Finding Your Roots

Now we encountered those same qualities in Sharon's own mother, Dorothy Lawson.

Dorothy was born in 1933, and she's still going strong today, which is all the more remarkable, given the circumstances of her childhood.

According to Sharon, Dorothy's parents were simply unable to care for her.

They lived in abject poverty.

Mmm.

They had a two-room house on the railroad tracks, and five daughters.

They had more, one of them was hit by a drunk driver and killed when she was crossing the street with my mom and her sisters, and was killed instantly.

My mother had a twin who died, was dead at birth.

Just malnutrition.

They had, my mother grew up with rickets and scurvy.

And finally, they took her out of her house and moved her into the local dentist's home when she was nine, and she became their maid, their cook, their laundress, their shopper.

Hmm.

Till she met my dad at 16 and got married.

That's tough.

Mm-hmm.

As it turns out, Dorothy is not the only member of her family to survive great hardship.

Moving back on her paternal line, we came to a man named George Greggs.

George is Sharon's third great-grandfather.

He was born in 1842, and he spent much of his life as a coal miner in Pennsylvania.

But that's not all that he did.

This is the veteran's schedule of the 1890 Federal Census for Mercer County, Pennsylvania.

"George Greggs, address, Stoneboro, Pennsylvania, rank, private, company A, 17th Pennsylvania Cavalry.

Date of enlistment, August 30th, 1864.

Date of discharge, June 17th, 1865."

Did you have any idea that you descend from a veteran of the Civil War who fought on the right side?

From a Yankee?

Feels good.

You know, it's a proud moment for me to look at this.

I'm a proud American.

I'm proud of our democracy, and I believe in our democracy, and I'm proud to be a part of it.

I'm sure my great-great-great- great-grandfather was too.

George signed up to fight when he was 22 years old, and was assigned to a Calvary regiment.

As a coal miner, he likely had little experience riding horses, but he quickly found himself tested.

In the early hours of October 19th, 1864, Confederate forces launched a surprise attack on the Union Army in the Shenandoah Valley, threatening Washington DC.

By mid-morning, the Union was in disarray.

But a ferocious counter attack, led by the Calvary, turned the tide in what became known as the Battle of Cedar Creek.

Wow!

The victory became national news.

That victory helped ensure Abraham Lincoln's reelection to a second term the following month, and your ancestor was there.

Freaking badass.

I love that.

When the war ended, George was a hero, but he paid a heavy price.

His military records show that he left the Army suffering from rheumatism, a chronic condition marked by intense pain in the joints and muscles.

What's more, George's mental health suffered too.