I'm reminded of a folk song which became very popular in the 1840's (particularly in the western mining camps)and would have been familiar to most of the people of that period:

WHAT WAS YOUR NAME IN THE STATES?
Say, what was your name in the State?
Was it Johnson or Thompson or Bates?
Did you murder your wife, and fly for your life?
Say, what was your name in the States?

Did you have to change your name?
Was it Miller or Benton or James?
Did you spend time in jail, or ride on a rail?
Say, what was your name in the States?

I suspect that following the war, very many Southerners, returning to homes that were gone, family dead or gone off, may have changed their names too, and went west to start over again.

I suspect that story was not at all uncommon in the days as the veterans came home.

I have an acocunt of a young veteran who was coming hoem from Appomattox. He tells that as he went by the home of the captain of his company, the captain was sititng on the steps of his home, his head in his mother's lap, crying his heart out, and, according to the account, "his wife was not there." The veteran doesn't say that his wife had run off, but that is the clear imnplication, and within a year or two that former captain picked up and moved to western Arkansas.