Week 21 Prompt: Military
This week’s 52 Ancestors theme is “Military.” There are lots of things I can write about, but something’s that had my attention lately is the World War II Draft Registration cards that are now available for the “young men.” Previously, only the fourth registration (a.k.a. Old Man’s Draft) for men born from 28 April 1877 to 16 February 1897 was available. Now, the first through third and fifth and sixth registrations, covering men born from 17 February 1897 to 31 July 1927, are mostly available.
FamilySearch (free) has digitized 37 states/territories, while Fold3 (subscription) has digitized 38 states/territories. Ancestry is working on an index of these cards, and right now, the indexed entries are attached to the images on Fold3 (at least for the ones I’ve found).
Last year, when I learned about FamilySearch having digitized the Illinois registrations, I was all over it, searching for my grandfathers, their siblings, and some of their cousins. I found everyone I was looking for, but I knew there were many other men in my database. I ran a report in Legacy for men born between 17 February 1897 to 31 July 1927 and wound up with a 44-page report (without counting, I have no idea how many names are on the list, but it’s a lot!).
Because I could only include three criteria to run my report, I couldn’t exclude any males who died before the draft registrations. So I included the death date on my report and went through and crossed out any who died before the last draft date. I also crossed out men who were not residing in the US at the time of the registration. Now, when I have a few minutes here and there (or when I need a break from something else), I can grab the list and try to find the cards.
Here’s the card for my paternal grandfather, who was actually drafted. He served from 2 June 1943 to 19 January 1946.
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