History Of Delaware County Indiana Illustrated T.B. Helm 1881                                                               Military History                                             WAR OF THE REVOLUTION                      T HE only connection that Delaware County could sustain to that conflict which raged more than a century ago, is that a scanty few of its surviving veterans might wander away from the scenes of their youth and their manhood, and of the conflict which they waged for freedom, to spend their few remaining years beneath the protecting shadow  of the“stars and stripes” in the mighty forests of the untrodden West.  Such, doubtless, there have been—Revolutionary soldiers who took up their abode in Delaware County, possibly, accompanying their children to this wild country for succor and support in the day of trial and weakness. We know of one such; probably, there were more. Yet, we havefound no account of them. November 3, 1843, Frederick E. Putnam writes in his diary,as printed elsewhere in this work: “Old Mr. Gilbert (Revolutionary pensioner)died to-day, and was buried with the honors of war.” How old this aged soldier was at the time of his death, Mr. Putnam does not state. If, however, he was eighteen years old in 1780, he would be eighty-one in 1843. And now, only theold, possibly the middle aged, remember so much as to have seen a soldier of the Revolution. And the actors in the last great war are gradually dropping out, one by one. Though the land is full of soldiers now, the time is not very far distant when these, also, with all others of like age and service, shall behidden away in the tomb.                                     WAR OF 1812.                        Something may be said concerning this now ancient war in connection-with Delaware County. Of course, the war itself was past before this region became opened to white settlers. Still, to some of the counties lying around Delaware that war was a fearful calamity, and a source of great terror and danger. These forests were full of hostile savages, their towns were on all the chief streams, their trails threaded the forests through the whole extent of the country, the few families flocked to the rude forts and block-houses, while the husbands joined the army and marched against the foe. Wayne, Dearborn and Union Counties had been partly settled, and, until within a few years past, the fearful tales of savage warfare in 1811-13, might still be heard from the lips of those who took apart therein. Perhaps a scanty few even yet survive the storms of the years that have past, and can, at this late day, remember and rehearse how the British burnt Washington or Buffalo, or how Gen. Harrison defeated the Indians at Tippecanoe, or on the Thames; or, how “Old Hickory” broke the British power at New Orleans. But, however that may be, it is certainly true, that, during the lapse of time since those days of  peril and fear cast their dark shadow over the land, a considerable number of the soldiers in that “second war of independence,” have taken up their abode within the limits of this county. Upon the banner containing thelist of our departed heroes are inscribed the names of eight aged veterans,from eighty to eighty-six years old, who had been soldiers in that war of by gone generations, and whose worn-out frames have found rest from the weary toils and cares of mortal life in the friendly’ soil of Delaware, the latest burial among the number occurring in 1876.            These eight names are given elsewhere, and do not need to be repeated. Whether any soldiers of the war of 1812 are still living in this county, we do not know; but it is a fact that several widows of those old veterans do yet dwell among us, at least two of whom reside in the city of Muncie, viz: Mrs. Mary Youse and Mrs. Wilson,the first seventy-eight and the second eighty years old. Both these old widows are cheered, in these their later years, by the bestowment of a pension from the friendly hand of the National Government. These widows were not the wivesof these soldier husbands till long since the close of that war, and hence it happens that the governmental favor has been slow in reaching them, the act of Congress applying to their cases having been passed only about 1877. This branch of our subject may be fully closed by a brief account of the husbands