Just yesterday, I wrote about my distant cousin ancestor, Edward Colman and the terrible wound he suffered during the Battle of Shiloh. While revisiting his family records afterward, I discovered something about Edward’s childhood that I had somehow overlooked.

Long before Edward survived a gunshot wound to the face, he had already experienced tremendous loss.

Edward was born July 28, 1828, the son of Dr. Anson Colman and Catherine Kimball Rochester. His mother was the daughter of Colonel Nathaniel Rochester, one of the founders and namesake of Rochester, New York. Contemporary family records confirm Edward’s birth and this place among Anson and Catherine’s children.

Catherine died on April 7, 1835, when Edward was just six years old.

Two years later, on April 22, 1837, Edward’s father, Dr. Anson Colman, made his will. Among its provisions were careful instructions for his four surviving children.

His daughter, Sophia and his eight-year old son, Edward, were placed under the guardianship of Thomas H. Rochester, Catherine’s brother. Edward’s sisters, Catherine and Cornelia, were placed under the guardianship of another maternal uncle, Henry E. Rochester. Anson also directed that the guardians oversee the children’s education and support, with money from his estate provided for their needs.

Less than three months after writing the will, Anson Colman died on July 17, 1837. Historical accounts describe him as a prominent Rochester physician; during the cholera epidemic of 1832, he had even been sent to Montreal to study the disease and possible methods of preventing it’s spread in Rochester.

Edward was now an orphan at eight years old.

A later genealogical account independently confirms what I found in Anson’s will: Thomas H. Rochester was appointed guardian of Sophia and Edward, while Henry E. Rochester became guardian of Katherine (“Kitty”) and Cornelia. Interestingly, that researcher also found that the surviving records don’t establish exactly where each child lived afterward.

That distinction matters. I can’t say with certainty that Edward lived with Thomas Rochester throughout the remainder of his childhood. But I can say that his father legally entrusted Edward’s care to his maternal uncle and made provisions for his upbringing and education.

And suddenly, the man I wrote about yesterday looks a little different to me.

Before Shiloh, before the Civil War, and long before a bullet struck him in the face, Edward Colman had already survived the loss of both of his parents before his ninth birthday.

Sometimes you think you know an ancestor’s sotry.

And then you turn one more page.