Research

Administrative History

A law of 1863 required the Bureau of Military Statistics to collect and preserve "an authentic sketch of every person from this State who has volunteered into the service of the general government" since April 15, 1861, but no mention was made of muster roll abstracts. A law of 1876 authorized the appropriation of funds for clerks to copy "muster-out" rolls, but no citation can be located mandating their duplication.

The abstracts seem to have been compiled by several people since similar types of handwriting appear throughout the series which would indicate that these may be the records for which funds were appropriated in 1876.