Military Records

Newly online - Papers of the War Office, 1784-1800, about 55,000 records of the early US Republic. http://wardepartmentpapers.org/about.php

Faces of the Fallen - collection of information about each US service member who died in Iraq: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/world/iraq/casualties/facesofthefallen.htm

National Cemeteries Gravesite Locator: http://gravelocator.cem.va.gov
The VA has put a Nationwide Gravesite Locator online, with all the burials in all National Cemeteries nationwide, with the exception of four cemeteries that have not completed their records: Long Island; Los Angeles; Ft. Rosecrans; and the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific.

Interment.net has Los Angeles National Cemetery online (85,825 records): http://interment.net/data/us/ca/losangeles/lanat/index.htm

Fort Rosecrans (71,608 records): http://interment.net/data/us/ca/sandiego/rosecrans/index.htm

National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific (35,224 records): http://interment.net/data/us/hi/oahu/natmem/index.htm

The website says: "Arlington National Cemetery records are also available for interments that occurred after 1999. As more records are added to the database, more burial information will become available. Some state veterans cemeteries can also be searched." The latest: they have added maps of burial sections that can be printed from home computers and at national cemetery kiosks. Once you have entered a veteran's name to search, click on the "Buried At" (burial location) link and a map of the national cemetery is displayed, showing the section where the grave is located. Also, VA recently added to its database the cemeteries in which 1.9 million veterans were buried with VA grave markers, mostly private cemeteries. This addition brings the number of graves recorded in the locator to approximately five million. And they are adding approximately 1,000 new records to the database each day!

Nationwide Gravesite Locator: http://gravelocator.cem.va.gov

There are many vets who are NOT buried in the National Cemetery system. But once the final records are in place, this will cover all those who are. Keep in mind that many of those buried in the VA cemeteries are not vets, but family members. My father is a veteran of the Second World War, and so my mother was eligible to be buried in the Tahoma National Cemetery. When my father dies, his ashes will be with hers, under one shared stone.

Many soldiers who died during the war are buried overseas. My husband's uncle Frank was one such -- we found his grave by searching the American Battle Monuments Commission site: http://www.abmc.gov/.

Here is his listing: http://freepages.family.rootsweb.com/~bobofwa/JohnF_Zimmerman.htm

Whether your vet is gone, or still with you, you can honor him or her at the WWII Registry: http://www.wwiimemorial.com/default.asp?page=registry.asp&subpage=intro It isn't much, but it's something.

Find your WWII vet's WWII Enlistment File: http://genweblog.blogspot.com/2006/07/wwii-enlistment-file.html

The search on the WWII Registry page supposedly searches the ABMC database, but the listing that comes up for John F. Zimmerman is minimal compared to the beautiful page that comes up by directly querying the ABMC site. So it's worth searching both sites, if you don't know where your vet is buried. And of course Interment.net: http://interment.net and Find A Grave: http://www.findagrave.com/ are both worth a look, too.

New! Service Personnel Not Recovered Following World War II: http://www.dtic.mil/dpmo/WWII_MIA/INDEX.HTM

National Purple Heart Hall of Honor: http://nysparks.state.ny.us/heritage/purple_hrt.asp
   The website has a PDF available detailing the documentation necessary to include your Purple Heart recipient. For more information or to share the story of a Purple Heart recipient, contact the National Purple Heart Hall of Honor, New Windsor Cantonment State Historic Site, P.O. Box 207 (374 Temple Hill Road), Vails Gate, New York 12584-0207, telephone 845-561-1765, or fax 845-561-6577.

Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual Service Members Memorial: http://genweblog.blogspot.com/2006/06/lesbian-gay-bisexual-service-members.html

Obtaining military records of U.S. veterans from the National Archives: http://www.archives.gov/veterans/evetrecs/index.html
20th-Century Veterans' Service Records Safe, Secure -- and Available, By Norman Eisenberg: http://www.archives.gov/veterans/research/prologue-spotlight-nprc.html

POW Network Japan: http://homepage3.nifty.com/pow-j/e/
$$$ Ancestry has a database of 143,374 records of WWII POWs, compiled by the Red Cross

Another great WWII site: Indiana Soldiers & Sailors: http://fizkid.tripod.com/
   Photographs of the Manila American Cemetery in the Philippines

WWII Kansas Veterans Index: http://www.kshs.org/genealogists/military/wwiivetsindex.htm

Online Military Indexes & Records - A Genealogy Guide: http://www.militaryindexes.com/

WWI Draft Records: http://www.genealogybranches.com/worldwaronedraftcards.html

Missouri World War I Military Service Cards Database: http://www.sos.mo.gov/archives/ww1/
Other Missouri military records, not online: http://www.sos.mo.gov/archives/resources/military.asp

Pennsylvania State Archives - various military records, including Pennsylvania National Guard Veterans' Card File, 1867-1921; World War I Service Medal Application Cards and Mexican Border Campaign Veterans' Card File: http://www.phmc.state.pa.us/bah/dam/overview.htm
For best results spend some time learning how to use ARIAS (Archives Records Information Access System) to search its 1.5 million records: http://www.digitalarchives.state.pa.us/

Another useful link - USIGS Military Links Collection: http://www.usigs.org/library/military/links/

State-level Lists of Casualties from the Korean Conflict (1951-1957) and the Vietnam Conflict (1956-): http://www.archives.gov/research_room/research_topics/korea_and_vietnam_casualties.html

Also, for Vietnam: http://www.viewthewall.com/

FoundDogTags.com is a site attempting to return dog tags found in Vietnam to the families: http://www.founddogtags.com/

Civil War / War Between the States: http://genweblog.blogspot.com/2006/05/american-civil-war-or-war-between.html

War of 1812: http://valoriez.blogspot.com/2004/12/war-of-1812.html

The Mexican War: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/ops/mexican_war.htm


Commonwealth War Graves Commission (UK, AUS, NZ): http://www.cwgc.org/cwgcinternet/search.aspx

Land Forces of Britain, the Empire and Commonwealth: http://www.regiments.org/nations/

$$$ UK War Dead from the Boer War to the Korean Conflict: http://www.FindMyPast.com/

Canadian Military Records and Service Files: http://www.collectionscanada.ca/02/020203_e.html


French War Dead: http://www.memoiredeshommes.sga.defense.gouv.fr/

Volksbund - German War Graves: http://www.volksbund.de/
   Click "Gräbersuche" to search the names of German war dead. Nachname=surname; Vorname=first name; supplying a date of birth or death is optional. Click on "Suche beginnen" to start, then register your name and address. Required: Vorname (first name), Nachname (last name), Straße / Nr. (Street & Number), Land/Plz/Ort (Country/Postal or Zip Code/City). Then click on "Zur Ergebniseite" to continue. On the next screen click "Suchanfrage ausführen." Thank you Casi!

Finding German Military records: http://en.wiki.genealogy.net/index.php/Finding_German_Military_records


You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man's freedom. - Clarence Darrow

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