Existing comment:
Colonel Patterson's death proved ruinous for his family. In 1865, the Orphan's Court directed the sale of the Patterson's home to support the family. Almira -- with three fatherless children, without job skills, and amidst a society that frowned on women working -- received a widow's pension of about $360 a year. She never remarried.
Widows and families, North and South, suffered similarly.
In the wake of John's death at the Wilderness, Almira had to sell her house to support her family. She had this poster printed in 1865.
When Almira died in 1908 at the age of 73, her obituary identified her simply as "the widow of Colonel John W. Patterson." |