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The 80,000 federal Revolutionary War pension claims filed by
soldiers, widows, and surviving children contain a great deal of
genealogical information. These claims are available through
Ancestry.com and
Footnote.com, and they should be routinely
checked whenever anyone is seeking to establish a new patriot or
to prove a new child of a patriot.
What Is In a
Revolutionary War Pension Claim?
Original Bible records listing the names and birth dates
of all the soldiers children are often contained in these
claims. However, there are several other types of documents in
pension files that can establish parent-child relationships:
1) Affidavits by one or more children indicating their status
as a son or daughter of the soldier
2) Affidavits by others listing some, or all, of the soldiers
children
3) Claims filed by the surviving children of the soldier which
often list daughters by their married names
4) An 1820 estate schedule that lists all the people in the
soldiers household by name and age (in essence this is an 1850
census in 1820).
Three Types of
Pension Claims
There are 3 types of claims. Claims designated with an S (for
Survivor) were filed by the soldier. Claims designated with a W
(for Widow) were filed by a widow. If the soldier filed a claim
before his death and his widow filed one later, the soldiers
documents will be combined with the widows claim under the W
designation. The S claims and the W claims received pensions
from the government. However, claims designated with an R were
rejected. If surviving children filed a claim, their documents
will be combined with the S claim, the W claim, or the R claim,
whichever claim pertains to them.
How Do I Know if the
Revolutionary War Soldier Had a Pension?
That is the big question, and there is no straightforward
answer. Do not rely solely on the DAR Patriot Index as it often
does NOT indicate a pension when one actually does exist. Of
course, one strategy would be to check the pensions on
Ancestry.com or
Footnote.com for every soldier, but that
strategy may not always be practical. Another strategy would be
to check my
Bible Records Index. Although I am listing pensions
that identify 3 or more children regardless of whether a
Bible record is included, it is going to take some time for me
to review 80,000 pensions.
A Little History
It is helpful to know a little about the history of our
Revolutionary War pension laws. For the first time in 1818,
soldiers in need of assistance who had served in a Continental
military organization (not militia) for 9 months or until the
end of the war were eligible for a pension without regard to
disabilities. Prior to 1818, most of the pension acts limited
pensions to those disabled during service, and the majority of
the early claims were destroyed by fires in 1800 and 1814.
Thus, one might think that a soldier had to live until at least
1818 for a pension claim to exist. However, if his widow lived
a long life, a soldier who died in 1785 could have a pension
file with valuable genealogical information.
As a result of the pension act of 1818, the Federal Government
was overwhelmed with applications, and many of the approved
claims (over 20,000) were for soldiers who were not in financial
need. Thus, in 1820 Congress passed a law that required
pensioners to submit a certified schedule of their estate and
income. The genealogical benefit to the 1820 legislation is
that pensioners frequently identified all the people living in
their household by name and age.
In 1832, Congress opened up pension eligibility to veterans who
had served at least 6 months in the militia or state troops.
Over 33,000 soldiers were granted pensions.
In 1836, widows of veterans eligible under the act of 1832 were
allowed pensions if they had married the veteran before the
expiration of his last period of service. In 1838, the marriage date was
extended to marriages taking place before 1794.
Ten years later the marriage date was extended to marriages
before 1800. Finally, in 1853, Congress removed all
restrictions regarding the date of marriage, and widows whose
husbands had served at least two weeks were eligible.
Proof of Marriage
The marriage date requirement for widows pensions is important
for understanding who might have filed a pension and why certain
documents were often submitted with a claim. Widows had to
prove their marriage date. One way to do this was to submit a
Bible record that listed the marriage date and/or the birth
dates of the children. Another way was to ask friends,
neighbors, or family members to testify that they had first-hand
knowledge of the widows marriage date and/or birth dates of her
children (especially the oldest children).
From 1838 to 1848, widows had to claim pensions based on
marriages that took place before 1794. Thus, it is common to
see widows with multiple marriages claiming pensions for the
service of their FIRST husbands even when subsequent husbands
also served. Of course, some widows whose husbands died young
never remarried, and they filed pensions some 40-50 years after
the soldiers death. Thus, many widows pensions exist for
soldiers who died well before the pension act of 1818.
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