It's Thursday and after a short visit to the doctor for some tests the
rest of my day is free.I prefer to schedule the appointments as early
as possible in the day for just that reason.
I thought I'd
revisit Footnote.com to see what databases were new or updated
and
found one that was unfamiliar to me, the Final Payment Vouchers Index
for Military Pensions, 1818-1864. These records show the date of the
final payment to a Revolutionary War veteran or his widow and many
have the dates they died. I found cards for the following ancestors:
John Ames
Asa Barrows
Jonathan Barker
Amos Upton
I also found the
records for Jonathan Barker's brothers Benjamin and Jesse. I didn't
learn
anything I didn't already know but I downloaded the images to each of
the files I have for them.
I also checked again for pension
files for a few of the ancestors I hadn't found one for
as yet. One
of these is John Griffith (4Jun 1763 Rochester, Plymouth, Ma.-8Feb 1840,
Livermore,
Androscoggin, Me.). I knew that he'd served as a matross in an
artillery company under Captain William Treadwell in the 3rd Artillery Regiment
commanded by Col. John Crane. And of course not
all veterans applied for pensions.
But this time around I checked
under the names of the widows and got a hit. On an
image from the pension
file of James Rankin I found a letter concerning the cases
of several widows and on it was the following:
"In the case of Mary Griffith widow of John Griffith you inform
me that no papers
can be
found-it is stated in her application that her late husband enlisted in
Col Crane's Regiment of Artillery and served til the end of the war, the foregoing
are all the particulars we can furnish you."
The letter's signature is faded but looks like it could be a
Levi Bailey. It's addressed
to "J.S. Edwards Commissioner of
Pensions, Washington DC" and was written on 16 Apr
1845 from the
Bangor Land Office so Mary Boyden Griffith might have been applying
for
a land grant. I've found no record online that she succeeded so she may
have failed. She died in Livermore, Oxford, Me in 1846. Her granddaughter Arvilla
Ames is my 3x great-grandmother Arvilla Ames
West.
But not bad for an hour's search on Footnote.com, I think!
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