 Welcome to the National Archives and Records Administration's 2023 genealogy series. My name is Andrea Matney, the program's coordinator, and we are so happy you've joined us. In recognition of public service, we are offering a themed program that will provide family history research tools focused on both military and civilian records. You will also learn how to preserve your own family collections. Our presenters are topic experts broadcasting from across the United States and offering sessions intended for beginners to experienced family historians. All are welcome. In addition, we invite you to join the conversation. Participate with the presenters and other family historians during each session's premier time. Here's how to engage in live chat. You can ask questions via chat by first logging into YouTube. Please watch chat because the speaker will answer your questions there in the chat. Type your questions about today's topic at any time. In addition, please select Show More to find links to handouts and the events evaluation form. We are offering six genealogy sessions on Wednesdays at 1 p.m. Eastern time, starting in May and ending in mid-June. If you missed the premier broadcast, know that the videos and handouts will remain available after the event and at your convenience. Today's presentation is entitled Basic Military Records at the National Archives Revolutionary War to 1917. Our presenter today is John P. Deben. John is an archivist with the reference branch at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. He provides reference services for old Army records from the Revolutionary War to the early 20th century and frequently lectures and writes about federal records of genealogical interest. I'm pleased to introduce our presenter today, John Deben. Thank you. I think it's probably a fair statement to say that most families have at least one or two relatives who either fought in a particular war or served in the military in general. From 1775 to the early 20th century, before America's entrance into World War I, the United States of course engaged in numerous military conflicts both internally and against foreign foes. These records are held at the National Archives building in Washington, D.C. and we're going to take a more in-depth look at those and see what kind of information they have to offer. The time period that we're talking about from the Revolutionary War to the beginning of World War I is generally referred to as the old military and it's characterized by different types of service including volunteer service, which involves state militias and regiments as well as the regular military, the Army, Navy and Marine Corps. These various types of service were each documented by distinct types of records as listed here with whether you're looking at compiled military service records, registered enlistments, rendezvous reports and Marine service record case files. So we're going to take a look at these in-depth and then we're going to look at some several basic records that are common to all of these types of service regardless of the time period. So to begin with volunteer service, this has always been a unique aspect of the American military tradition. It's a tradition based on a small standing army that would be supplemented when necessary by state troops. Volunteer service included the citizen soldiers or the militiamen who were recruited by the state governments in response to a specific threat or national crisis. They were organized into state regiments and militias and then turned over to the federal government for service. Once their enlistments expired, these volunteers were discharged, their units disbanded and the soldiers returned to their civilian lives. So the basic type of record that we have for this service are the compiled military service records. Beginning in the 1890s, the war department started creating these compiled service records to document the military service of volunteers as a way to permit more rapid and efficient checking of military and medical records for pension applications. So they ended up transcribing information from original muster rules and payrolls, regimental returns, descriptive books, hospital roles, prisoner of war roles and a lot of other things that the war department had on hand to create these individual cards for soldiers. These cards were all numbered on the back and the numbers are entered into the outside of the jacket containing the cards. So what we have now are service records that are arranged by war, then by state, the military unit and then alphabetically by soldiers, surname. So as they said, they started doing this initially in the 1890s for union veterans to better facilitate their pension applications because they needed to have a convenient way to verify their military service. So after they completed the carded records for the union veterans, they turned around around 1912 and started creating compiled service records for state volunteers from other wars as well. So now what we have are a separate series of compiled service records for all of the major wars from the Revolutionary War starting in 1775 up through the Philippine insurrection which ended in 1902. This was the last conflict in which state regiments were raised. And this also includes the antebellum Indian wars before the Civil War. I should point out that after the Civil War, all of the Indian conflicts or war that were fought after the Civil War were conducted solely by the regular army so there were no state regiments involved in those conflicts. For the most part, the records are only available in their original textual format with a couple of exceptions. The Revolutionary War records, the Indian War records and some of the Civil War records including all of the Confederate records and union records for the border states, the western states and territories, southern states that supplied union regiments and the U.S. color troops. They're all being microfilmed and or digitized and they're available online either on Fold 3 or Ancestry. So the carded service records provide basic information about the soldiers. And this is the first source that researchers should consult when they're looking for military service information. It includes basic information as a soldier's name, their dates of enlistment, their periods of service, where they were residing at the time that they enlisted which may or may not be their hometown. And oftentimes a personal description. And then there may be other information included, pay rates, special duties, notations whether they were wounded or died in combat. One other thing that you will not find however in the compiled service records are information about parents or next of kin because as I said the service records are basically about the soldier himself. And it will not indicate specific battles in which the soldier fought. So we'll take a look at an example of a compiled service record. This is an image for William Graham who served in the Revolutionary War. This is his envelope or jacket that contains his compiled service record. And it itself includes some basic information including his name. It identifies his unit as the 1st Massachusetts Regiment, the war which is of course the Revolutionary War. And it shows two ranks which was the rank that he held when he enlisted on the left and the rank that he held when he was discharged from service on the right. So in this case William Graham went into service as a corporal and he completed his service at that same rank. Here are some examples of the cards that you can find inside the jacket. This is a copy of a company payroll in the middle and a company muster roll. Some idiosyncrasies about these records. Oftentimes you will find units identified by different names. In this case we already established that it's the 1st Massachusetts Regiment but here in this payroll card is just identified as Abraham Hunt's company of Colonel Joseph Vogue's Regiment. And then in the muster roll card we see it's identified as the 1st Massachusetts battalion of forces. It's the exact same regiment. It just, there was no standard naming conventions at that time so whatever information was written down on the original records that's what the cards recreated. The middle card you can also, as a payroll you can see he was being paid $70 or $30 per month for his service and the muster roll card shows his date of enlistment which was January 26, 1776 for a period of three years. Now there are also within the compiled service records there are also personal papers filed as the ward department went through the process of creating the compiled service records whenever they came across an individual document that related to a specific soldier. The clerks would file those records with the compiled service record. Therefore many service records include extra copies, file copies of enlistment or discharge papers for soldiers who died during service there are sometimes copies of inventories of personal effects, final statements of service, casualty reports and other records of death and internment. For earlier wars particularly the war of 1812 there may also be pay and subsistence accounts for officers because those soldiers were required to purchase their own rations and supplies and were then reimbursed by the ward department. So here's an example of a personal paper that you might find. This is from the service record of Nicholas de Abrego of Company K first Texas U.S. Cavalry during the Civil War and it's again it provides some basic information about the soldier's service it shows that he was born in Madame Morris, Mexico. He's 22 years of age and he's a rancher by trade. The Confederate service records they also have their own personal papers filed but there's also a separate series of unfiled papers and slips that belong to compiled service records that are microfilmed on publication M347. These are not indexed with the state indexes and the consolidated Confederate indexes. It generally serves as a catch-all series that was intended to be filed with the service records but never were. For a number of reasons sometimes they couldn't establish the document to link it to an established service record or sometimes there was insufficient information to create a new service record for the individual and some of the papers document actually civilian service with the Confederate government such as employment as army teamsers or government clerks and other officers. Another piece of information that you can find in the compiled service record especially on the jacket at the bottom of the jacket there is a line for bookmarks. Bookmarks are found notations that often throughout the 19th century various offices or bureaus of the war department investigated or reviewed a soldier's service information to resolve either questions or discrepancies in the record and the process usually generated additional paperwork. So the bookmark notations are cross references to documents that are located in one of several other possible letter or document files within the Aging Generals Office. And you can tell which office is it by the different file designations. The most common that we run across are CB files which are from the commission branch of the Aging Generals Office, ACP files which are from the Appointment Commission and Personal Branch, CT files for the Colored Troops Division, EB files for Enlisted Branch Office, VS files for the Volunteer Service Division and RMP files for the Record and Pension Office. And we'll take a look at an example. This is the service jacket for Thomas W. Custer, a second lieutenant and the sixth Mr. Eugen Calvary. He of course is the younger brother of George Armstrong Custer. And you can see at the bottom there are actually several bookmark notations listed. We're going to take a look at the first one which is file K125-VS-66 which stands for 1866, the year the document was filed. So if we look at that document, if we go to the Volunteer Service Division's Letters and Received series and look that file number up, these are the documents that we can find. Thomas Custer of course was the first Army officer who was nominated for and received two Medals of Honor and he earned those within a week of each other for different actions in combat. So this document shows on the left a list of officers and men who captured rebel battle flags during combat and you can, it's probably hard to read but you can see here is listed Thomas W. Custer, he's on that list. And then the document on the right is a letter from the War Department recommending these men for Medals of Honor. And we can also see Thomas Custer listed on this letter. So these are documents substantiating his nomination for the Medals of Honor. And these do not appear in the Compiled Service Record, you have to go to the additional letters to find these documents. We also have, along with the Compiled Service Records for individual soldiers, the War Department prepared carded histories for volunteer organizations. These are often referred to as troop movements or records of events. These carded records contain information relating to stations, movements or activities and frequently include a unit's organization or composition, their strength and losses and their information about their disbandment. Sometimes the names of commanding officers and unit states of enlistment and muster out in the terms of service were included. Sometime around 1903 the carded history of Confederate units were created as well using captured Confederate records from the War Department as well as other privately held Southern sources. So here's an example of the Record of Event cards that go along with the carded service records for the individuals. You can see they look pretty much identical to the compiled military service records for the soldiers. In this case these are Record of Event cards for the 83rd Pennsylvania during the Gettysburg Campaign. And it shows what the regiment as a whole was doing during the time period from May to October of 1863. The first card and you can see that sometimes the information is very detailed and sometimes is very sparse. So during May and June there's a very detailed description of their movements following the Battle of Chancellorville and as they're marching into Pennsylvania, what they're involved in. The middle card documents their engagement at the Battle of Gettysburg on July 2nd and then there's also a reconnaissance to Manassas Gap that they engaged in towards the end of the month. And then the card on the right for September and October basically shows that they are in camp near Warranton Junction in Virginia. So those are the records that we have for the volunteer circles. The regular Army service during the old military period of course includes service in the regular military establishment, the Army, the Navy and the Marine Corps. The regular or the standing Army comprise the professional or career soldiers. They differed from the volunteers in that they served during peacetime as well as during war. They enlisted for a specific term of service rather than for the duration of the war as did some volunteers. And they were assigned to pre-existing military units that continued to operate after the individual soldier was discharged and left service, as opposed to the volunteers units that were disbanded after the enlistments expired. Since the War Department was directly responsible for recruiting men into the regular Army, the Navy and the Marine Corps, it did maintain specific records relating to the enlistment of this individual personnel. So for the Army, the basic record of service is the register of enlistment. The textual series for this is a huge series of 161 bound volumes covering service in the regular Army from 1798 up to 1914. It's arranged by year of enlistment, then generally in alphabetical order by the first letter of the soldier's surname and chronologically by date of enlistment. Therefore, to search the volumes, you need to start with an approximate date when the soldier enlisted. The register of enlistments contain basic information about the soldier, but it's often more detailed than what you can find in the compiled service records for the volunteers. In addition to name, rank, date of enlistment, unit assignment and a physical description, the registers provide such personal details as the soldier's age, their place of birth and their civilian occupation. The remarks column in the soldier's entry can also include date and place of discharge, highlights of important events such as promotions, transfers to different units, post assignments and sometimes medical information if they were admitted to a military hospital for an extended period. These records have been microfilmed in publication M233 and they're available digitally, both on Ancestry and on Fold3. So to look at an example of this, this is the one page from the register of enlistments and we're going to take a look at soldier Alfred Pride. Each entry in the register covers two pages. So this is the first page on the left including a lot of his basic information and then the page on the right including the remarks column and if we look at all the information for Alfred Pride collectively, this is what we learn about the soldier. He enlisted February 11th in 1878. He was born in Richmond, Virginia. He's 32 years old. He identifies his occupation as a soldier. His physical description includes black hair. He's five foot eight inches tall and he served in the 24th Infantry Company F. He's enlisted three times and his current term of service ends on February 10th, 1883 and his expiration of service took place at Fort Elliott, Texas. He was a private at the time that he was discharged and his character as a soldier at his time of discharge is listed as good. In addition to the register of enlistments, the enlistment papers are the original paper contract to serve in the U.S. Army signed by the recruit. The War Department retained the original copies on file, organized into two sub-series covering the periods from 1798 to July 14th, 1894 and then the second sub-series picks up in July 15th, 1894 and runs through the end of October 1912. So this is the entry 91 in the records of the Adjunct General's office includes the main these main series of enlistment papers and there's also a separate series of enlistment papers just for Indian scouts for the post-civil war period. And here's an example of an original enlistment paper. This is also for Alfred Pride. The envelope or the jacket on the left you can see there are actually six different enlistment papers inside this record. So when he said he was a professional soldier he he really was telling the truth because you can see from his service here that he served from at least the beginning of 1868 all the way into the 1890s consecutively. So this enlistment paper on the right corresponds with the register of enlistment entries that we just looked at and it includes all the identical information that was recorded into the register. This is the front side of the document and this is the back side of the document. The regular army also has their version of enlistment papers like the state volunteers and these papers consist of various types of documents including descriptive lists, orders, assignment cards, certificates of disability, final statements, discharges, and burial records. The Porter-Barbon originally intended to file all of these personal papers with the individual soldier and is compiled in his enlistment jacket. This effort never really took place. An attempt was made at some point to separate some of the documents by type including the certificates of disability and the final statements but the other personal papers remained in the miscellaneous collection. So we do have a main series of personal papers and then there are separate series just for the certificates of disability and the final statements and the final statements have also been digitized and they're available on fold three. So here's an example of some personal papers. These are our final statement of service and a record of death and internment for Private John D. Boyer of Company B 10th U.S. Infantry. A final statement was basically a form was filled out once a soldier died during service. So the top of the document shows on the left shows all of his personal information and his service information and because it's documenting his death there's a line that shows that he died on October 19th, 1864 at the Lincoln USA General Hospital at Washington DC from inflammation of the lungs. The document on the right, the record of death and the internment confirms that information but also provides some additional some additional details. Under the cause of death where it shows that he died of inflammation of the lungs it also notes that he was wounded through the right lung so the infection was caused by a gunshot wound. Okay that's for the information that we have about the regular army and the Navy service. The basic record of service that we have are the rendezvous reports. The rendezvous report is basically the naval equivalent of the Army enlistment record. A rendezvous was a term used by the Navy for a recruiting event and the rendezvous reports were weekly summaries of recruiting activities at specific locations. Surviving rendezvous reports that we have covered the mid to late 19th century from basically from the Mexican war to the early 1890s. As far as we know rendezvous reports for earlier periods have not survived so the records show again basic information about the sailor including their name, their date and term of enlistment, their rating which is equivalent to their rank in the Navy, any previous naval service, their usual place of residence when they're on land as well as their place of birth, occupation, a physical description and including permanent marks or scars. So we'll take a look at what these reports consist of. This is a copy of a rendezvous report from Maryland California and we're going to take a look at the report for James G Mason and if we again if we collectively read the information from his entry this is what we learned about the sailor. He enlisted on June 25th, 1884 at Maryland, California. He enlisted for one cruise on the USS Montaguella. He's 22 years of age. He's a cook by occupation. His physical description he's Negro five foot one and a half inches tall. He was born in East Oakland, California and he has a scar on his left leg and a tattoo of a shield cross and a flag on his left forearm and his rating at the time of enlistment was Lansman which means that he had no prior experience at sea and then for the Marine Corps basic information documenting service in the Marines during this time period are the service records or case files for enlisted Marines. We have information running from 1798 to 1895. For this time period enlisted Marines have jacketed service records or case files that may contain any or all of the following types of documents including enlistment or re-enlistment papers, conduct records, descriptive lists, notices of discharge, medical surveys, service reports, and a military history. There's an alphabetical card index for these service records that are organized by initial letter of the Marine surname then alphabetically by the given name and the index provides a date and place of enlistment or re-enlistment. Once the date is known the service record can usually be located. So here's an example of an enlistment paper from the service record for John Easton showing he enlisted in the Marines on December 15th 1864. It provides again some personal details about him and it notes that prior to enlisting in the Marines he listed his occupation as a soldier so he was enlisted as a volunteer in the army before transferring over to the Marine Corps. Now we're going to take a look at some of the basic records that are common to all types of service whether you're a state volunteer or a member of the regular military establishment and first of all are the muster rolls. Our muster rolls are lists of all troops present or otherwise accounted for made on the day of the muster or review of troops under arms in order to take account of their number inspect their arms and accoutrements and examine their condition. The muster rolls from which names were called also serve as the pay master's voucher for a pay issued. The muster rolls were made by an inspector general or other officer specifically designated by the commander of the regiment, the division department or the individual post. The forms were furnished by the Ed and General's office and consisted of several types of muster rolls including descriptive rolls, muster in and muster out rolls only for volunteers and regular muster for pay rolls for individuals detachments companies and regiments as well as field staff and band for specific regiments. So for the volunteers US volunteers muster rolls include volunteer organizations providing information by company for each unit showing their locations or duty stations during each reporting period and the names of individuals who had enlisted deserted died or been discharged. We have separate series of muster rolls for all the major conflicts during this period from the Revolutionary War up to the Philippine insurrection and as well we we also have a separate series of muster rolls for the Puerto Rico Regiment of US volunteers during the period of the Philippine insurrection. For the most part all of these rolls are only available in their original textual format with the exception of the Revolutionary War rolls that have been reproduced in microphone publication M246 and those rolls have been digitized on Fold 3. But we'll take a look at an example of an original muster roll from the Revolutionary War. This is a muster roll from Captain Thomas Bood's company of the 5th Pennsylvania line from April 1779 and again you can see it's just a basic list of the names of all the privates serving at that time period as well as the company officers and the commissioned officer. And I would note on a personal note that if you look under the category of drum and fife you'll see a 16 year old drummer named Adam Deal who eventually would go on to become my fifth grade grandfather. Muster rolls for the regular army include all regular army organizations including the field units infantry, cavalry, and artillery as well as general service recruits detachments doing recruiting service other detachments Indian scouts, Philippine scouts, prisoners, and other miscellaneous groups organized by location. The earliest rolls that we have are in the series post-revolutionary war papers from 1784 to 1815 and these include muster and payrolls for portions of the regular army that existed from the end of the Revolutionary War to the organization of the Legion of the United States in the early 1790s and this includes the First American Regiment, Harmer's First U.S. Infantry Regiment, and so forth, Corps of Artillery, all these early early pre-1812 regular army regiments. Then the main series of muster rolls that we have are in entry 53 muster rolls of regular army organizations. So here's an example of an original muster roll this is for Forest Heights Company of the First U.S. Riflemen from September and October 1811. This is the front side of the muster roll again showing the complete list of members of the unit. It usually includes their date of enlistment, their term of service, and then on the right side there are remarks noting whether somebody transferred to a different company whether they were discharged if they died or any other noteworthy information that happened to that individual during that reporting period. Here's the backside of that muster roll completing the list of names and then down at the left bottom corner there is a statistical recapitulation of the total numbers available for service during that reporting period. For the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps there are various muster rolls available that have been reproduced on microfilm and or digitized. The earliest ones that we have are reproduced in microfilm publication T-829, miscellaneous records of the Office of Naval Records and Library. It includes muster rolls for ships going back as early as 1813 during the war of 1812 up to just prior to the start of the Civil War. There are combined muster payrolls for ships from 1798 to 1847, list of personnel at naval stations and also Confederate muster rolls from Confederate shore establishments during the war, and other personnel lists from Navy yards from 1805 to 1840. We also have original series of muster rolls. The main series is entry 132 in Record Group 24 which is the records of the Bureau of Naval Personnel. These muster rolls have been digitized and are available electronically in the National Archives catalog online. And then there are also separate series in Record Groups 45, records of the Office of Naval Records and Library. There are additional Confederate muster rolls available for the Confederate Navy and Marine detachments in the Confederate Navy. And then for the U.S. Marines, all of their muster rolls have been microfilmed on two different publications, T-1118 for 1798 to 1892 and T-977 from 1893 all the way up to 1858. And both of these microfilm rolls are available digitally on Ancestry. So here's an example of some of these rolls. This is one of the early roll for the U.S. Marine Detachment aboard the USS Hornet during the war of 1812. It gives you a basic list of names and whether they were present or absent from service. Here is an example of the original rolls that are digitized in the catalog. This is a muster roll for the USS Hartford, which was Admiral David Farragut's flagship during the Civil War. This is the cover for the muster rolls. And then we'll take a look at this muster roll for the August-September 1864 period. And again it gives a complete list of personnel on the ship. I'm giving information about their enlistments and some personal information showing where they were born, their age and so forth. And on the remarks column you may be able to see a number of manner listed as killed on August 5th. And this is when the Battle of Mobile Bay took place, where the USS Hartford took a leading position during that, during that invasion of the bay. And here are some other examples of the Marine Corps muster rolls that are reproduced in T1118. On the left is a Marine Corps roll for the Brooklyn Navy Yard in May of 1864. And on the right is a muster roll for the Marine Detachment aboard the USS Minnesota during the Civil War. And again, they'll both of them provide the basic similar types of information that we've seen here. Having shown you all of the different muster rolls that we have available, I have to point out that we do have a rather strict access policy as far as the original rolls concerned because all of the rolls in our holding are in delicate to fragile condition. So we usually will only pull original rolls if the information sought by the researcher is not available in other records or publications and also if staff determines that the the muster rolls are in condition to be pulled and examined in the research room. If they are, we can bring them in but they're under no conditions. Can the original rolls be photocopied? However, you can take non-flash digital photography photographs of the original rolls if you need to. I'd also like to say some things about regimental records. These records generally include the administrative and operational records that were created and used by units as they operated in the field. They usually documented information about members of the regiment as well as the activities of the unit. For the volunteer organizations, we have books available for state volunteer infantry cavalry and artillery from the Mexican war through the Philippine insurrection. They're enlisted in different series although earlier records may not have survived or been retained by the by the war department or they may be available in state repositories. Regimental books can include following types of records. They can include regimental letter books, regimental company order books, regimental and company descriptive books, and morning reports. To a lesser extent, sometimes you can also find clothing books, guard reports, other financial accounts, reports of sick and wounded, some court martial records. The availability of those types of records varies widely from unit to unit. I want to take a specific look at the regimental descriptive books. These are organized by state and then by arm of service then numerically by the unit designation. These records include both regimental and company roles in book form, including personal descriptions of every member of the company that was associated with that regiment from the beginning of service until the regiment was disbanded. It can also include rosters of commission and non-commissioned officers, lists which provide lists of name, rank, dates of promotions and transfer of resignation, and also depths of officers and the company descriptive books can also contain commissioned and non-commissioned officers, a list of men, list of men transferred or discharged, registers of men who died in the company, and lists of deserters. So this is a detail of a company descriptive book for the 46th Pennsylvania and we'll take a quick look at the entries for two brothers who served, Amos Wenrich and his brother John. This page of the descriptive book gives their personal information, showing Amos was 19 years old, his brother John was 21, they're both five six with ready complexions, although one had brown eyes, the other one had blue eyes, but they both had sandy colored hair. They were both from Doffin County, Pennsylvania and Amos was a farmer and John was a miller by trade. The second page of the descriptive book includes their enlistment information, when and where they enlisted for service, and the remarks column contains additional data. In the case of Amos, the remarks indicate that he died while in service by drowning in the lock at dam number six along the Potomac while he was on picket duty on a night of January 31st, 1862. And the interesting thing about this entry is that whoever entered it into the descriptive book, whether it was the company clerk or the company captain or other officer, he took the time to write a little epitaph for the soldier, saying that Wenrich fell in the line of duty, a mild, inoffensive boy, always ready and willing, intelligent and pious, in fact the model soldier, along with his memory be cherished. And that's a nice little detail that you don't often find in a lot of these regional records, so it's a real gem when they show up. Unfortunately, his brother John also died during service. His note remarks column indicates that he was killed in acting at Gettysburg on the 3rd of July by the bursting of a shell from our battery, which basically indicates that the 46th Pennsylvania was stationed on Culp's Hill during pick's charge and they received some incoming artillery fire from a friendly battery, so he died by a friendly fire. For the regular army, regimental records, including regimental books, are available in two different record groups. The earliest record that we have are in record group 98, US Army commands from 1784 to 1821, and these include records of field establishments for the US Army, as well as some departments and districts and so forth. Mainly they include company books, orderly books, morning reports, and other miscellaneous returns for various US Army cavalry or dragoon regiments, infantry regiments, and US riflemen. For the later period from 1821, actually up to the beginning 1916, there are regular army unit records for the various branches of the army, cavalry, infantry, and so forth, as well as field artillery field batteries, coast artillery companies, and engineers, sappers and miners, and so forth. And these records can include our regimental headquarters administrative records, such as correspondence, orders, unit histories, as well as company or battalion records, including descriptive books, additional rosters, returns, and muster rolls, and perhaps other letters issued by the company headquarters. And finally, I'm going to say a couple words about medical records for this time period. Beginning in 1889, the Record and Pension Office of the War Department created various types of carded records relating to office and listed men who served in the army. And this project, which ended approximately 1950, was intended to facilitate, as I mentioned before, the verification and approval process for pension applications. And one of the additional records that they created was carded medical records. These provide information about wounds, injuries, sicknesses, hospitalizations, and deaths. And these records are not helpful, I should point out, in documenting those killed in action, as these casualties were not typically transported to field or general hospitals. So the records that the cards reflect are actually the hospital registers for sick and wounded, which are part of the field records of hospitals in the Record Group 94. The hospital registers were transcribed pervaded onto the cards and do not include additional information about the patient. The carded medical records may include some or all of the following types of information, including the soldier's name, his rank, his organization, his complaint or ailment, his date of admittance, and name of the hospital to which he was admitted, any pertinent remarks about his stay during his hospital, his date he returned to duty, or if he deserted, was discharged, transferred to another hospital, if he was furloughed, or if he died. Medical cards can also include a reference to the original hospital register from which the information was transcribed. Carded medical records dated 1894 and later may also include information such as race, birthplace, date of enlistment, and complications. For the U.S. Volunteers, there are several different series of carded medical records. We have one early series for the war of 1812. It just covers patients who were at the Williamsville Hospital in New York. Otherwise, we have separate series of carded medical records for officers during the Civil War, and a combined series of records for volunteer soldiers in the Mexican and Civil Wars. And then there are a separate series of cards for the Pioneer Corps during the Civil War. And medical cards, I should point out, for Confederate soldiers, Spanish American War, and Philippine are still filed with the individual's soldier's compiled military service record. So the earlier ones from the Civil War and before are the only ones that are arranged separately. For the Regular Army, there are two different series of carded medical records covering the periods 1821 to 1884. And then there, for reasons we don't really know, there's a 10-year gap. And then the another series picking up in 1894 to 1912. Then there are separate series for hospital personnel, non-commissioned staff officers and musicians, contracting dental surgeons, and then for the Marine Corps and Naval Service, there are separate series, including the gunboat and naval service during Civil War. And here's an example of what a carded medical record looks like, and you can see it looks very similar to the individual compiled service record. These are records for Michael Jacobs, who was in Company K of the 46th Pennsylvania. And to the cards, the first two cards show that he was admitted to the USA General Hospital at Broad and Cherry Streets in Philadelphia in March of 1863, complaining of incipient amaurosis, which basically translates into a form of, he was developing a loss of sight, but it wasn't and it wasn't complete. He didn't go completely blind, but it doesn't indicate what might have been causing it. The middle card shows that he was admitted on April 2nd of 1863 to the USA Convalescent Hospital in Philadelphia. And then the card on the right shows that he appears on a list of casualties resulting from the, listed here is the Battle of Dallas, which is all the same as the Battle of New Hope Church during the Atlantic Campaign, and it shows that he was wounded in the leg on May 25th, 1864. Now to show you how how these cards are connected or refer back to the original records, at the bottom of the card there are notations showing where the information was transcribed from, whether it be a hospital register, and we're going to take a look at the final card. Down at the bottom you can see it shows he was taken from Casualty List number 8638. So if we go to the series in the Records of the Aging Generals Office, Regimental Casualty List, which is entry 652, if we go to the records for the 46th Pennsylvania, we will find Casualty List number 8638. You can see it noted in blue pencil at the top of the front page there, and if we go to the appropriate page here is where we find Michael Jacob listed with his leg wound occurring on May 25th, 1864 at the Battle of Dallas. And that's an overview of the basic records that we have in the National Archives, and we'd be happy to answer any additional questions. Thank you again for watching. This ends the lecture portion of the broadcast, but we will continue to take your questions about today's topic in the chat. If we do not get to your question, please send us an email. Note that the presentation's video recording and handout will remain available on this YouTube page and our website. We plan future programs based on your feedback. Would you please take a minute to complete our short online evaluation form? At this time I'd like to thank the genealogy series team who contributed to the success of this program. We are grateful for your work. And if you enjoyed this video, check out the Know Your Records program. We have over 100 educational videos on how to do research with us, including playlists for civilian service and U.S. veterans. In the autumn of 2023, the Know Your Records program is offering this schedule of sessions. We invite you to participate with the National Archives presenters and other audience members. Although this concludes the video portion of the broadcast, we will continue to take your questions in chat for another 10 minutes. Please stay if you have questions. Thank you for joining us for today's presentation.