Thursday, December 3, 2015

United States National Homes for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, 1866-1938

The National Home (called Asylum up to 1873) for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers was founded in 1865 to look after volunteer soldiers who had been injured or disabled during the American Civil War. Twelve homes were opened across the United States, beginning with the first home in Togus, Maine in 1866.[1]

Home
Location
Date Established
Eastern Branch
Togus, Maine
1866
Central Branch
Dayton, Ohio
1867
Northwestern Branch
Wood, Wisconsin
1867
Southern Branch
Hampton, Virginia
1870
Western Branch
Leavenworth, Kansas
1885
Pacific Branch
Sawtelle, California
1888
Marion Branch
Marion, Indiana
1888
Roseburg Branch
Roseburg, Oregon
1894
Danville Branch
Danville, Illinois
1898
Mountain Branch
Johnson City, Tennessee
1903
Battle Mountain Sanitarium
Hot Springs, South Dakota
1907
Tuskegee Home
Tuskegee, Alabama
1923
Bath Branch
Bath, New York
1929
St. Petersburg Home
St. Petersburg, Florida
1930
Table 1: Chronological year of opening of National Homes for Disables Volunteer Soldiers

Both Ancestry.com and Familysearch.org have the database United States National Homes for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, 1866-1938. It contains almost 400,000 records and the page for each veteran in the registers is divided into four parts: military history, domestic history, home history, and general remarks.  Just over 28,100 of the entries are for men who were born in Ireland. Of those, the Irish county or place of birth is recorded for almost 500 men.

County
No. of records
Dublin
124
Cork (inc. 2 Queenstown)
60
Galway
43
Limerick
32
Tipperary (incl. 1 Templemore)
28
Donegal (incl. Donnegal)
18
Derry/Londonderry
18
Mayo (incl. May & 1 Charlestown)
18
Tyrone
14
Sligo
14
Kilkenny
13
Roscommon (incl. Rosecommon)
12
Waterford
11
Kerry (incl. 1 Killarney)
11
Kildare
8
Cavan (incl. Caven)
6
Antrim
6
Clare
6
Armagh
5
Down
4
Offaly (incl. Kings)
4
Westmeath
4
Monaghan (incl. Monoghan)
3
Leitrim
3
Longford
3
Wexford
3
Wicklow
3
Fermanagh
2
Carlow
2
Laois (incl. Queens)
2
Meath (incl. 1 Navan)
2
Louth
1
Castle Borough, Ireland
1
Clashmore, Ireland
1
Rockville, Ireland
1
Drummond, Ireland
1
Barr, Ireland
1
Kilduff, Ireland
1
Kenmore, Ireland
1
Bangor, Ireland
1
County Carney, Ireland
1
Grey Abbey, Ireland
1
Ardmore, Ireland
1
Clifton, Ireland
1
TOTAL
495
Table 2: No. of records that give Irish county/place of birth

The questions asked on the pro-forma registers changed slightly over the years but a core of questions were asked throughout:[2] (i) military history - time and place of each enlistment, rank, company and regiment, time and place of discharge, cause of discharge, kind and degree of disability, when and where contracted; (ii) domestic history - where born (state or country and town or county), age, height, complexion, color of eyes, color of hair, read and write, religion, occupation, residence subsequent to discharge, marital status/social condition, name and address of nearest relative; (iii) home history - rate of pension, date of admission re-admission and transfer, condition of re-admission, date and discharge of transfer, cause of discharge, date of death, cause of death (iv) general remarks - papers, effects, location of grave and remarks.

Not every question is answered for each resident, especially in the records of those who were admitted to the first few national homes.  However, most questions were usually answered and this is a tremendous amount of detail about one individual, especially in the 19th century. It is also unusual to see a government document ask about the religion of a person.

Entry for Austin Connelly, born about 1810 Dublin, Ireland
To share one example, Austin Connelly entered the Central Branch home in Dayton, Ohio on 13 July 1875. He was born in Dublin, Ireland about 1810. In the United States, he worked as a shoemaker in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He first enlisted in the 109th Pennsylvania volunteers on 22 February 1862 at Philadelphia. He was discharged in 1863 before re-enlisting in the 116th Pennsylvania volunteers in February 1864. A relative was named as John Finnell of Camden, New Jersey. Austin Connelly died on 4 May 1891.[3]

Access this database at Ancestry.com and Familysearch.org.



[1] National Parks Service. History of the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers. Date Unknown.  http://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/veterans_affairs/History.html: accessed 28 November 2015.
[2] Questions with strikethrough were asked in later years
[3] "United States National Homes for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers, 1866-1938," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VZ39-D1Y : accessed 28 November 2015), Austin Connelly, 1875; citing p. 5403, Dayton, Ohio, United States, NARA microfilm publication M1749 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), roll 32; FHL microfilm 1,547,614.

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