In 1894 the state of New York began publishing rosters of soldiers who had served in New York regiments in the American Civil War. The state spent many years of research, identifying soldiers and clarifying records. The result was 43 published volumes of service records from 280 regiments, battalions and batteries of infantry, cavalry, artillery and engineers. Over 393,000 names of Civil War officers and soldiers were listed along with their service records. Now, a hundred years later, this set of rosters is invaluable to persons seeking to document their family history and find their genealogical roots. Researchers wanting to use these important service records quickly run into two problems. First, the books are hard to find. Complete sets of 43 volumes are rare and expensive. Second, the set of rosters was printed with no index. Finding all references to a single soldier among 51,000 pages is a daunting task, especially since many soldiers served in more than one regiment, either voluntarily through multiple enlistments or incidentally through consolidations and reorganizations of regiments. With the publishing of the New York Soldiers in the Civil War, the researcher's task has suddenly become easier. An alphabetical, columnar format lists the soldier's name and regiment(s). Researchers will now be able to identify all the regiments in which a particular soldier may have served. They can then search out additional material in other sources on those regiments.
Richard A Wilt
1999, 8½x11, paper, 404 pp. 101-W1141 ISBN: 0788411411
