The Daily Alaska Empire

Patron Saint for WAAC Suggested; Historical Incident Is Brought Up (Continued from Page One) November, 1783, she married within a year one 'Benjamin Gannett and there is no record that anything but conjugal bliss prevailed for the next 43 years, when the Army's one and only (until sometime hence) grand old lady died. Instead of being horrified, the Congressmen of those days tilted their beavers in courteous admiration. They even approved Deborah's pension-$48 a year at first and finally $76.80 a year. When she died. Benjamin Gannett got a "widow's pension." It took a special act of Congress, but those who were close to the memory of the nation's first female soldier didn't argue long. With the notation that the history of the young nation "furnishes no similar example of female heroism, fidelity and courage," Congress voted the soldier's widower $80 a year for the rest of his days. The WAACs will be hard put to find a more suitable patron saint than Deborah Sampson.