The Women Married to Civil War Ancestors

Excerpt from Wood Civil War Ancestors booklet

In researching and writing about my husband's Civil War ancestors (both blue and grey), I'm making sure to document the lives of the women they married.

Some wives outlived their Civil War veteran husbands, by a few years or decades; some wives died while their husbands were away at war; some wives died soon after the vets returned home. Each has a story and I want to be sure their lives are remembered, along with their husbands.

Here's my plan for writing "cradle to grave" about each veteran and his wife or wives:

• Head the first page with veteran's full name and dates. 
• Explain the veteran's relationship to readers in the next generation.
• List the full name of his wife (or wives) and her dates. 
• List the units in which the veteran served (blue indicates Union, red indicates Confederate).
• First paragraphs summarize the man's family background (parents, siblings, birthplace, movements, occupation). This is the "cradle" part of "cradle to grave" in a nutshell.
• Emphasize "story" part of family history by adding a dramatic hook early in the veteran's life narrative. Here, I say that this man and two brothers were all in the Union Army, but their lives diverged after the war was over.
• Include at least one illustration, such as a newspaper obit or a Civil War Pension card. 
• Say when and where the man got married, and any special circumstances. In the excerpt above, John N. McClure married Rebecca Jane Coble only 3 days after he enlisted in the Union Army, just before he shipped out with his unit. Quite a start to their married life.
• Describe the wife's life as well as the veteran's life to add context to the family tree overall. 
• Say when and where (and why) the veteran and his wife died and were buried, the "grave" part of this "cradle to grave" profile.

What's in This Family History Booklet?

My booklet will have a table of contents, a listing of Civil War military units in which the men served, and possibly the key battles or actions in which they participated. 

This is a work in progress, having grown from the quickie booklet I originally envisioned, so I may decide to add an index. After all, I'm profiling 19 men and their wives/families. That's a lot of names. I want to make it easy for descendants to look up any particular ancestor by checking the table of contents and/or the index.

Highlight the Drama: Spoiler Alerts Wanted!

I'm going to write a page highlighting "not to be missed" dramatic or interesting details about some key ancestors. Spoiler alerts will actually whet my readers' appetite for more. 

For instance, Robert Crooke Wood was the next generation's 4c5r and a senior U.S. Army surgeon. He married Ann Mackall Taylor, the oldest daughter of Major General Zachary Taylor--yes, the U.S. Army veteran who later became the 12th U.S. president. Zachary Taylor's daughter Sarah married Jefferson Davis. Yes, that Jefferson Davis. So Robert Crooke Wood's father-in-law was a future U.S. president, and his brother-in-law was a future Confederate president.

The Civil War intensified the family drama: Two of Robert Crooke Wood's sons fought for the Confederacy, while their father remained on active duty in the Union Army. (Many thanks to my hubby's wonderful cousin L for sharing his knowledge of this distant part of the Wood family tree.)

Don't you think such spoiler alerts will get my readers' attention?

The Weddingest Months in His Family Tree

February 14, 1861 marriage of Adaline Steiner Sigler and John Dome in Crawford county, OH

My husband's family tree has one Valentine's Day wedding, among 25 marriages that took place in February. But February isn't the month with the most weddings in that family tree.

Valentine's Day Wedding

Above, the marriage license of Adaline Elizabeth Steiner Sigler (1837-1912) and John Dome 1824-1902). Adaline was my hubby's 2d great aunt, the sister of his great-grandfather Edward George Steiner.

Addie's first marriage was to Albert Sigler (1833-1858), who sadly died at the age of 24, just three months before their only child was born.

When this child was nearly three years old, Addie married for a second time. She and John Dome applied for the license on Thursday, February 14, 1861, and were married the same day. This was two months before the official start of the Civil War. John did register for the draft in July of 1863, but he was not called to serve.

By the time great-great-aunt Addie died, she was widowed again and a grandmother several times over.

August and December, the Weddingest Months

In my husband's family tree, the most weddings took place in August and December. According to the anniversary list I generated using my RootsMagic7 software, 40 couples were married in each of these months. By comparison, only 25 couples were married in February.

On the first day of August, 1722, Andrew Allen and Abiah Lovell were married in Barnstable, Massachusetts. Andrew and Abiah were my husband's 5th great-grandparents. This is the earliest August wedding in the anniversary list.

There were three New Year's Eve weddings on the anniversary list. On December 31, 1863, John N. McClure and Rebecca Jane Coble were married in Wabash county, Indiana. John was my husband's 2d great uncle. They were part of the McClure contingent that left Indiana to try farming in Emmet county, Michigan.

My husband's great-great-grandpa William Madison McClure, part of the contingent, briefly farmed in Little Traverse, Michigan before returning to Indiana. One of his four children was born in Little Traverse. That child was Grandpa Brice Larimer McClure, born on December 29, 1878. The other three were all born in Indiana.

I wrote this post for Elizabeth O'Neal's Genealogy Blog Party, February 2020 edition!