Civil War Veteran
Questionnaire
This is taken from The Tennessee Civil War Veterans Questionnaires, Vol 4, Compiled by Gustavus W. Dyer and John Trotwood Moore, Southern Historical Press, Inc., 1985, pp 1151-1152 Form number 1, which is what this one is, was mailed out by Gustavus Dyer in 1914-1915 to Veterans. MITCHELL, NAT 1. State your full name and
present Post
Office address:
2. State your age now:
3. In what State or county
were you born?
4. In what State and county
were you living
when you enlisted in the service of the Confederacy,
or of the Federal
Government?
5. What was your occupation
before the war?
6. What was the occupation
of your father?
7. If you owned land or
other property at
the opening of the war, state what kind of property
you owned, and state
the value of your property as near as you can.
8. Did you or your parents
own slaves?
If so, how many?
9. If your parents owned
land, state about
how many acres:
10. State as near as you
can the value of
all the property owned by your parents, including
land, when the war opened:
11. What kind of house did
your parents
occupy? State whether it was a log house or
frame house or built
of other materials, and state the number of rooms it
had:
12. As a boy and young man,
state what kind
of work you did. If you worked on a farm, state
to what extent you
plowed, worked with a hoe, and did other kinds of
similar work:
13. State clearly what kind
of work your
father did, and what the duties of your mother
were. State all the
kinds of work done in the house as well as you can
remember--that is, cooking,
spinning, weaving, etc.
14. Did your parents keep
any servants?
If so, how many?
15. How was honest toil-as
plowing, hauling,
and other sorts of honest work of this class-regarded
in your community?
Was such work considered respectable and honorable?
16. Did the white men in
your community
generally engage in such work?
17. To what extent were
there white men
in your community leading lives of idleness and having
others dod their
work for them?
18. Did the men who owned
slaves mingle
freely with those who did not own slaves, or did
slaveholders in any way
show by their actions that they felt themselves better
than respectable,
honorable men who did not own slaves?
19. At the churches, at the
schools, at
public gatherings in general, did slaveholders and
non-slaveholders mingle
on a footing of equality?
20. Was there a friendly
feeling between
slaveholders and non-slaveholders in your community,
or were they antagonistic
to each other?
21. In a political contest
in which one
candidate owned slaves and the other did not, did the
fact that one candidate
owned slaves help him in winning the contest?
22. Were the opportunies
good in your community
for a poor young man-honest and industrious-to save up
enough to buy a
small farm or go in business for himself?
23. Were poor, honest,
industrious young
men, who were ambitious to make something of
themselves, encouraged or
discouraged by slaveholders?
24. What kind of school or
schools did you
attend?
25. About how long did you
go to school
altogether?
26. How far was it to the
nearest school?
27. What school or schools
were in operation
in your neighborhood?
28. Was the school in your
community private
or public?
29. About how many months
in the year did
it run?
30. Did the boys and girls
in your community
attend school pretty regularly?
31. Was the teacher of the
school you attended
a man or a woman?
32. In what year and month
and at what place
did you enlist in the Confederate or of the Federal
Government?
33. State the name of your
regiment, and
state the names of as many mambers of your company as
you remember:
34. After enlistment, where
was your company
sent first?
35. How long after your
enlistment before
your company engaged in battle?
36. What was the first
battle you engaged
in?
37. State in your own way
your experience
in the war from this time on until the close.
State where you went
after the first battle--what you did, what other
battles you engaged in,
how long they lasted, what the results were; state how
you lived in camp,
how you were clothed, how you slept, what you had to
eat, how you were
exposed to cold, hunger and disease. If you
38. When and where were you
discharged?
39. Tell something of your
trip home.
40. What kind of work did
you take up when
you came back home?
41. Give a sketch of your
life since the
close of the Civil War, stating what kind of business
you have engaged
in, where you have lived, your church relations,
etc. If you have
held an office or offices, state what it was. You may
state here any other
facts connected with your life and experience which
has not been brought
out by the questions:
42. Give the full name of
your father ___________;
born __________ at __________; in the county of:
____________ state of
___________. He lived at ____________-.
Give also any particulars
concerning him, as official position, war services,
etc.; books written
by, etc.
43. Maiden name of your
mother: _______________;
She was the daughter of___________(full name)
___________ and his wife
______________(full name) ________ who lived at
______.
44. Remarks on
ancestry. Give here
any and all facts possible in reference to your
parents, grandparents,
great-grandparents, etc., not included in the
foregoing, as where they
lived, office held, Revolutionary or other war
services; what country the
family came from to America; where first settled,
county and state; always
giving full names (if possible) and never referring to
an ancestor simply
as such without giving a name. It is desirable
to include every fact
possible and to that end the full and exact record
from old Bibles should
be appended on separate sheets of this size, thus
preserving the facts
from loss:
45. Give the names of all
members of your
Company you can remember: (If you know where the
Roster is to be had, please
make special note of this.)
46. Give here the NAME and
POST OFFICE ADDRESS
of living Veterans of the Civil War, whether members
of your company or
not.
Submitted by LuAnn Lawton |
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