The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1897-09-06
WAR WIDOWS.
How ,Iatrlmouy swells and PerPstuatsa
'' the National Pension Roll.

the National Pension Roll.
washington Correspondent Of the ST.
ropis Globe Democrat; Commissioner
ry,ps was at his desA the other day fig
,,ring on pensions as they concern gener-
Lions vet unborn. The Declaration of
r,aependence Is 12l years old. The coun-
80, ia ann discharging It's debt Of graft
,,5s IN The material form OF pensions
,I,.ar5s those who "At" for IT, OF
tgTrse. there are no surviving soldiers OF
,,s revolution. There are, however, sur
,''ving widows. The commissioner was
snsrul,tlng on what that fact has to do
linn the future OF the present pension
i'at He has now upon his roll Of months
iy recipients 9sS62S names. Before the
snd AZ the current year the grand army
~ PENSIONERS will have passed the l,OOO,-
G66 mark. II is n fair deduction that
ninety years hence the government OF the
Tinted States win still be paying, PEN
si1ns for the civil war OF 1876,
The army of George Washington was a
eouad compared with the 100000 and
more enrolled in the north to crush seces-
sI5n. II suffered privations calculated
IA sap vitality, but the widows Of those
patrlots OF Valley Forge are still draw
ing pensions. Unless the twentieth CEN
tury women differ much from the nine
tsanth century women there will be a
rail OF honor in the year 1887 of quite re-
spectable proportions, Pensions conducd
matrimony. A fixed income which can
be transmitted after death as an estate
has lis bearing on the question OF mar
rIage.
Suppose" suggested the commission
or. with his sheet OF figures before him,
fourteen years IA be the lowest limit OF
age for a soldier In the revolution OF
1870. A soldier OF that age would have
been thirty-eight years old in 1900, Now,
the youngest OF our revolutionary Wild
ows on the pension Hist is eighty-three,
She was born In 1914 At the date of her
birth the youngest of the revolutionary
soldiers was fifty-two. II he married
this woman when she was eighteen he
was seventy, There you have the aga
conditions of matrlmony not at all I'M
reasonable ar unusual
Reasoning from what has proven true
regarding pensioners, the commissioner
has no doubt that during several years
to come girl babies will be born to the
destiny OF becoming the widows of the
veterans of 1865, and or drawing pen
slons. II there are ten revolutionary
widows on the roll now there may be
1000 civil war widows In 1896. This is
possible without taking into account the
fact that the world is learning how to
live longer. The ranks Of the old SOL
ders are thinning. The ranks OF the
old soldiers widows are not. Nearly
one-fourth OF the 9S3,62S names now on
the roll are widows. To be exact the
widows at present receiving pensions
number 22S,622. The proportion Is In
oreasing steadily. Soon one-third OF
the pensions VIII so to widows. a few
years later the widows will outnumber
the veterans, The time will come when
the widows will exceed the old soldiers
in such numerical relation as they do
for the war OF 1879. There are seven
survivors of 1912 on the roll, and there
are ESQ pensioned widows Of that war.
The Indian wars were fought from 1882
to 1882, from fifty-iive to sixty-tive years
ago The peEslOned veterans of those
Indian wars number 1878 and the Wild
ows 4.9SS. The Mexican war widows do
not uu,tc equal the veterans, They
number S072, while the male pensioners
of that war, fought fifty years ago, are
1882.
Cf Union soldiers who participated in
the civil war the number now pensloned
Is 7ii.lil Unless additional laws are
passed this number Of civil war vet
Grams VIII not grow much. The deaths
are about $4,000 year. The new appli-
cants admitted to the roll, with the
greatest diligence the pension bureau
can bestow. Will not long maintain the
present strength OF pensioned veterans.
But the widows will grow in numbers
for many years to come.