After interviewing Capt. Riddell, Special Examiner MacBride returned to Cincinnati and immediately penned a letter to Albert Corbin. MacBride had good reason to want to talk to Albert. Finally, he had found someone who actually served in the Mexican War alongside Randolph Corbin. And according to Capt. Riddell, Albert reportedly knew the circumstances of Randolph’s death.
The Witnesses
Special Examiner Thomas H. MacBride arranged to have three witnesses give testimony about Benjamin F. Black and Randolph B. Corbin. Two of them knew the real Randolph Corbin.
The Special Examiner
A Special Examiner came to Walton, Kentucky in August, 1893 after Cynthia Black disclosed some questionable circumstances surrounding her late husband’s Mexican War pension. The Special Examiner asked a lot of good questions, some with fantastic genealogical value!
The fraudulent pension application
Cynthia Black accidentally stumbled into her late husband’s pension fraud when she applied to receive her widow’s pension.
Cynthia Black’s application for Widow’s Pension
Cynthia Black, Benjamin’s third wife, wasn’t a branch on the family tree that I’d paid much attention to before now. I wasn’t aware of much documentation about her, other than my great-grandmother Lola’s handwritten notes.
