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Looking for the Jackson connection to John A. McAnally
By John R. (Jack) McAnally
April 10, 2008

At the time of this photo, my second great-grandfather, John A. McAnally, veteran of the Civil War, was on a near total disability pension due to his wartime injuries.  He died in 1890.  The child on his lap is unidentified.

His civil war record indicates he was born in Franklin County, Kentucky in 1819 before the 1823 marriage of his assumed parents William and Nancy Poe McAnally in that same county.  Through Y-DNA testing my second cousin once removed and I have proved that he is actually a descendant of Robert Jackson born abt 1615 England d. 1683 Hempstead Long Island, New York, but we still have not determined who his father was or identified any other link to this Robert Jackson; nor do we know how and when the McAnally surname was acquired.

As an adult at age 45 John McAnally (Jackson) and his two oldest sons joined the Indiana Volunteers at the same time in January 1864, leaving his pregnant wife Mary Herndon McAnally at home with three children less than eleven years old.  One wonders if this was done because of the lure of the signing bonus or because of Mary Herndon’s connection to her cousin William (Billy) Herndon, former law partner of President Abraham Lincoln.

John A. (Jackson) McAnally descendants chart