Civil War veteran given military award 126 years after death

NEW CITY, N.Y. – A Civil War medal has been awarded to a Union veteran who died before the military decoration was created.

New York state Sen. David Carlucci presented Viola Silverman, great-granddaughter of veteran John Ferguson Pratt, with a replica of the Civil War Campaign Medal on Wednesday.

Silverman, of Sparkill, says Pratt served in the 39th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment from November 1863 to July 1865. He had been shot during a battle in Virginia in May 1864.

Pratt had died in 1892, several years before the campaign medal was established for Union veterans of the Civil War.

Silverman says Pratt is buried in an unmarked grave in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, but the cemetery’s website says he’s buried in a gravesite marked with a stone that notes his wartime service.