Marge,
Thanks for your contribution on the effects of the civil war. I've looked
through quite a few civil war pension files and every one contains a story
filled with stories of hardships for the veterans and their families. Of
course in some cases there may have been exaggeration in order to justify
the pensions, and in other cases subsequent accidents or illnesses rather
than the war directly were responsible for the disabilities or hardships.
But in many cases the war itself was directly responsible, either through
war time injuries or through what we now recognize as "delayed stress
syndrome."
My gr gr grandfather McCaffery was much like the case you described. He
came over from Ireland, settled in WI, started his family, and was becoming
successful when the war broke out. He joined the Union army, leaving my
underage gr-grandfather to watch the farm. According to affidavits in his
pension file, he came back from the war acting strangely and gradually
became more and more anti-social until people started to avoid him. We
learned a few years ago that he spent his last few decades in an
institution for the insane in Brown County WI (a fact the family never
passed down to my mother's generation). His first application for a
pension (about the time he was institutionalized) was denied for lack of
some records. The 2nd application (made in 1907 after his death) resulted
in the widow receiving twelve dollars a month. She claimed then to be
frail and poor, having exhausted all the family's resources to pay for her
husband's care. Unfortunately the claims of her poor health were
justified, as she died a few months after the pension was approved.
Another great uncle spent many months hospitalized in Washington D.C. at
the end of the war. He came home so disabled that he never was able to
farm again. Both he and his wife died relatively young leaving two
children who we've never been able to trace.
I'm sure others have stories of civil war veterans and their families who
suffered greatly as the result of the war.
Phil