| Notes |
- AMELIA "MILLE" DRULLINGER was born 16 March 1836 in Darke County, Ohio and died 16 August 1909 in Keeler, Van Buren County, Michigan. She married Reuben Shockney 25 June 1870 in Randolph County, Indiana. Millie and her new husband Reuben are enumerated in different households in 1870. They were married June 25, enumeration was July 16. The date of census was 1 June so they were enumerated in the households they were living in then. However, Millie is listed as Millie Schockny rather than Millie Drollinger. The 1900 census indicates that neither Reuben nor Mille could read and write.
Reuben Shockney applied for a Civil War pension 22 July 1890, because he suffered from "a breach kidney complaint, rheumatizm and chronic diarree and is from these causes disqualified from working to earn a living." He entered the service as a private in Company H of the 124th regiment of Indiana Volunteers 4 February 1864, and in September of that year was detailed to the 3rd Division as a teamster. The following February he was sent to the 124th Regiment at Camp Stoneman near Washington, D. C. His commanding officer said he complained of a rib broken by coming in close proximity to a mule. Six months later Reuben was sent to a hospital in Marietta, Georgia, because of his diarrhea and soon thereafter, on 31 August 1865, he was discharged at Greensboro, North Carolina.
The picture of Reuben Shockney that emerges from his Civil War pension file is of a man almost completely debilitated by chronic diarrhea, complicated by rheumatism and eventually by a hernia, heart disease, impaired eyesight and hearing. There is no record of his health before he enlisted in the Army in 1864, but it is clear that he was a broken man when he was discharged 18 months later. He made his way home to Randolph County, Indiana from his release in Greensboro, North Carolina, and it was obvious to his friends and neighbors that this 35 year old man was seriously ill. Seven affidavits in his file give witness to his particularly embarrassing illness. His brother-in-law Aaron Drullinger and nephew Charles H. Drullinger said they did not remember his exact symptoms when he came home from his service, but "what was said among ourselves and the neighbors that the disease he suffered with was chronic diarrhea." Furthermore, they said he never looked well. Gideon L. Rathbun, married to Ellen Drullinger, the sister of Reuben's wife, did not know him when he came home from the Army. However, he knew him "by repute for 15 years and intimately since 8 August 1882." That was when Reuben and Millie moved from Indiana to Michigan and lived in the same house with Gideon for two months. Gideon said "I learned immediately after his coming that he was affected with chronic diarrhea from the fact that each day he frequently responded to calls of nature and his countenance plainly showed that he was suffering with said disease." In spite of being very careful with his diet not eating "sour or tart apples, pickles or drunk cider or anything of that character" (the Drullingers) and "avoiding all acids," (Rathbun), Reuben was so disabled that he could not do manual farm labor more than half the time.
Reuben was an uneducated man, probably with few skills beyond those of a simple farmer, and being unable to perform manual labor prevented him from earning a living. Jonathan Mikesell said he didn't work at all for the first two years after his discharge and subsequently lived with Mikesell in 1868 and 1869. In fact it was this Mikesell he lived with just prior to his marriage.
Millie must have been aware of Reuben's health problems when she married him and perhaps that was why she was an old maid of 34 when they wed. She would have seen him walking with his cane upon his return from the service and small town gossip being what it is, she no doubt knew about his diarrhea. Their move to Michigan in 1882 may have been prompted by a need for emotional and financial support. All of Millie's siblings lived there and one was married to a Shockney who may have been a younger brother of Reuben. None of the affidavits in the pension file mention Millie. She may have worked as a housekeeper as she did before their marriage or helped her sisters and sister-in-law to care for their children. Presumably, they spent their entire married lives in poverty. Deed records in Randolph County, Indiana, and Van Buren County, Michigan, show no property transactions for Reuben. In spite of his health problems, Reuben outlived Millie by 4 years. And the final paper in his pension file asks permission for the man who cared for and buried Reuben to claim the last pension check as there is no widow and no children.
Kay Germain Ingalls 2003
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1836 - 1909 (73 years)
