On 7 September 1897, Thomas M. Graves filled out his first circular requesting family information from the Bureau of the Pensions. What follows is an extracted and summarized list of the details her provided: He was married to Sarah Graves whose maiden name was Sarah Newman. Thomas was married to Sarah on 23 October 1885 […]

As we delve further into his pension file, there are some other irregularities with Thomas Graves. Thomas Graves responded to the 15 January 1898 circular from the Bureau of Pensions asking for information on his family. This circular is one of the best documents in a Union Civil War pension file–assuming the veteran was receiving […]

In his letter of 15 December of 1914 , C. M. Stewart of North Liberty, Iowa,  indicated that if the Pension Department needed additional information about the marriages of Civil War veteran Thomas Graves and the fact that his widow Sarah Graves was not his legal widow, that those details could be obtained from Mrs. […]

C. M. Stewart replied quickly to the 10 December 1914 response to his letter from the Bureau of Pensions. In fact, five days after the Bureau of Pensions wrote to him in North Liberty, Iowa, he was crafting his letter full of information back to them. C. M. Stewart gave details about Thomas M. Graves’ […]

The Pension Department in 1914 appreciated neighbors who took the initiative to inform them that pension fraud was possibly taking place. Charles Stewart received a response to his letter of December of 1914 which indicated that he had evidence that Sarah Graves was not qualified to receive a widow’s Civil War pension based upon the […]

One document rarely tells the entire story and that appears to be the case with this December of 1914 letter written by Charles M. Stewart of North Liberty, Iowa. There is more going on than just what is stated in this one letter from a veteran interested in preventing a fraud that he thought was […]