JOHN WILLIAM DOUGLAS -- 96th INFANTRY4 MONTHS AND 29 DAYS IN THE 96th - John William Douglas was born inNapierville, Quebec, and came to the United States with his parents,Benjamin Douglas and Felicité Dupuis, and they finally settled in theBlack Brook area. He married in August of 1861.John Douglas was twenty years old when he enlisted in the 96thInfantry in Black Brook. He left his pregnant wife, Isadora Martin, athome and went to Plattsburgh where he was mustered into Captain NicholasDay's Company H on December 18, 1861, with seventy other men fromsouthern Clinton County. They left by train from Plattsburgh on March11, 1862, expecting to serve for three years.Before the 96th was ordered to the Virginia Peninsula in early April,John became ill with typhoid fever, and he was left in hospital inWashington. He died in there on May 17, 1862, and was buried in, what isnow, the United States Soldiers\' and Airmen\'s Home National Cemeterynear Rock Creek, MD.Isadora started receiving her Widows Pension in September 1862. Shelived until 1911 and was buried in Holy Name Cemetery in Ausable Forks.Their son, John, who his father had never seen, died in 1925. He wasburied in the Fairview Cemetery. He was a lifelong employee of the J. &J. Rogers Company of Au Sable Forks, and at the time of his death, hewas in charge of the dam construction at Taylor Pond. For a number ofyears, he had been superintendent of woodlands for the company with theexception of a few years passed in the west and the time he spent inAlbany during the period Mr. George Chahoon was state senator and Mr.Douglas was doorkeeper of the senate.
