Fearless Females: Marriage Record

Continuing to honor the women in our family, today's question from The Accidental Genealogist:

Do you have marriage records for your grandparents or great-grandparents? Write a post about where they were married and when. Any family stories about the wedding day? Post a photo too if you have one.

I stumbled on this Marriage License one day while searching the Civil War records for my 2nd great grandfather, Thomas Hansel Shepherd. It always pays to look around when searching records. I would not have found this had I not searched several pages before and beyond the pension application that I was originally looking for. This Marriage License was attached to the Widow's Pension Application that was filed upon Thomas' death by his wife, Mary Anna Ruth Harvey (Shepherd).

Here are a couple of excerpts from an interview with Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepherd for the Macon Telegraph in the early 1930s:

"My husband was Thomas Hansel Shepherd and he fought in the (Civil) war in the last year. That was before we were married though, he was just a boy!"

"I was married when I was not quite 18 and my husband was just 18 and we farmed, that's about all a boy could do in those days." 

Thomas and Mary were married in Laurens County, Georgia on December 21, 1865.

Mary Anna Ruth Harvey Shepherd
"Granny Shepherd"