I just finished reading a wonderful book called This Thing Of Darkness, a mostly factual novel about the 1830s voyage of The Beagle.
Everyone has at least heard of the Beagle through Charles Darwin; the ship’s naturalist who discovered en route the principle of evolution through natural selection, thereby winning immortal fame for himself and considerably elevating human understanding.
During this uniquely famous voyage Darwin amassed a great collection of specimens, among which were three live giant tortoises he brought back to England from the Galapagos Islands.
Two of the three tortoises died, but the third, Harry, became a pet and lived with Darwin in England. However poor Harry was not suited to our climate and Darwin eventually sent him to his friend John Wickham in Australia.
Now here’s the single most amazing thing I know: Harry, or Harriet as she now is since the great man mistook her gender, is still alive and living in Australia! Not only that, she’s looked after by Steve Irwin! From Darwin to Irwin…
Of course everyone knows turtles and tortoises can live an alarmingly long time, and there are are some trees alive today which were alive many thousands of years ago, but it still flabbergasts me to think that there a living, breathing survivor of the voyage of the Beagle still with us.
The internet made Alberta Martin somewhat famous. She was the last surviving widow of a Civil War soldier. That blew my mind and I was greatly disappointed when she died in 2004.
That is, everyone thought she was the last Civil War widow. The family of Maudie Celia Hopkins was suprised when they heard on the news that the last Civil War widow was dead. They were sitting there looking at one and now she has her rightful place.
ok - see I have a problem with the logisitcs of the claim - the statement “Civil War Widow” implies that she was married to a soldier who died in battle - neither Ms Hopkins nor the late Ms Martin are/were old enough to have accompished that. Each married a Civil War Veteren, by title, both men survived the war, likely both fought in WWI, then years later, met and married their ladies, which technically makes the women WWI widows; it is a stretch, to say the least, to bestow them with the title “Civil War Widow”
and by the way - the turtle fact is way cool
while in high school, a friend had a pet South American Tortoise - at a party, while getting high, we blew smoke in its face - it then pulled in its legs, and stuck its head way out, looking around at us and everything - and i swear – it SMILED!!!
It’s not exactly certain this is so, I’m afraid, as records were lost in a flood. She’s the right species and over 142 years old, but that’s all that’s known for sure.
Am I missing something? The end of the Civil War and the start of WWI are 49 years apart. Even if they were lifer soldiers, it’s just possible, but unlikely they served in both wars. Even joining a CW side at the end makes for math of 49+17=63 as a minimum age for the start of WWI. Most people would have retired by then, and IIRC, would be required to (unless they were field grade officers?).
true - there were several decades between the two wars (rethinking my original statement) - which makes it even less likely that the two women, who were both 89 last year, and therefore born in 1915, could have been “Civil War Widows” - the men they married would have to have been old enough to be their grandfathers when they were wed, even if the women were still teenagers; it is more likely that the men were children or even infants during the Civil War, and therefore could hardly have been veterens of the event - survivors would be a more accurate title - and the title of war widow is usually given to women whose (note the correct spelling - see grammar thread <gd&r>) husbands die in battle. So tell me please, how either of these relatively young women could claim to be Civil War Widows?
possibly, but to have fought in the war, the men would have been well in their late 60’s early 70’s when the women were born, and in their 80’s when they married. Now Whatsisname and Anna Nicole notwithstanding, that kind of age gap is just too bizarre, and very likely totally unheard of in the late 1920’s early 1930’s when the women would have been old enough to marry
Why would it be more unlikely to have happened then? I would think we’ve generally gotten more mores about marriage now. Remember that Jerry Lee Lewis wasn’t doing anything that unusual for his region and time when he married his 13-year old second cousin.
I believe that the so-called Civil War widows are the genuine article.
I’ll have to research this to get the specifics but I remember reading this a long time ago. I think in the 1920’s, Civil War veterans were given some kind of pension, bonus, etc and young women married some of these rather old veterans in order to have this payment go to them upon the death of their husband.
