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We composed a search in Yahoo! consisting of the following keywords: civil war last survivor. Charging right past the irrelevant "Site Matches," we went straight to the "Web Page Matches" provided by Google's index. Our first match was from the U.S. Civil War FAQ, a mighty two-part document that covers all aspects of the war between the Union and the Confederacy (1861-1865). We learned that yours is a "frequently asked question." By using Ctrl F (the "Find in Page" function in the Edit drop-down menu of your browser), we located your answer within the long page of text. In the group of questions about the end of the war we discovered:
Q3.4: Who was the last surviving veteran of the Civil War? Albert Woolson of Minnesota was a Union drummer boy who died in 1956, and the Civil War's last authenticated survivor. On the Confederate side the answer is somewhat more difficult to confirm. An article by historian William Marvel, published in Blue and Gray magazine in February 1991, and titled "The Great Impostors," names Pleasant Crump of the 10th Alabama, who died in 1951, the last Confederate vet. Prior claimants to the distinction included Walter Washington Williams (who died December 19, 1959) of Texas and John Salling (who died March 19, 1959) of Virginia. A thorough check of official census records by Marvel suggests that both
Williams and Salling were too young to have served. We went back to the search results to substantiate our findings, only to discover that the reference desk at the Chicago Public Library, in answer to the very same question, still lists Mr. Walter W. Williams as the last Confederate survivor, despite the fact that the page was updated in April, 1999. Looking for more? The real-life last Confederate widow, Mrs. Alberta Martin, resides in an old-age home in Elba, Alabama, and although the ancient lady is still alive, plans for her funeral have already been made. It is to be a celebration of Confederate
heritage. "Old times there are not forgotten..."
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