Jane Perkins Buried in Hollywood Cemetery is NOT the Soldier Jane Perkins - Here's Why

Like so many women soldiers, Jane Perkins exited the stage of history leaving an impression on soldiers she encountered.  Indeed, a number of men wrote about her, either as fellow prisoners of war at Point Lookout or her Federal captors who described the Irish woman as unruly.  She appears to have been quite an interesting character, one whose story is incomplete as she seems to have disappeared from the records after her she was released from military prison.  Some modern researchers have attempted to fill in the blanks, which I greatly appreciate the effort.  It is quite a chore to document people of the past who didn't want to be found.  I speak from twenty-years experience.  But there are mistakes that have crept into Jane Perkins's story, and I wanted to address them with my most current research.

Elliott Burial Map of Gettysburg

We can't imagine what it was like to find ourselves in the aftermath of a catastrophic battle like Gettysburg.   Death and destruction were all around.  And the stench.  Approximately 7,000 corpses lay rotting in the Pennsylvania sun following the climactic action on the final day, July 3rd, 1863.  Then came the grisly and monumental task of interring the dead, a lengthy endeavor that horrified all involved.  The residents of the town soon found themselves living in a vast cemetery.  And while the citizens just wanted things to go back to normal and likely had no desire to document the location of the graves, others undertook the challenge.  One of whom was Samuel G. Elliott, a California engineer who surveyed the field during a visit in 1864.  

https://www.loc.gov/item/99447500