Alfred Hart, I figured, may never even have left the state of Maine during his brief Civil War service. He enlisted for nine months on Sept. 10, 1862, and was discharged on Nov. 23 that same year.

Probably not much point in seeking out his military records. Boy, was I wrong. And it took a couple of “new” cousins to prove the point.

First, I received a “Certificate of Disability for Discharge” for Alfred from Brenda Miller of Michigan, who was looking for Nasons, particularly Nahum and Polly (Dexter) Nason, parents of Alfred’s wife, Olive.

Pvt. Alfred Hart, of Capt. Henry L. Wood’s Company E, 22nd Regiment of Maine Volunteers, was listed as 26 years of age, 5 feet 7 inches tall, dark complexion, blue eyes, dark hair, and by occupation a miller, disability discharge approved by J.H. Frantz, Assistant Surgeon USA and Acting Medical Director, 7th Army Corps. Alfred was discharged from Newport News, Va.

According to the Department of the Interior in 1888, he had been discharged because of “rheumatism contracted in Baltimore Md. and in camp at Arlington Heights Va. in October 1862.”

This year, I received a thick packet of information on Alfred from another new cousin, Bob Joiner in Arizona.

I find that when he died in 1890, Alfred was getting $4 a month in disability pension. And what a lot of paperwork he had to do to satisfy the government that he was the same Alfred Hart who had served the Union, and that he had a legitimate disability.

Records included a deposition by Alfred, and also one by Samuel Morrill of Dexter that Alfred was “a well and able-bodied man” before the war, and that they had served together.

“We were mustered into the U.S. Service at Bangor, Maine, Oct. 10, 1862 and were sent to Washington D.C. and from thence to the Arlington Heights where we camped without tents or rubber blankets and were exposed to rainstorm lasting thirty-six hours: We had no shelter at all and suffered from wet and cold,” Morrill said. “From there we were ordered to Newport News by way of Washington and Alexandria. At Alexandria and on the route we encountered another storm of snow and rain which lasted about twelve hours. At Newport News I found him sick and unable to do duty and said Hart was sent to the Hospital at Fortress Monroe.”

Morrill went on to talk of observing Alfred’s ill health once back in Dexter.

Also interesting was a record of medical examination of April 4, 1888, listing Alfred’s pulse of 104, respiration 24, temperature 971/2, height 5 feet 61/2 inches, weight 117 pounds.

Among the observations, “unhealthy, anemic, complexion livid and sallow, lips cyanosed. Evident deficiency of red corpuscles … both legs below knees cold, pinched in appearance …”

The recommendation was that he receive a 2nd-grade rating for disability caused by disease of kidneys and results.

The review was signed by E.A. Thompson, president; J.B. Cochrane, secretary; and E.P. Snow, treasurer, in Dover.

Another deposition was filled out by Albert F. Bradbury, agent for Dexter Woolen Mills. He listed the number of weeks Alfred had been unable to work in each year 1870-71, 1873-76, 1878-82 and 1886-88. Without today’s technology, I imagine that putting together that information was rather time-consuming!

Other citizens giving testimony on Alfred’s behalf in 1888 included Thomas Knowles, 62, and Asa F. More, 55, both of Dexter. They said that their friend was disabled to the point that he had “often been carried to his work.”

Particularly poignant was a note added to the deposition of Henry L. Wood, who had been captain of Company E 22nd Maine Volunteers:

“I told him years since that he ought to apply for a pension, he always answered that his service was so short, that he would not ask the United States to help him, until he was not able to help himself.”

Alfred died in Dexter in January 1890, with one child still a minor, 15-year-old Bertha G. Hart. She applied for his pension with the assistance of her guardian, Barnet Whorff of Skowhegan. I don’t know his connection to the family.

The Declaration for Pension form included these words, which Barnet Whorff attested to: “that the said children have not aided or abetted the rebellion.”

Of course, said child wasn’t even born until several years after the Civil War ended! In 1890, 25 years after the Civil War, the government wanted to make sure that anybody they paid money to was still on the side of the Union.

So even if an ancestor’s military service was brief, it’s worth looking for the records. For information on requesting copies, visit www.archives.org and click on military records.

Though Alfred served his country, he wasn’t born here. He was a native of Trowbridge, England, who apparently came over in the 1850s. He is buried on Liberty Street in Dexter.

Send genealogy queries to Family Ties, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor, ME 04402; or familyti@bangordailynews.net.