What is a Service Record?
Many records have been produced to give information about a military man’s career. Company clerks were ordered to document certain activities of each regiment and these collections detail specific periods and events. The most useful collections for family historians fall in the following collections: • Enrollment (attestation) • Muster Rolls (roll call) • Discharge • Stations or assignments • Diaries • Medal rolls • Pensions for disability or death Soldiers. If your ancestor married, died, or had children while in the army after 1760, he may be listed in the Chaplains’ Returns or Regimental Registers. If you cannot find your ancestor’s regiment from these records, the other sources you should search will depend on what you know: If you know a campaign or battle in which the ancestor fought, a place he was stationed, or a place where a child was born while the father was in the service, use: Kitzmiller, John. In Search of the “Forlorn Hope.” Two Volumes plus supplement. Ogden, Utah: Man
