Man Born in 1846 Talks About the 1860s and Fighting in the Civil War

YouTube ^ | circa 1947 | Julius Franklin Howell

[RandFan]

Julius Franklin Howell (January 17, 1846 - June 19, 1948) joined the Confederate Army when he was 16. After surviving a few battles, he eventually found himself in a Union prison camp at Point Lookout, Maryland.

In 1947, at the age of 101, Howell made this recording at the Library of Congress.

[waterhill]

Learned how to hunt fish and cook. She was nadass.

[Myrddin]

I do have a daguerrotype of my great grandfather in his Union Army uniform. The image is on glass with a copper edging to cover the sharp edges.

My paternal grandmother was an active DAR and member of the Mayflower Society. She did most of the serious research for the family genealogy records.

[Verginius Rufus]

Lots of photos of Civil War soldiers survive.

My two great-grandfathers who were born in the US were too young to fight (one was 9 when the war began, the other one born in 1863), while the other two lived in Europe. I had a great-great-grandfather who was a Confederate but have no photo of him. Another great-great-grandfather was a Union soldier and I have a photo of him but taken many years after the war.

[Myrddin]

Make your best effort to document the family history. It is easily lost as each generation passes. The advent of DNA family tracing has helped connect some of my family records. My dad reconnected with his half brother. His half brother's mom died in child birth. I now have a connection to cousins that would have disappeared from the family records.

[Verginius Rufus]

I agree entirely. I have been working on genealogy since I was 21 years old, spent many hours looking at census records on microfilm readers before they were made available online, have visited archives in the UK and Eastern Europe. My maternal grandfather died when I was a baby so never knew him but learned a lot from his sister and brother.

My other grandfather lived to 93 so I tried to think of questions to ask him while he was still alive. On one of my paternal grandmother's lines I can trace back to about 1200 but on my maternal grandmother's side I can only get back to her grandfathers (both immigrants and I don't know their exact places of birth).

I think it's kind of cool to have been able to join the SAR while being just a third-generation American on one side.

[Myrddin]

I think it's kind of cool to have been able to join the SAR while being just a third-generation American on one side.

I don't know if my dad ever joined SAR. I have not. My wife researched diligently for her DAR qualifications and was rejected for having a Quaker in her lineage. After months of effort, she just dropped it entirely.

[Verginius Rufus]

It should be easy to find out if your father was ever a member of the SAR. I think they have records of everyone who ever belonged. I could have some Quaker ancestors way back (but not the ancestor I joined under, who was a Scots-Irish Presbyterian)...but I haven’t verified the Quaker bit. My Confederate great-great-grandfather later belonged to a pacifist denomination but I don’t know if he was a member during the war.

[SunkenCiv]

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