The Source
Brothers in Arms: The Gladstone Afro-American Military Collection
By Michael K. Shaffer · Originally published April 2022 · pp. 22–23
In February 2022, the Library of Congress released the Gladstone Afro-American Collection; https://crowd.loc. gov/campaigns/gladstone/. This source contains “… correspondence, pay vouchers, orders, muster rolls, enlistment and discharge papers, receipts, contracts, affidavits, tax records, miscellaneous military documents, and printed matter.”
One note to researchers: while one must not set up a free LOC account, doing so will enable the user to save specific material. Through their crowdsourcing effort, the LOC currently has over 1,600 transcribed documents in this collection, covering the period of 1773–1987. The American Civil War section will serve as the focus for this column. Upon navigating to the homepage, select the ‘Civil War and Reconstruction Era’ section as shown, and read the description of holdings. Now, go back to the homepage and click ‘About the Collection,’ then select ‘Collection Items,’ where you can filter with various search criteria. On the left side of the screen, select ‘Civil War.’ Filter dates to ‘1860-1869’ to create tighter search parameters of the 269 documents completed thus far (February 2022). One search revealed “General Orders, No. 125, War Department, furloughs for noncommissioned officers and privates of the army desiring to enter the Free Military School in order to earn commissions, Feb. 1864.
