OLD WIVES' TALES TELL ON SOLDIER by Eileen Niederkorn, [email protected]

In researching my great-grandpa Gabriel G. JONES, I sent to the National Archives for his Civil War records. I was pleasantly surprised when I received 60 pages of information.

Among the papers was a photocopy of a letter that great-grandma JONES had written to the Pension Board so she could receive great-grandpa's Civil War pension. She had to prove that his first wife, Martha Ann BLACK, had died and that his second wife, Margaret, had divorced him. When she received the copy of the divorce papers, she found that she had been married to Gabriel JONES three years before his divorce was granted in 1875. There was a lot of information in the papers but the item I liked best was the letter great-grandma wrote to the Pension Board saying, "He told me his wife divorced him and I, being only a child of 15, believed him and married him."

The divorce papers said Gabriel had been notified but not being able to read and write, perhaps he just assumed that Margaret went ahead with the divorce and that he was free to remarry. I guess we had better not take anything for granted.