Person:Elmer Pilcher (1)

Elmer Ellsworth are unusual names for the Pilcher family. what is more unusual is that there is a famous martyr of the Civil War named Elmer Ellsworth. In The Civil War (Ward, Burns and Burns) there are a couple of paragraphs about him. He is described as "a celebrity soldier..captain of the dashing New York Fire Zouaves." He was killed on May 23, 1861. Lincoln had sent a detachment of soliders to occupy Arlington and alexandria, as a buffer for D.C. in the initial tsages of the civil war. Elmer Ellsworth ran up to the top of an Alexandria hotel to take down a confederate flag flying there. On his way down, he was shot and killed by the hotel owner, and his deed was widely known and celebrated. But Elmer Ellsworth Pilcher was born BEFORE this occurred. Yet his name is so unusual that he can only have been named for him. Is his DOB wrong? Did the family know of Elmer Ellsworth before his death? Ward, Burns and Burns note that he "was once an apprentice lawyer and close to the President's whole family." Since parts of the President's family were from Kentucky, could he have been personally known to the Pilchers? This is a mystery.