Beginning United States Civil War Research

United States     U.S. Military      Civil War, 1861 to 1865

Steps

Many records are available to help you find information about your Civil War ancestor. The following are good steps to start:

Step 1. Identify an ancestor who may have served in the Civil War
Look at your ancestors' information to determine which match the following criteria:


 * - Ages: Most soldiers and sailors were men between the ages of 18 and 30, so they would have been born between 1831 and 1846. Some were as young as 10 or as old as 70, which widens the birth years to between 1791 and 1854.


 * - Death: Did your ancestor die between April 1861 and June 1865? Did he die in a Southern state or a different state than where his family was living? These might indicate that he died as a soldier in the Civil War. For example, Samuel Potter and his family were in Michigan in the 1860 census. He died in April 1861 in Tennessee. Research showed that Samuel was in Company C, 12th Regiment, Michigan Infantry and died in the Battle of Shiloh, April 6, 1861.

Step 2. Identify the state where your ancestor lived around 1861

 * - Location: Soldiers came from all over the continental United States.
 * Note: Every state had some men who fought for the Union, and some men who fought for the Confederacy.




 * Union States (24 states and 7 territories)
 * States= California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Wisconsin
 * Border states (4 states were for the Union but had slaves. Many men served in the Confederacy instead of the Union)= Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, West Virginia
 * Territories=Colorado, Dakota, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico (all of New Mexico and Arizona), Utah, Washington
 * Confederate States (11 states and 2 territories)
 * States= Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia
 * Territories=Arizona (Southern half of New Mexico and Arizona), Oklahoma

More maps of the United States during the Civil war are available on the Wikipedia page Territorial Evolution of the United States.

If you do not know where your ancestor lived at the start of the war, check the following:


 * The 1860 federal census for the soldier or his family. The following have digital versions of the 1860 census:


 * - FamilySearch
 * - Ancestry($)
 * - Fold3 ($)
 * - Heritage Quest ($)


 * Several states took censuses, usually in the years between the federal censuses. A list of links to articles about the censuses in each state is on the United States Census page.

Step 3. Find your soldier's regiment and company
Your soldier's regiment and company are often needed to find his records and to recognize him in the records. Some ways to find his regiment and company are:


 * Civil War Soldiers and Sailors database to find your soldier with his a regiment and company.
 * You may find several soldiers who match your ancestor. If this happens, copy the information about all of them and continue searching to eliminate all but one.
 * - Look at each regiment Wiki page to find the county for the company or regiment. If some counties don't match what you know about your ancestor, this could eliminate some of the possible soldiers.


 * 1890 Census of Union Veterans and Widows of the Civil War
 * Information in the 1890 veterans schedules normally includes name, rank, company, name of regiment or vessel, date of enlistment, date of discharge, length of service, post office address, disability incurred, and remarks. Many Confederate veterans were mistakenly listed as well.
 * - 1890 Veterans Schedules, Ancestry.com ($), has every name indexes and images to all veterans schedules except indexes to Ohio and Pennsylvania.
 * - United States, 1890 Census of Union Veterans and Widows of the Civil War, FamilySearch.org, has images only but can be browsed by county


 * Surviving schedules include Washington D.C., the eastern half of Kentucky, and the rest of the U.S. States in alphabetical order Louisiana through Wyoming, Indian territories, and U.S. ships and navy yards. Unfortunately the census pages were destroyed for the states in alphabetical order from Alabama through the western half of Kentucky.

Step 4. Check the Wiki article for your ancestor's regiment
The indexes for Civil War soldiers often list more than one soldier with the same name in the same state. By finding the counties for the companies in a regiment, you will have additional information to help determine which might be the your ancestor.

On the regiment page, the list of companies will give the county or counties where many men were recruited.

Note: The Research Wiki will eventually have information about each regiment including links to many Internet sites, lists of books, pictures, etc. If the Research Wiki does not yet have information about your ancestor's regiment, please check back. If you know additionl information about the regiment or company, please add it or send the information to uswiki@familysearch.org, and we will add it.

Step 5. Internet Databases
Many Internet sites have information about the Civil War and those who fought. Three sites that have broad coverage rather than just 1 or 2 states are Ancestry, Fold3, and FamilySearch. The links below are to lists of databases available on each, so when you go to the sites, you will know what to look for.


 * Ancestry ($) has many records, both published and manuscript, about the American Civil War. For a list of many of these records, see American Civil War records on Ancestry.com


 * Fold3 ($) is digitizing many of the Civil War records at NARA. For a list of several of these records, see American Civil War records on Fold3.com


 * FamilySearch Historical Record Collections is digitizing Civil War records. For a list of these records, see American Civil War records on FamilySearch.org

Step 6. Check sources listed on the following Wiki pages

 * - United States Civil War, 1861 to 1865, Part 2 describes records and resources on the national level.


 * - [state] in the Civil War describes state records and resources. See the list below for links to the state pages.


 * - The regiment article for the regiment of your soldier gives information about the regiment and its companies with links to the counties where the companies recruited men. For links to the regiment pages, see the table on the state page.


 * - The county page for the county where a company recruited men describes county records and resources. This is a good way to find records about an ancestor and his family.


 * - Begin a search for Union records describes major Union records.


 * - Begin a search for Confederate records describes major Confederate records.

Decide what else you want to find.
Focus your research by deciding to find just one or two things, such as age, death date and place, pension record, or service record.

The chart, US Military Record Selection Table, shows which type of record has the various types of information you may want to find.

Online Classes about the Civil War

 * Beth Foulk,Civil War Genealogical Research, video, 46 min.


 * Russell Lynch, U.S. Military Records: Civil War, video, 35 min.

State Civil War Records
Many additional records have been created either by the state or about the state. Click the state of interest below to see explanations of these records and for links to pages about the each of the state's military units.

Union Regular Troops
These troops were supported solely by the federal government rather than partly by a state. The men came from many states, but the troops were not organized by state.

Union Regular Army in the Civil War

Union Volunteers in the Civil War

Veteran Reserve Corps in the Civil War

Union Navy
Union Navy in the Civil War

Confederate Regular Troops
Confederate Regular Troops in the Civil War

Confederate Navy
Confederate Navy in the Civil War

Ethnic Groups

 * African Americans, see United States Colored Troops in the Civil War
 * American Indians in the Civil War
 * Hungarians in the Civil War
 * Norwegians in the Civil War
 * Danes in the Civil War A great article describing the contributions and stories of a few Danish men serving in the American Civil War.