Stefan

Nonetheless, family lore built him up into the Surgeon General of the Confederacy. Ain’t history fun?

Jim Morgan

I’ve been trying to track down Sheridan’s supposed relationship with the Indian woman “Francis” during his prewar days in Oregon. I’ve been unable to find any originally primary source material regarding that relationship prior to 1900.

The story you related seems very doubtful. No doubt Sheridan probably wished he had experienced the process of babymaking but all indications that I have indicate that he was anything but a ladies man and extremely shy and uncomfortable around the opposite sex. Hence, I think that the large age difference with his wife was a result of the unease he felt around women when he was a younger man.

Scott

That is a great story. My Great Great Grand Mothers Uncle was in The First Colorado Cavalry as well. He was not in the company in the mascre though. That unit was split up after its conversion to cavalry from infantry and its battles in New Mexico.

That is great that he took a stand on his beliefs.

Chris

Soule was in Co. D., 1st Colorado cavalry. On 11/29/1864 he refused Chivington’s order to attack a group of innocent Cheyenne, mostly women and children. This became known as the Sand Creek Massacre, one of the biggest mass slaughters in U.S. history. Chivington was furious and branded Soule as a coward. Soule later testified against Chivington and was thereafter killed by a man named Squires. Lt. Cannon tracked Squires to NM and brought him back to Denver to stand trial. Squires escaped and Cannon was poisoned. Squires was never caught.

I could not help but think of him when I saw the brother of Pat Tillman testify about the Bush administration’s lies about his death.

Same thing holds true for Lincoln. There are people now who still claim to be direct descendants of Lincoln even though the last one died in the 1980s. IIRC he even had to defend himself in a paternity suit. His defense?…He had had a vasectomy long before this person was even born.

Best
Rob

It’s nice to know that I’m not alone here. As I said, this stuff just flabbergasts me. Debunking myths is one of my life’s missions. 🙂

Eric

The one family she did manage to tie together was on her mother’s side and it turned out my great-great grandmother was a sister to George Lawton, the father of Henry W Lawton. In the process of my involvement, as the internet opened new doors, I connected to a number of Lawton families and started getting fat envelopes with family trees and ‘lots of cousins’.

My wife, being Spanish, is heavily into genealogy and has published quite a bit of the family records and histories for New Mexico. She’s amazed at the number of people who want to somehow erase the fact that there is some Native American history in their background (some of those priests were busy people), or again, there are many who ‘want’ somehow to find that they are of Native American heritage.

Her word of caution to people is that when they want to start opening all those closet doors, they should be prepared to find a number of ‘clunkers’ in there.

If I had a nickle for every “descendant” of Grant, Lee, Custer, Sheridan – you name it – that I’ve run into over the years I’d have retired long ago.

J.D.

The most outrageous though was one clown who claimed to be a descendant of Buster Kilrain, apparently unaware that his “Great-Great-Grandfather” was an entirely fictional character!

In my own case the “family legend” ended up being true although it didn’t involve anyone famous. I grew up with a very vague story about a G-G-Grandfather who was a CW vet. After some digging (including finding mention of him in “Gettysburg’s Forgotten Cavalry Actions” by some lawyer in Ohio) I was able to confirm the tale and found out he served in the 6th US Cavalry – giving perhaps a genetic explanation for my longtime fascination with horse soldiers.