The history of benefits paid to U.S. Military Veterans is actually as old as the Declaration of Independence. The Continental Congress approved the nation’s first pension law in 1776, granting half-pay for life to Revolutionary War Veterans in cases of loss of limb or other serious disability. 

The first national effort to provide disabled Veterans with medical care began with the opening of the Naval Home in Philadelphia in 1812, followed by the Soldiers’ Home in 1853 and St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in 1855 – both in Washington, D.C.
 

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