Online Military Records and Indexes Website (USA) - Latest Updates

The Online U.S. Military Records and Indexes website has been updated with links to the following items...

War of 1812
 - War of 1812 Index to Pension Application Files, 1812-1910 from FamilySearch
 - Michigan: War of 1812 Pensioners Index, 1883

Spanish American War
 - Wisconsin Genealogy Spanish American War Database

Civil War
 - United States Veterans Administration Pension Payment Cards, 1907-1933 at FamilySearch
 - Kentucky: Battle of Perryville Casualty Database
 - North Carolina Confederate Soldiers Burial Database (ongoing project)
 - South Carolina: Confederate Rolls of South Carolina
 - Texas: United Confederate Veterans Robert E. Lee Camp No. 158 in Fort Worth (from the Fort Worth Library Digital Archives)
 - Washington: Civil War Veterans Buried In Washington State
 - Wisconsin Genealogy Civil War Database

World War I
 - Alaska WWI Military Service Records: Personnel Information and Death Statistics
 - Arkansas World War I Discharge Records Index
 - California: San Francisco World War I Enemy Alien Registration Affidavits, 1918, from FamilySearch
 - New York Soldiers of the Great War: Fallen New York Soldiers of World War One
 - Texas: A Short History and Photographic Record of the 359th Infantry Texas Brigade (scanned searchable book); primarily from 39 Northeast Texas counties, but some other counties are included

World War II
 - United States Marine Corps Casualty Card Databases (for World War II, the Interwar Period 1946-1950, and WWII War Dogs)
 - Arkansas First Registration Draft Cards, 1940-1945 from FamilySearch (index is not yet complete)
 - Louisiana First Registration Draft Cards, 1940-1945 from FamilySearch (not yet complete)

Vietnam War
 - Indiana Vietnam War Deaths

This is a list of the most recent additions. There are many more military indexes listed at: Online Military Indexes and Records

Ports, Immigrants, and Passenger Records

Whether they arrived by ship from Europe, Asia or somewhere else, or whether they came across the Canadian or Mexican borders, our immigrant ancestors usually came to the USA through a port of entry. Beginning in 1820 (and much later for the land border ports) their names were usually recorded on some kind of record for that port. These records are sometimes called "ship manifests" or "passenger lists" or "immigration records" or "alien arrivals" or something similar. Many of these records or copies of them have survived and they are kept at the National Archives (over the years some have been lost or destroyed). Quite a few of them have been microfilmed and some of these microfilms have been digitized and put online.

Here are the twelve most popular ports used by immigrants to the United States from 1820-1920 based on number of immigrant arrivals...

• New York, New York
• Boston, Massachusetts
• Baltimore, Maryland
• Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
• New Orleans, Louisiana
• San Francisco, California
• Key West, Florida
• Portland-Falmouth, Maine
• Galveston, Texas
• Passamaquoddy, Maine
• New Bedford, Massachusetts
• Providence, Rhode Island

But there are many more ports where immigrants arrived.

Four years ago I made a webpage that listed all the ports I could find that have published immigrant arrival records. The page has been updated several times. I've been spending the last three days updating the webpage again - I added more ports and updated others - because the National Archives continues to publish more records of immigrant arrivals at ports. And more continue to go online.

You won't find every port here, but you will find a lot of them. They're arranged alphabetically by state. Included are links to lists of microfilm or research guides or finding aids or online records or whatever I could find to help you find your ancestor's name in the records of that port.

U.S. Immigration Ports and Their Available Records or Passenger Lists 1820-1957

If you aren't sure where your ancestor arrived, you might find this guide helpful: Tips for Determining Your Ancestor's Port of Arrival

Book Review: The Source - A Guidebook to American Genealogy

You may not be aware that before Ancestry was a provider of online genealogy databases and family trees, they published genealogy books. In 2006 they updated one of their major reference works (and later put it online as a wiki -- see below). The Source - A Guidebook to American Genealogy (edited by Loretto Dennis Szucs and Sandra Hargreaves Luebking) is now available in a third edition. It has been expanded and revised to include both online and offline resources. The Source is essentially a guidebook through the vast maze of records created about people over time and place. We like to call these genealogy records.

The early chapters cover the basics of genealogy research, using offline records, and the Internet. Then there are separate chapters on the following types of genealogy records: businesses and other organizations, census records, church records, court records, city and other directories, immigration records, land records, military records, newspapers, and vital records. Special guides include: African American research, colonial English, colonial Spanish (for Arizona, California, Florida, Louisiana, New Mexico and Texas), Hispanic, Jewish American, Native American, and urban research (for finding lost people in large cities).

Descriptions of Two Chapters
Rather than try and cover this entire book - it's over 900 pages long - here's a brief look at two of the book's chapters...

Immigration Records... The chapter on immigration records has useful information about ship passenger lists, border crossings (from Canada), naturalization records, alien registrations and passports. This section was put together by some of the best experts in the field of immigration records, including Kory Meyerink and INS historian Marian Smith. Genealogy speaker and author Megan Smolenyak contributed a helpful four-and-a-half page guide to using the Ellis Island Database. And they even recommend a visit to my own online Guide to Passenger Lists on the Internet.

A section called "American Sources for Documenting Immigrants" suggests helpful places to look for records that document immigrants, some of which might name that all important place (village, town, city) where your immigrant ancestor came from. Knowing this can help you pursue further research in foreign records. A later section covers foreign sources that also might help determine immigrant origins.

Census Records... The chapter on census records discusses the importance of the census to genealogy research, and has tips for searching in census records online and off. Questions asked in each census are given for each census year, along with specific research tips. Two small sections offer "Suggestions for Microfilm Searches" and "Suggestions for Online Searches." There are also two helpful tables for dealing with census indexes - "frequently misread letters" and "phonetic substitutes." Microfilm and soundex are discussed for offline searching.

There is also a section on non-population schedules and special censuses, including mortality schedules, veterans schedules, state and local censuses, African American and Native American censuses, and others. A helpful table at the end of the chapter, "Potential Census Substitutes," offers suggestions for other types of records to look for.

This book is like having several specialized guides combined into one large work. You could build a fine genealogy reference library by starting here.

The Source: Book and Online Versions

Order a copy of the book from Amazon: The Source: A Guidebook Of American Genealogy

A digitized version of The Source can be found online at: The Source - A Guidebook to American Genealogy Wiki

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Ancestry adds some World War II Draft Registration Cards

Ancestry has put some digitized images of World War II Draft Registration Cards online, and they are indexed by name (this database requires a fee-based subscription). These draft cards are from the Fourth Registration, which was conducted on 27 April 1942 - this is the only registration currently available to the public. This registration was for men born 28 April 1877 to 16 February 1897 (and not already in the military). It is sometimes referred to as "the old man's registration." These WWII draft cards are presently available online at Ancestry for the following states... Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, DC, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, New York City, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

NOTE: the Fourth registration ("old man's registration") records for the following states were destroyed and are not available: Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee.

For a list of links to free and fee-based World War II indexes and records, including Ancestry's fee-based WWII Draft Cards database, see: Online World War Two Indexes and Records - USA

For information on World War ONE draft cards see: World War One Draft Registration Cards 1917-1918

This article was updated on 2 March 2018.

New Additions - Online Birth and Marriage Indexes

The following links were recently added to Online Birth and Marriage Records Indexes ...

California...
- Shasta County Marriage Records Index 1854-1930

Colorado...
- La Plata County Marriage Records Index from 6/19/1877 through 7/2/1959

- Colorado Historical Records Index - includes...
-- Boulder County Birth Index 1892-1906
-- Denver (City) Birth Index 1875-1906
-- Elbert County Birth Index 1869-1906
-- Kit Carson County Birth Report Register 1892-1907

Florida...
- Brevard County, Florida Marriage License Application Inquiry 1999-current - also includes historical marriage records 1938-1998

Indiana...
- Indiana Marriage Index 1993-2000

Kentucky...
- Fayette County Kentucky Birth Index 1911-1930

Louisiana...
- Caddo Parish Marriage Index 1937-present

Maryland...
- Howard County, Maryland Marriage Licenses 1860-1939

Minnesota...
- Minnesota Birth Certificate Index 1900-1911 (updated)

New York...
- New York City Brides Index - various years (ongoing project)

North Dakota...
- Grand Forks County Marriage License Search, November 1875 - June 1914

Oregon...
- Multnomah County Marriage Records Index 1850s-1904

Vermont...
- Early Vermont Marriages from Berlin, Burlington & Montpelier

West Virginia...
- West Virginia Vital Records Indexes - includes birth indexes for 3 counties & marriage indexes for 6 counties; more are being added

Wisconsin...
- Wisconsin Pre-1907 Vital Records Index -- covers 1852 to September 30, 1907 (most entries date from 1880; includes some entries prior to 1852)
- Milwaukee County Marriage Records 1822-1876