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Pieces of the Past: Ithaca's 'Aunt Becky' cared for Civil War wounded
NOVEMBER 6, 2009, 6:15 PM
Pieces of the Past appears every other Saturday. Carol Kammen is the Tompkins
County historian and the author of several books on local history, most recently
"Ithaca: A Brief History," published by The History Press.
On Nov. 11, Veterans Day, members of Company A of the 49th Iowa Voluntary Infantry
will raise a flagpole at Woodland Cemetery in Des Moines to mark the grave of Sarah
Young -- born in Ithaca and known during the Civil War as "Aunt Becky."
She was born Sarah Graham and went to war as Sarah Palmer, but the soldiers she
nursed, in their pain and weakness, began calling her "Mother." Then one soldier said
she reminded him of his Aunt Becky back home and that name stuck. She became well
known in the regiment and beyond as Aunt Becky.
In 1908 she was buried in Des Moines, Iowa, as Sarah Young in a grave shared with
her second husband David Young. Their grave puzzled a member of the Iowa Voluntary
Infantry who regularly visited local cemeteries to see that the stones are upright and the
service markers in place. At the grave for David and Sarah Young, the metal Civil War
marker was placed next to Sarah's side of the stone and not that of her husband. Why
was this?
When he finally looked into the records, he discovered that the marker was rightly
placed--Sarah Graham Parker Young had been an army nurse during the Civil War and
was the only woman member of the Iowa GAR. David Young, her husband, was also a
veteran of the war.
On Wednesday the company will raise a flag to remember the service of this Civil War
nurse.
Aunt Becky was born in 1830 as Sarah Graham in Ithaca. About 1850 she married Abel
Palmer and so became Sarah Palmer. Abel died shortly before the start of the Civil War,
leaving Sarah a widow with two very young daughters.
Her brother Theodore Graham answered the call for volunteers in the summer of 1862,
joined two weeks later by her brother John. Both were members of Company A of the
129th New York Infantry. Although nursing was not regarded as a proper thing for a
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woman to undertake, Sarah's brothers asked that she accompany them into the field to
care for them if they fell ill.
On Sept. 3, 1862 Sarah Palmer left Ithaca on the train to Owego, then she took the cars
to Baltimore. She was 32 years old. Going off to war could not have been an easy
decision for she had two young daughters she left behind with members of her large
family. Following her brothers might have been an economic, as well as a patriotic
option, for she did draw army pay while in service.
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As the war neared its end, Sarah Palmer looked about for a means of earning her
livelihood. She received an appointment as Matron of the Asylum for Orphans in
Washington, D.C. but without enthusiasm, she wrote, "if that is my sphere henceforth, I
will try to be happy."
That was not, however, to be her fate. When she returned to Ithaca in the late spring of
1865 she had her army pay and $165 from the soldiers, which they collected for her
benefit. To raise money, she put together her one diary that had not been lost and wrote
out her recollections, and in 1867 published "The Story of Aunt Becky's Army -Life."
Sometime before 1870 Sarah Palmer married David Young and the couple, with her two
daughters, moved to Iowa. Her brothers also moved west to Iowa and Nebraska.
Sarah Young remained spunky and outspoken during her long lifetime. When given the
chance to meet with a former Confederate officer she declined, stating she didn't care to
remember all the starving she had done on his account.
Sarah Young was called in Ithaca newspapers "Our Florence Nightingale." She died in
Iowa in 1908. There will be some of Aunt Becky's descendents at the ceremony No v. 11
as a new flagpole is raised in her honor. We should remember her too.
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Pieces of the Past appears every other Saturday. Carol Kammen is the Tompkins
County historian and the author of several books on local history, most recently
"Ithaca: A Brief History," published by The History Press.
As the war neared its end, Sarah Palmer looked about for a means of earning her
livelihood. She received an appointment as Matron of the Asylum for Orphans in
Washington, D.C. but without enthusiasm, she wrote, "if that is my sphere henceforth, I
will try to be happy."
That was not, however, to be her fate. When she returned to Ithaca in the late sprin g of
1865 she had her army pay and $165 from the soldiers, which they collected for her
benefit. To raise money, she put together her one diary that had not been lost and wrote
out her recollections, and in 1867 published "The Story of Aunt Becky's Army -Life."
Sometime before 1870 Sarah Palmer married David Young and the couple, with her two
daughters, moved to Iowa. Her brothers also moved west to Iowa and Nebraska.
Sarah Young remained spunky and outspoken during her long lifetime. When given the
chance to meet with a former Confederate officer she declined, stating she didn't care to
remember all the starving she had done on his account.
Sarah Young was called in Ithaca newspapers "Our Florence Nightingale." She died in
Iowa in 1908. There will be some of Aunt Becky's descendents at the ceremony Nov. 11
as a new flagpole is raised in her honor. We should remember her too.
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