Veterans - Lost and Found

Sorry, I know it has been a few weeks since my last post, but I just got back from vacation.  Not a good excuse, but it's the best I can do.  Before I get started with the recent veterans that I picked from my family tree, I have to show you something that I found, and thought it was humorous.

I was in Glendola Cemetery in Wall, NJ on a Find-A-Grave mission. and I came across this military headstone in the cemetery:

There is nothing humerous about this man or his service to our country, and I mean no disrespect to him, however, look at this stone and read it fast.  It took me a minute, but at first I was unsure if his last name was Greenlaw or Cook.   But I then I realized when I saw 8 CAV that he was a cook in Troop E of the 8th Cavalry.  Then I saw the abbreviation for the war SP. AM. War and that's when I had to chuckle.  It looks like he was a cook in the SPAM War (not the Spanish American War).  Perhaps the men tired of the same menu of spam every day - maybe he started the war.

When I was in Pottsville and Minersville in my last post, I mentioned that I had been in the St Vincent de Paul Cemetery and could not find a headstone for James Bradley.  I was in that cemetery before and had seen a headstone for a James Bradley and I thought that there was a military marker with it, but I could not find it that day.  When I got home later, I entered James' date of death into my computer program and made sure that the on line tree was in sync.  Within a few minutes, I got a shaky leaf on James Bradley, when I checked the hint from Ancestry.com, it was an entry from a data base from the Pennsylvania Department of Military Affairs and was a Record of Burial Place of Veteran.  I opened the entry and found the following card:

Anyone want to hazard a guess as to where James is buried?  You got it - St Vincent's, Minersville, PA.  So he was a veteran of the World War (if you note the date on the card of 7-10-35, you notice it was before WWII).  The military wasn't very exact on dates either - date of birth 1876, date of death 1928, Homeland Security might not let him get buried today without proper ID.  I did a little bit of research on Co B 103 Reg. Engrs and found a book in Google Books about Pennsylvania in the World War and it says that the 103rd Engineers were formed in August 1917 as the Pioneer Engineer Regiment, it says that Co. B was formed in Philadelphia, and Co. C was formed in Pottsville, apparently he signed up before the recruitment in Pottsville.  Company B was also the first unit of the regiment to be mobilized for service in the World War, it became part of the 28th Division on 3 Sept 1917.  18 May 1918 the unit embarked on H.M.S. Metagama and crossed the Atlantic in a convoy of thirteen ships under guard of a battleship.  So he went on to see service in England and France.  It is an interesting story, but I don't think I could do it justice.  If you would like to read it, just google: An illustrated history of the Twenty-eighth Division, Volume 2 (Google eBook).

After this find, I decided to check the Pennsylvania State Archives for any more info, and I found a place to check file cards for Pennsylvania Militia Units in various conflicts.  I looked for James Bradley, but had no luck.  Then I saw a link for file cards for Pennsylvania veterans of the Spanish American War - yes the famous SPAM war.  I check through a list of cards alphabetically.  In case you didn't think of it Bradley and Brady are very close, so after striking out with Bradleys, I continued and checked the Bradys.  This is what I found:

I know that my great great grandparents Thomas and Bridget Brady had a son Andrew, and the first thing that caught my eye was the place of birth - Gordon PA - that's where they lived early on.  Then the current residence - Scranton PA - which also is where they lived in 1900.  I thought they lived on Riffle St in Scranton, so I checked the 1900 census and much to my surprise they were living at 641 Birch St, Scranton, PA. - the same address as the card.  Holy cow!!  I knew nothing of Andrew and now this.  He apparently served in Porto Rico - love the spelling -and was mustered out with his company and honorably discharged 24 Jan 1899.  He promptly went home and was counted in the 1900 census.  Andrew is not in the 1910 census.

I checked a little further and found that I have his father's obit from 5 Oct 1904 and it listed his survivors - his widow (no name, just widow Brady) and children - Andrew is not listed among the survivors.  So I put my detective skills  to the test - they are a little rusty - and surmised that he died sometime between 1900 and 1904.  A few years back I visited Thomas' place of burial in Cathedral Cemetery, Scranton, PA.  Also buried there are his widow Bridget - yes she had a name all her own - and daughter, Mary.  I remember the staff there telling me that there was another grave there and there was probably someone buried there, but they had no record of who it was.  Then I remembered - now I'm really scraping the rust off those old detective skills - at the grave was a VFW marker with a flag and I wondered who that was for.  I called the cemetery today and checked on Andrew.  The woman said that records prior to 1905 were spotty at best, but they had no record of Andrew.  Then I called the Scranton public library - which is where I found my Great Great Grandfather's death certificate - and asked if they had death certificates for the city between 1900 and 1904.  I was told that they do, but death certificates were not required prior to 1906, so if may not be there.  I then asked if they had info on local Spanish American War Vets and, after checking her list, she said he was not on it.  So at least I can check for a death certificate in the Scranton Public Library for him.

Before I started writing this post, I did some research on line on the Spanish American War and I found that the VFW was organized around 1899to 1900, after the war, as an organization for veterans of foreign wars.  So I am now going to check with the local VFWs in Scranton to see if he is listed on any of their roles - maybe they know where he is buried.  I think it is probably Cathedral Cemetery, which would explain the VFW marker.

Before I found any of this information, I knew of several veterans in the family.  Starting with my father in WWII, his two brothers Jim and Frank in WWII, his brother Paul in Korea, my mother's two brothers Ed and Bill in WWII, and my mother's father served in WWI.  I could go on about my wife's family's military history - which includes several West Pointers, a Civil War General, and various other Generals, Colonels, and Majors, and no less than three burials in Arlington, but I would need alot more time and room.  

So it was nice to uncover the service of these two veterans that I did not know I had.  The thing that I wonder about is why did they die so young?  Andrew died about five years after his return at about 30 years old and James died at 51 years of age, only 10 years after his return from the service.  Did they suffer wounds or the effects of stress, disease or mustard gas?  Clearly more research is need to answer these questions.  I will research them more and hopefully get some more information about their service. 

One more thing I noticed - right after my wife asked about it.  Katrina reads my posts while they are still drafts - mainly for spelling errors and to make sure it makes sense.  After reading this post, she asked "So how are they related?"  My first answer was "they're not", but after thinking for a moment I said "James' sister Madge/Maggie/Marcella married Andrew's brother James, so I guess they are brothers-in-law".  Sometimes when you write these stories, you just don't think about basic questions.   So after reading this if you have any questions - ask.  It also helps me to figure this all out.

Return to the Bradleys of Schuylkill County PA

I really was not intending to write about my Bradley peeps, but Katrina and I took our son Tom to camp in Pennsylvania last week and I drove back on Friday afternoon to pick him up.  Okay, so  he didn't need to be picked up until Saturday morning, and I drove out early to visit my sister.  Okay, so on my way to my sister's house I stopped in Pottsville at the county courthouse (it was only a couple of hours out of my way, but I consider that close).

If you have never been to Pottsville or the Courthouse, they have both been there for a couple of hundred years.  The Courthouse is an older brick structure built on a hill, but when you park in the back, you have to walk down these old concrete steps to get down to ground level (it's tougher going back up).  Across the street is a castle looking building, minus the moat, which is some type of detention facility (juvenile- I think)  It is all looks rather foreboding.  In front of the detention facility is a large historical placard which tells about the "Molly Maguire Executions".  Never heard of them?  The Molly Maguires were a secret society of Irish Mine Workers. There were several members who were convicted of various violent crimes against the coal industry - usually killing bosses, etc..  This placard reads that on June 21, 1877, six Molly Maguires were hanged here, four others were hanged at the county jail in Mauch Chunk on the same day.

The reason I bring this up, is that I was thinking that these "gangstas" were running around this area back when my ancestors were mining coal or working the rails to transport the mined coal.  So I guess things haven't change much over the years, we have the bloods and the crips, they had the Molly Maguires.  It gives you an idea of what your ancestors had to deal with when they were alive.  I don't know if any of my peeps were "Mollys", but it was a secret society so I may never know.  You also wonder if any of them were targeted by the Mollys - again I will probably never know for sure, but it does make you think.

My original reason for going to the courthouse was to check old property records and deeds, but when I got to the archives, it was getting late and deeds were on another floor in the building.  I figured that I was lucky to just get to where I was and told the woman that I was doing a family tree.  She suggested that I check the estates and wills.  I didn't locate anyone named Brady with a first name that sounded familiar, but I found some Bradleys.  The person I found was James J Bradley, who died 23 May 1928 in Minersville.  You may remember that I posted his obit and his mother's obit in a previous post.  I remember that his obit says that he died in the hospital. Well it looks like he wrote his will  on 28 Mar 1928, he probably knew the end was coming and wanted to have all of his affairs in order.  It is interesting to read, even though I did not take the time to read it at the archives. I am getting my first chance to read it while I am writing.  There is a copy of the will, in which he leaves everything to his brother Joe and his sister Mrs N Murtha (Sorry Colin, but it must be Murtha with no "Mc").  In the will he uses the phrase "share and share alike".  I kinda like that phrase - a last loving gesture to his siblings. 
James and Joseph lived in Minersville, probably close to each other, both were blacksmiths, and Mrs N Murtha is their sister, Mary, with whom their mother lives in Pottsville.  So maybe he is taking care of his mom and helping his brother.  I say that because later in the day I found a headstone in St Vincent de Paul cemetery for Joseph Bradley who died in 1930 - maybe he was sick also.  Joseph is also the Administrator of the estate.  There is an appraisal of James' wealth, which amounts to $1,535.81 cash in the First National Bank of Minersville - I am not certain, but it sounds like a tidy sum for that time period in that area.  He owned no real estate.  There is also a list of Administration Expenses: Funeral $450. 35, Tombstone $250.00 (I didn't find that one), St Vincent's Church $ 56.00, Milliken Hospital $36.50.  It was interesting to read. (Notice how the bill for St Vincent's is almost double that of the hospital).  I then went to the Library and tried to find an obit for his sister, Ellen Bradley in 1911 (that explains why she is not mentioned in the will), but they were closing so I didn't have time.

Then on to Minersville to St. Vincent De Paul to walk the cemetery looking for headstones.  I found one for Joseph Bradley and Jennie Bradley, he died in 1930, she died in 1951.  I think this is James' brother from Minersville and his wife.  Joseph's wife is listed in the 1930 census as Jane (she is also a witness in James' will listed as Jane), so maybe they called her Jennie as a nickname.  Right next to this headstone is an older one with the family name of  Pepper.  Pepper is Annie Bradley's  maiden name.  Annie is James and Joseph's mother and my great great grandmother.  The headstone is for Francis Pepper.  I recall seeing Annie Pepper in the 1850 census in Cass Twp with her parents, Patrick and Magdelina (Reilly) Pepper, on the same page listed before Patrick is a man named Francis Pepper.  I think that he is a relation to Patrick Pepper.  I am gonna have to write to St Michael the Archangel Church to get more info.

Francis Pepper

I suspect that there is much more to be learned from this trip to PA, and I will return there again to check further.