Thursday, February 18, 2010

Treasure Chest Thursday - the Martin Carringer Bible

It's Treasure Chest Thursday, time for another document or artifact from my family history treasure chest.

My 4th great-grandfather, Martin Carringer (1758-1836), was a Revolutionary War Soldier from Pennsylvania, who applied for and received a Pension for his service. The entry in the book Genealogical Abstracts of Revolutionary War Pensions Files by Virgil D. White says:

"CARRINGER, Martin, Molly, W6905 BLW 1259-100, PA line, soldier enlisted in Westmoreland Cty PA, soldier applied 12 Apr 1824 Mercer Cty PA aged 65, soldier married Mary "Molly" Hoax in May 1785 and soldier died 25 Jan 1835 in Mercer Cty PA and widow applied there 8 Feb 1839 a resident of Sandy Creek Twnshp PA aged 71 and widow died there 31 Aug 1850. Children were Jacob, born 1 Oct 1785, Lizbet born 6 Sept 1789, Katharine born 18 Jan 1792, George born 5 Sept 1795, Calli born 9 Mar 1797, Henrick born 6 June 1800, Soloman born 24 Aug 1802, Joseph born 22 Oct 1805. Also shown was a grandchild Tastet born 13 May 1811 and died 27 Aug 1820; soldier's son George signs affidavit 28 Aug 1851 Mercer Cty PA, surviving children at widow's death were Jacob Carrigan, Elizabeth McCartney deceased in 1851, Catherine Cazbe, George, Henry and Joseph Carrigan. Soldier's daughter Elizabeth McCartney died 14 Nov 1850".

Where did they get all of the name and birth date information? From a family Bible record torn out of the Bible and submitted with the pension application. I downloaded all 45 pages of the pension file from www.Footnote.com about one year ago, and included were these three pages:



The two pages above were the handwritten pages in German from the Bible. The page below is the translated summary that appears in the abstract transcribed above:


Only www.Footnote.com has the images of the complete Revolutionary War pension file. HeritageQuestOnline has ten selected pages for this pension file, including the Bible pages.

The lesson learned here is that those Revolutionary War Pension Files sometimes contain absolutely wonderful and priceless family records, such as the Bible pages above. The same thing happens in all of the pension files - there are family Bible pages in the pension files for the War of 1812, Mexican War, Civil War, and other wars.

If you have Revolutionary War ancestors, have you checked online to see if there is a pension file for your soldier(s), or their spouses or children? If so, the file may contain a family Bible record.

1 comment:

Ann Martin said...

Randy, you are so right. Several years ago I found 4 letters written by my husband's ancestor, Edward Williams, to his wife. Two of the letters were written while Edward was serving on the "Shark" a row boat on the Hudson River where the cannon balls were falling like snow. The other two letters were written aboard the British prison ship in Newport Harbor, the last letter just a few days before Edward died. I must admit I shed a few tears when reading these letters--all signed "Yours til death." His widow was in her 90s when her granddaughter found the letters in an old trunk and they were used to prove his service so his poor widow could get the pension she needed so much.
Ann Martin, a descendant of Eunice Seaver