The US National Archives is like a great-grandma’s attic, chock full of family memorabilia just waiting for the family’s historian to dig through it. It’s a treasure chest of historical documents and information about our nation’s history. With 14 regional offices across the country, the original National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is located in Washington, DC and holds two of the most valued, most revered resources for the Civil War researcher. They are Compiled Military Service Records (CMSR) and Civil War Pension Files. This month we’re going to take a look at Compiled Military Service Records.

After the war in the late 1880s, Brigadier General Fred C. Ainsworth was head of the Record and Pension Office in the War Department. …show more content…
Every time a volunteer was found listed in the records a new card was included in his file. These abstracts are considered so accurate there is no need for the researcher to seek out the original records.

The CMSR files are also referred to as envelopes or jackets. There are files for both Union and Confederate veterans. They are as complete as possible but of course there were records lost and destroyed during the war especially in the south. So no soldier’s CMSR is considered complete.

The outside of the CMSR jacket contains the volunteer’s name, rank and regiment. The jackets contain cards filled with information found for each veteran regarding their military service. These cards usually supply age, regiment, rank, muster in and out dates, and many times a physical description. There’s also muster rolls, pay vouchers, descriptive rolls, returns, hospital rolls, if your soldier was sick or injured, and prison records. Most often there’s some notation of the type of illness, like lung disease, and the dates if your guy was in the hospital. Also there could be information on a desertion, court martial or a soldier’s death. Added to that there may be actual papers included in your veteran’s jacket, like enlistment papers or correspondence. As the name implies, all the information found in a CMSR pertains to your ancestor’s …show more content…
They are listed alphabetically by soldier’s surname and can be found at the National Archives Building, also at NARA regional sites, libraries with large genealogy departments, state archives or at Fold3.

Another area I recommend for research is the Record of Events (ROE). Strictly about the company and not individual soldiers, these records include, muster rolls and morning reports. Each company has a ROE jacket with this information inside. Union ROEs can be found on microfilm M594 Compiled Records Showing Service of Military Units in Volunteer Union Organizations at the National Archives Building, NARA regional sites, Ft. Wayne Public Library, loan through Family History libraries and other libraries with large genealogy departments.

Confederate ROEs are on microfilm M861 Compiled Records Showing Service of Military Units in Volunteer Confederate Organizations can be found at the National Archives Building, NARA regional site in Atlanta, on a loan through Family History libraries and libraries with large genealogy