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Andrew Ferguson moved to Indiana (which became a state in 1816) after the Revolutionary War. The 1840 United States Census, shown here, documents Ferguson’s residence in Monroe County. Ferguson is listed as a Revolutionary War veteran who received a pension for his military service. He is listed as being 82 years old (or born in about 1758), but he had previously claimed that he was born in about 1765. No other family members are documented in his household. 

National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC/Ancestry.com

One year after he initially applied for a Revolutionary War pension from the United States Government, Andrew Ferguson returned to the courthouse in Monroe County, Indiana, to share more details about his military service during the war. This document records his additional testimony. Ferguson declared that he had hoped to apply for a pension 17 years earlier in response to Congress’s 1818 law that allowed impoverished Revolutionary War veterans to apply for financial support from the United States Government. However, at the time, Ferguson was told that “a Colored man could not get a pension.” Many veterans of African descent applied for and received pensions according to the 1818 legislation, but they encountered racial discrimination and intimidation during the application process.

National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC/Fold3.com

Take a closer look at the buildings and parade ground at West Point. Cadets at the United States Military Academy continue to train on the same ground where the Continental Army encamped during the Revolutionary War. 

Image courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C.