fran earthquake) was in his 50s when my dad was was born, and my g-grandfather (b. ca. 1842) was about 40 when my grandfather was born.
I was born in 1980, still single, but looking at my family history I have a while to start having kids!

Anyone else out there have a similar story? How rare are my degrees of separation?

-Clay Pendleton

[smander]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

Sir, Very compelling arguement. I am 3 degrees of separation. My Great-Grandfather was fought in the Civil War. Does that make me 2 degrees??

Scott Manderville

Great Grandson of PVT Ebbin S Shover G Trp. 21st Ny Cav
Great Grandson of PVT Daniel Vandecar, F Co. 95th Ny Inf

[David Fox]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

God help me, growing up in the '40s and '50s, I knew my G'grandma Watson who died, aged 101, in 1957. As a girl in southern Ohio she helped hide the family horses from Morgan and his Terrible Men during the Confederate Indiana/Ohio raid of 1863. When we took my new-born baby brother Jeffrey for her to see, she asked his name then exclaimed: "Why 'Jeff': I recall singing 'Hang Jeff Davis from a Sour Apple Tree'!
When I was given the much-coveted Columbia Civil War record set in the 1950s, my grandad surprised me (and perhaps himself) by singing along w/ "Johnny Fill Up the Bowl (We All Went Down to New Orleans)". Born in 1882, he'd learned it from his dad, a private in the 7th West Virginia who died, regrettably, 14 years before I was born.

[smander]

Re: Civil War Degrees of Separation

Gentlemen, Hooorah!!!

As I am thinking that we are not forgeeting

Scott Manderville
Great Grandon Of Ebine S Mandervillle
and Pvt Daniel Vanercar