The Department of Veterans Affairs still issues a monthly pension payment to 84-year-old Irene Triplett, for her father’s service in the Union Army during the Civil War.

Triplett is “the last child of any Civil War veteran still on the VA benefits rolls.”

According to The Wall Street Journal, “Ms. Triplett’s pension, small as it is, stands as a reminder” that the end of actual warfare does not mark the end of paying for that warfare. “The VA is still paying benefits to 16 widows and children of veterans from the 1898 Spanish-American War.”

Moreover, “the last World War I veteran died in 2011…but 4,038 widows, sons and daughters get monthly VA pensions or other payments” tied to that war.

Families of “deceased veterans from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan received $6.7 billion in the 2013 fiscal year.”

Follow AWR Hawkins on Twitter @AWRHawkins Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.