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The last American citizen receiving a Civil War pension has died in North Carolina at the age of 90.
Irene Triplett, whose father fought for the Union Army between 1863 and 1865, passed away Sunday in Wilkesboro from complications following surgery.
Irene suffered from from mental disabilities and therefore qualified for federal financial support as a ‘helpless adult child of a veteran’, according to The Washington Post.
She received a monthly check of $73.13 from the Department of Veterans Affairs, which went towards expenses for the nursing home where she lived.
Her father, Mose Triplett, was 83 years old when his much younger wife, Elida, gave birth to Irene in 1930.
Irene Triplett, whose father fought for the Union Army between 1863 and 1865, passed away Sunday in Wilkesboro from complications following surgery. She was the last American citizen receiving a Civil War pension
Irene’s father Mose Triplett (center) fought in the Civil War of 1861- 1865. He is pictured in a photograph taken in the early 20th Century
Mose Triplett first enlisted with the Confederate Army at the age of 16. He eventually defected and became a Union soldier. He died at the age of 92, and is buried in North Carolina
Irene grew up in poverty in the Appalachians of North Carolina, and never learned to read or write. She became hooked on tobacco at the age of seven, and left school in the sixth grade.
In an interview with The Washington Post in 2014, she revealed she was teased by her peers about her father, who was dubbed a ‘traitor’ because he had defected from the Confederate Army to the Union Army partway through the Civil War.
Mose Triplett initially enlisted with the North Carolina Infantry Regiment in 1862, aged just 16.
However, he fell ill while his regiment was headed to Gettysburg and he was subsequently hospitalized in Virginia.
He later made a daring escape after his regiment suffered losses during the Battle of Gettysburg and he enlisted…
Read the full article at www.dailymail.co.uk