Updated September 2026 · 9 min read
Whether your ancestor earned the Medal of Honor or served quietly in a supply depot, their records can often be found. This guide covers the sources genealogists rely on most — many of them free.
1. Start with what the family knows
Gather discharge papers, photographs, letters, medals, obituaries and funeral cards. A single document can give you the full name, service number, unit and dates of service — the keys to every other record. The DD Form 214 (for service after 1950) and earlier discharge certificates are especially valuable.
2. Check whether they received the Medal of Honor
Search our archive by name, hometown, unit or ship. Each profile includes the official citation, dates, unit, birthplace and burial place. Remember that 19th-century names were often misspelled, and some men enlisted under assumed names — our records note known aliases.
3. Request official service records
- 20th and 21st centuries: Official Military Personnel Files are held by the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis. Veterans and next of kin can request them online through the National Archives or with Standard Form 180. Records of veterans who left service more than 62 years ago are archival and open to the public.
- The 1973 fire: A fire at the NPRC destroyed an estimated 16–18 million files, mostly Army personnel discharged between 1912 and 1960 and Air Force personnel discharged between 1947 and 1964 with surnames from “Hubbard” to “Z.” Replacement information can often be reconstructed from pay, medical and unit records.
- Civil War and earlier: Compiled military service records and pension files are held at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Many are indexed or digitized on genealogy platforms; pension files in particular can contain affidavits, marriage records and vivid details of wartime service.
4. Follow the unit
Once you know the regiment, ship or squadron, look for unit histories, morning reports, muster rolls, ship deck logs and after-action reports. State adjutant general reports list Civil War volunteers by regiment. For Navy personnel, deck logs record daily events aboard ship. Our recipient pages list units and link to others who served in the same unit.
5. Search historic newspapers
Local papers reported enlistments, casualties, homecomings and medal ceremonies. The Library of Congress’s free Chronicling America collection covers thousands of American newspapers; many state libraries run similar free archives.
6. Find the grave
- VA Nationwide Gravesite Locator — burials in national and many state veterans cemeteries, plus some private cemeteries with government markers.
- ANC Explorer — the official app and website for locating graves at Arlington National Cemetery.
- Veterans Legacy Memorial — an online memorial page for each veteran interred in a VA cemetery, where family and friends can leave tributes.
- Volunteer databases such as Find a Grave and BillionGraves, which include photos of headstones.
Our cemetery directory lists where Medal of Honor recipients are buried, grouped by cemetery and state.
7. Request a headstone or medals
If a veteran’s grave is unmarked, the VA can furnish a government headstone, marker or medallion at no cost. Families can also request replacement of lost or never-issued medals from the veteran’s service branch.
Research tips
- Record every source as you go — citation, date accessed and where the original is held.
- Search spelling variations and initials; clerks often wrote names phonetically.
- Check both the place of enlistment and the hometown — soldiers were often credited to a different town than where they were born, as our profiles’ “credited to” field shows.
- Contact the state veterans affairs office and local historical society; many hold records that were never digitized.