Samuel Aldrich updated 2026

Samuel Aldrich was born in 1820 or 1826  in Uxbridge, Worcester County, Massachusetts.  

He was reportedly a 21-year-old farmer born in Worcester, Massachusetts when he enlisted on May 26, 1840, at Dearbornville,  in the 4th U.S. Artillery for five years.    He deserted December 10, 1840, and was apprehended May 21, 1841; he deserted again on August 28 and was caught September 16, 1841. 

Samuel married Irish-born Eliza Sherwood (born 1816) on May 27, 1852, in Grand Haven, Ottawa County. 

By 1860 Samuel was working as a shingle-maker and living with his wife Eliza, who was working as a tailoress, in Norton, Muskegon County.

Samuel stood between 6’5” and 6’7” tall, with blue eyes, gray hair and a fair complexion, and was probably 40 years old and living and working as a sawyer and shingle maker in Norton  when he enlisted on April 29, 1861, as 6th Corporal in Company F, crediting Spring Lake, Ottawa County.  (Curiously Samuel did not join either the Muskegon-based Company H or the Ottawa County-based Company I.)

Samuel was present for duty through February of 1862, and then absent sick in his quarters in March and April and again in May and June. 

On May 5, 1862, while “on the march from Yorktown to Williamsburg,” Virginia, Samuel was carrying “the Regimental colors and marching much of the way very rapidly on the double quick when near Williamsburg, being a large and very tall man, he could not endure the excessive fatigue became exhausted and Major Byron R. Pierce, commanding the Regiment, finding that” Samuel “could not keep up with his Regiment told him to fall out and give the colors to another which he did. About two days after this,” about May 8, “varicose veins made their appearance around, above and below his left ankle, also upon his left leg nearly to his hip. . . .”   

He was listed as absent sick in a general hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, from August 18 through the end of the year.  Indeed, he was subsequently hospitalized at Patterson Park hospital in Baltimore during all or part of the months of August and September.  In August of 1862, he was reported sick in the hospital, and was dropped from the company rolls on December 30, 1862, at Camp Pitcher, Virginia. 

From Patterson Park, he was transferred to West’s Building hospital in Baltimore, where he remained about three months. He was then sent to the Convalescent Camp, in Alexandria, Virginia where he remained until he was discharged on February 16, 1863, for varicose veins of both legs, although he claimed in later years that he had been shot with a poisoned bullet, which produced the varicose veins. 

After he was discharged from the army, Samuel returned to Michigan. 

He was probably living in Lenawee County when he married Anna Odell (born 1818) on November 23, 1863, in Ionia County. (It is not known what had become of his first wife Eliza.) 

Samuel subsequently enlisted in the 2nd Veterans Reserve Corps on December 19, 1864, at Grand Rapids for 3 years, crediting Grand Rapids’ 1st Ward. Samuel may have been assigned to the rendezvous in Jackson, Jackson County. In any case, he allegedly deserted from Company B, 2nd Regiment, VRC on either April 6 or July 6, 1865. 

Following his “discharge” from the army lived in Grand Rapids where he was working as a laborer and living at 36 Waterloo Street. He was probably still living in Grand Rapids when he was admitted to the Central Branch, National Military Home, in Dayton, Ohio on April 1, 1867. He was eventually discharged from the NMH and returned to Michigan. By 1870 he was living on Ottawa Street, in Grand Rapids when he applied for a pension. He claimed he was suffering from the effects of varicose veins dating back to May 1862. 

Samuel was working as a laborer and living in Montague, Muskegon County, Michigan when he married a widow New Hampshire native Mrs. Sarah Griffin Sargent (1835-1903), on December 3, 20 or 30, 1872,  in Oceana County, Michigan. (Sarah was the widow of Fernando Sargeant or Sergeant, who had served in the reorganized 3rd Michigan Infantry.) 

However, it seems that Samuel had neglected to divorce Anna and had in fact simply abandoned her. In 1875 Sarah reportedly “filed a bill of complaint” against Samuel claiming that when they were married he had another wife, thus nullifying their marriage. She was also seeking divorce from Samuel on the grounds of cruelty. It is not known whatever became of the proceedings or the whether the charges were in fact true. 

Samuel was readmitted as a single man to the Central Branch NMH in Dayton on April 1, 1876, and discharged on June 30, 1879; he subsequently applied for admission to the Northwestern Branch of the NMH in Milwaukee and was initially refused but then given permission to stay in December of 1879. He withdrew his application and was dropped March 5, 1880. It appears he was readmitted to the Dayton NMH in May of 1880 and in the census for that year Samuel was listed as a resident of the NMH in Dayton, as married and his occupation as lumberman. He was still in the National Home in Dayton in 1883. 

Samuel was a member of Grand Army of the Republic Henry Post No. 3 in Montague, Muskegon County, and of Champlin Post No. 29 in Grand Rapids. In 1870 Samuel applied for and received pension no. 113,746, drawing $6.00 per month in 1887.

Samuel was living in Grand Rapids when he returned to the National Home in Dayton, Ohio where he died of pneumonia on January 22, 1888. He was buried in the Dayton National Cemetery in section G, row 8, grave 12.

In 1897 Sarah was living in Licking, Texas County, Missouri, but by 1901 she had returned to Michigan and was living in Muskegon. She applied for a dependent widow’s pension (cert. no. 658,553) but the certificate was never granted.