Are you searching for more information on your Union soldier ancestor? There is plenty available online, from service records to pension requests, widow’s pensions and veterans census records. However, unless you are lucky enough to find a pension request with personal letters from your ancestor detailing his service (which do exist, but are the exception rather than the rule… most pension requests just include a
questionnaire filled out by the applicant), you probably won’t get any additional detail on what his war experience was like. Understanding a soldier’s war experience makes it much more personal to you as a genealogist, brings your ancestor and his times back to life in a virtual way, and puts his service in the historical context of the entire Civil War.
If you are eager to find out more intimate details of your Union ancestor’s
service, you may have success with the federal government’s collection of Civil War medical cards. This is a little-known collection of records that is not yet available online, and it is only available for Union soldiers. Since they were part of the United States and the Confederacy technically was not, the records of Union soldiers were kept by the federal government and went to the National Archives, where they are still located today. This is a collection well worth exploring if you have an
ancestor who served with the Union during the Civil War. It will give you details on his service you won’t find anywhere else...
