Military Service Is Often Listed in Obituaries

Buried somewhere between the dates of birth and death and the list of the deceased survivors we find obituaries are filled with tiny slices of a person’s life. Concentrating on each grain of information separately and approaching it as though it was a search in itself is a real plus when it comes to getting results.

Take the one-liner usually given to military service. Between the fact that Uncle George was an attorney at law and president of the local Kiwanis Club is a small line that says, “served in the U.S. Navy during World War II.” It’s such a small fact among so many others there is often a tendency to overlook it. Yet, once we know someone served in the military, many new avenues of information open their doors.

Going online is always the fastest way to information, although physical libraries and their helpful personnel still have their place.

Easily found on line are several sites providing military records of veterans of various wars. In the United States, for instance, the National Personnel Records center, Military Personnel Records is the repository of millions of records including the health and medical records of previously-discharged and deceased veterans of all the services during the Twentieth Century.

Records prior to World War I are in Washington D.C. in the National Archives.

These organizations also store medical treatment records for all military retirees and dependents and other persons treated in military hospitals. Information from the records is made available with a written request. A standard Form 180 is what is used to obtain these records, which are usually only accessed by next-of-kin but may be obtained for genealogy purposes by writing to the National Personnel Records Center, Military Personnel Records, 9700 Page Ave., St. Louis, Mo., 63132-5100.

Many websites are also available by typing in the branch of service, or the war in which the ancestor fought. People whose ancestors fought in armies other than the United States are also easily found online, although many times will need to be translated. Typing in “Ireland war veterans” or “German war veterans” or “Civil War” or even a family name and the name of a war could yield a result.

There are even records available in towns all over Europe and Asia preserved in boxes that will never make it online because it is simply too expensive a project. But serious genealogists won’t let that – or anything else – stand in their way. People have been known to traverse across the world to stand at the grave site of a loved one who lived generations before, describing the event afterwards as a way of seeing the world through their ancestor’s eyes.

Searching for obituaries online? Beware of scammers. Read my report first.