In his book “Sustainable Genealogy: Separating Fact from Fiction in Family Legends,” Richard Hite devotes a chapter to the military service of our ancestors.
He warns that, many times, the truth is stretched to make an ancestor’s career sound more impressive. Sometimes, in family lore, the person has been given a higher rank or is said to have served with more important people, and so forth. If you have an ancestor with a military record, take the time to look up the facts about his military career. These can be found at Ancestry.com and Fold3.com. Both have the service records for most American wars, at least up to modern times. In recent years, members of the armed forces get a DD Form 214 when they leave the military and it lists all their ranks, any awards, medals and commendations. In pre-1900 conflicts, you need to rely on the online service records.
Men who served during the American Revolution often had short tours of duty and served several different times. One of the best ways to understand military service during that war is to read the firsthand accounts in their pensions. Those for Southern soldiers have been transcribed at https://revwarapps.org. Nothing is more real than reading these documents. So, before you go on and on about your ancestor’s military record, check out the facts.
Lynda Eller, Heard County historian
Lynda Eller, of Lanett, Alabama, died June 2. She was the Heard County, Georgia, historian and wrote or compiled 10 books on that county and others nearby. Her work was especially important because Heard County is a “Burned County” where the courthouse fire of 1893 had destroyed so many records. Her works are found at the Georgia Archives and other places. One of her projects was to record all the families who appeared in the Heard County censuses from 1840 to 1900. She will be missed.
Hillcrest Cemetery, East Point
A lot of things are going on to preserve and keep viable Hillcrest Cemetery, a large, private cemetery in East Point. Check the website hillcresteastpoint.org to see what is happening under the leadership of Kevin Hudson and others. There are monthly volunteer events to keep the place in shape.
Contact Kenneth H. Thomas Jr., P. O. Box 901, Decatur, Ga., 30031 or kenthomasongenealogy.com.
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