CHAP. CCXXXV. – An Act increasing the Pensions of Widows and Orphans, and for other Purposes.
| Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the provisions of the pension laws are hereby extended to and made to include provost marshals, deputy provost marshals, and enrolling officers, who have been killed or wounded in the discharge of their duties; and for the purpose of determining the amount of pension to which such persons and their dependents shall be entitled, provost marshals shall be ranked as captains, deputy provost marshals as first lieutenants, and enrolling officers as second lieutenants.
SEC. 2. And be it further enacted, That the pensions to widows of deceased soldiers and sailors, having children by such deceased soldiers or sailors, be increased at the rate of two dollars per month for each child of such soldier or sailor under the age of sixteen years. And in all cases in which there shall be more than one child of any deceased soldier or sailor leaving no widow, or where his widow has died or married again, or where she has been deprived of her pension under the provisions of section eleven of an act entitled “An act supplementary to the several acts relating to pensions,” approved June sixth, eighteen hundred and sixty-six, the pension granted to such children under sixteen years of age by existing laws shall be increased to the same amount per month that would be allowed under the foregoing provisions to the widow if living and entitled to a pension: Provided, That in no case shall more than one pension be allowed to the same person. SEC. 3. And be it further enacted, That the provisions of an act entitled “An act to grant pensions,” approved July fourteen, eighteen hundred and sixty-two, and of the acts supplementary thereto and amendatory thereof, are hereby, so far as applicable, extended to the pensions under previous laws, except revolutionary pensioners. SEC. 4. And be it further enacted, That if any person during the pendency of his application for an invalid pension, and after the completion of the proof showing his right thereto, has died, or shall hereafter die, but not in either case by reason of a wound received, or disease contracted in the service of the United States and in the line of duty, his widow, or if he left no widow, or in the event of her death or marriage, his relatives in the same order in which th[e]y would have received a pension, if they had been thereunto entitled under existing laws on account of the services and death in the line of duty of such person, shall have the right to demand and receive the accrued pension to which he would have been entitled had the certificate issued before his death; and in all cases where such person so entitled to an invalid pension has died, or shall hereafter die, under circumstances hereinbefore mentioned, whether by reason of a wound received or disease contracted in the service of the United States, and in the line of duty or otherwise, without leaving a widow or such relatives, then such accrued pension shall be paid to the executor or administrator of such person in like manner and effect as if such pension were so much assets belonging to the estate of the deceased at the time of his death. SEC. 5. And be it further enacted, That the repeal by the act entitled “An act supplementary to the several acts relating to pensions,” approved June sixth, eighteen hundred and sixty-six, of parts of certain acts mentioned in the first section of said act, shall not work a forfeiture of any rights accrued under or granted by such parts of such acts so repealed; but such rights shall be recognized and allowed in the same manner and to all intents and purposes as if said act had never passed, except that the invalid pensioner shall be entitled to draw from and after the taking effect of said act the increased pension thereby granted in lieu of that granted by such parts of such acts so repealed. SEC. 6. And be it further enacted, That nothing in the fourth section of an act entitled “An act supplementary to the several acts relating to pensions,” approved March third, eighteen hundred and sixty-five, or in any other supplementary or amendatory act relating to pensions, shall be so construed so as to impair the right of a widow whose claim for a pension was pending at the date of her re-marriage, to the pension to which she would otherwise be entitled, had her deceased husband left no minor child or children under the age of sixteen years. APPROVED, July 25, 1866. |