Veterans Day. Armistice Day. Day of Remembrance. Whatever you call it, it’s a day to honor those who have served in the military to help protect freedoms around the world. I have many relatives who served the U.S. citizens. Among them, my Dad, Bill Stuart, served in WWII, Great Great Grandfather William Slaker was in the Civil War until he was injured, 1c1r Robert Hanley was a POW in WWII, several Hanley granduncles served in WWI. Maternal Granduncle William G. Cook returned from WWI with a badly injured leg. Uncles by marriage, Bill Ronnan, Eddie Hatfield and Jerry Mueller (MIA, Korea to this day) served too. My ex-husband was in the Navy during the Viet Nam era. A schoolmate from grade school, Tom Kingston, was killed n Viet Nam. It made the viewing of the memorial in Washington DC even more personal and sobering.

On Fold3.com I found an amazing Civil War Navy widow’s pension for my brother-in-law’s Great Great Grandmother Elizabeth T. (Marfing) DuBois.  Theodore Bailey DuBois suffered a head injury and the resulting story in the pension record is both sad and interesting. Some day I will tell you about the zillion details from that pension record.

Online at SWVA.com, Margaret Linford, President of the Smyth County [VA] Genealogical Society, talks about Veterans Day, various military records and the War of 1812 Preserve the Pension Project. Readers know that I am a member of the Board of Directors of the Federation of Genealogical Societies which is heading this project. You can read more about the Project at www.fgs.org.

To read Margaret’s excellent writing on “String of Pearls: Preserving the records of our veterans’ service,” visit http://goo.gl/pSNv4H

What better day to contribute to the preservation project at www.fgs.org!

 

 

© 2015, Paula Stuart-Warren. All rights reserved.