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Surnames: Zimmerman
Classification: Query
Message Board URL:
http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/an/ZJYBAEB/783.1.2.1.1
Message Board Post:
Hi,
This is some of the information I have about the William Henry Zimmerman who married Sarah
Pry. I also posted it to the Prye forum at
genforum.genealogy.com
There is a Sarah L. Pry who married William Henry Zimmerman. Her middle initial of
"L" and his middle name of "Henry" are both found in his Civil War
Pension record. He was a private in Company C, 1st Ohio Volunteer Heavy Artillery,
enlisted August 11, 1862 in Seal Twp, Pike Co., OH, and discharged June 20, 1865 in
Knoxville, TN. They were married 13 February 1853 in Pike Co., OH, per Pike County
probate court marriage records.
From Sarah's death certificate #13320, available from the Ohio
Historical Society: Sarah L. Zimmerman, died Feb. 19, 1917, Scioto Twp., Pike Co., Ohio,
age 78 yrs, 6 mos, 2 days, widow, female, white, occupation house keeper, born June 18,
1838 in Ohio, father Daniel Pry, born Penn., mother Ellen Woodruff, born Ohio, cause of
death exhaustion due to old age, undertaker C. M. Freeman, buried Bailey's. (Note: If
she has a stone there, it is unmarked. - K.V.) The pension record also states that she
was dropped from their roll because of her death of Feb. 19, 1917.
(Note: It says in the 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880 Pike County, Oh census that Elenore
Woodruff Pry was born in VA. In the 1850 and 1860 census it says that Daniel Pry was born
in VA.-K.V.)
In a General Affidavit in William's pension file (the pension was actually claimed by
Sarah, his widow), Jacob Pry testified that William died about eleven years ago. A
Pension Office stamp on this affidavit is dated June 1889, making William's death
about 1878 if the paper was stamped on the date they received it. (William was in the
1870 census with Sarah, but he was not with her in 1880.) I have not been able to find a
death record, obit, will, estate, etc. for William. However, there is a cemetery called
Greggs Hill in Seal Twp., Pike Co. OH that has a tombstone for William H. Zimmerman, Civil
War, Army Pvt., Co. C, 1st Reg. OVHA, 1862-1865.
Also at Greggs Hill Cemetery is a stone that says "William D. Zimmerman, s/o W. H.
& S., died Oct. 13, 1862, aged 8 m, 7 d. There is also a fieldstone that has the
initials C. P., M.P., and D. Pry on it.
I am descended from Sarah L. Pry and William Henry Zimmerman through their daughter Emma
Rosetta Zimmerman, who married first Frederick Mortimer Varney and second Isaac Newton
"Newt" Vandegriff. In the 1900 Pike Co. Oh census it says that Sarah had 10
children born, and six were then still alive.
Sarah's death notice from one of the Pike County papers of the time (paper dated Feb.
22, 1917) said that Mrs. Sarah Zimmerman, widow of an old veteran of the Civil War, died
early Monday morning at her home near Shyville. It said she was over 86 years (which is
wrong) and that she was survived by three sons, Frank, George, and Tom, and one daughter
Mandy. (She was also survived by her daughter Emma.)
Elenor Pry's death record from the Pike Co. Oh probate court says she died Sept. 11,
1883, 78 years, widowed, born Ohio, died Seal Twp. Someone had written in later (the ink
and the handwriting are different) that her father was J. Woodruff.