Bearnut,

It's really your call. If the ancestor is a former slave, there is the potential of finding out more about the family during slavery, especially from the widow's application. This is very nearly a direct ancestor, so presumably this an important individual to your family. Service during the Civil War is somewhat rare in most families so that he should merit some consideration for your ordering the full package. I've only ordered the short package because the individuals I've ordered for were not direct ancestors but rather were collateral lines and they were free people before the Civil War. In every case, the short package listed all of the children of the individual and their dates of birth as well as all of the spouses and the dates and places of marriage.

Also, when I ordered, Ed Adams recommended to put both the Invalid and Widow's application numbers on the form.

In addition, there are about 1% of the widow's applications online at footnote.com which is free this month, so there is a very small chance that you could get the full widow's package for no cost.

Ron