XC (groan)
To request a Civil War veteran’s pension record at the National Archives, you must first access his file card on microfilm. This card contains application and certificate numbers for his disability and survivor’s pensions. These numbers are necessary to request his records. Fairly simple, considering the staggering amount of paperwork veterans and their families filled out, and the government maintains to this day.
Certain file cards contain the letters XC at the bottom, followed by a seven-digit number. I’ve come across these on several occasions. When I do, it’s usually followed by an audible groan, because this means the records are in the custody of the Veterans Administration.
At some point after their founding in 1930, surviving Civil War veterans or their survivors’ benefits records were transferred to the VA, and remain in their possession today. Pension records belonging to deceased veterans and their deceased spouses (or other beneficiaries) were sent to the National Archives. The records remain divided to this day.
To access the VA files, one must send a request letter. They contact a regional office. Regional representatives research their records, access more numbers, and then contact their central records storage facility to access the original file and make arrangements for the requestor to view them. This process usually takes at least six months, and has taken as long as a year. On more than one occasion I’ve had to make a second request. I’m currently appealing two requests, which the VA tells me they do not have sufficient information to locate the files. I believe this is an administrative error.
In contrast, the National Archives maintains their pension files in the main building in Washington, D.C. Once you’ve filled out the request form with the numbers from the file card, the original record is retrieved and delivered to a research room for viewing. The whole process takes about two hours.
If the pension files in possession of the VA were permanently transferred to the National Archives, the entire group would be reunited with the government agency best equipped to deal with fragile documents, and with a public request procedure that is efficient and timely.
Certain file cards contain the letters XC at the bottom, followed by a seven-digit number. I’ve come across these on several occasions. When I do, it’s usually followed by an audible groan, because this means the records are in the custody of the Veterans Administration.
At some point after their founding in 1930, surviving Civil War veterans or their survivors’ benefits records were transferred to the VA, and remain in their possession today. Pension records belonging to deceased veterans and their deceased spouses (or other beneficiaries) were sent to the National Archives. The records remain divided to this day.
To access the VA files, one must send a request letter. They contact a regional office. Regional representatives research their records, access more numbers, and then contact their central records storage facility to access the original file and make arrangements for the requestor to view them. This process usually takes at least six months, and has taken as long as a year. On more than one occasion I’ve had to make a second request. I’m currently appealing two requests, which the VA tells me they do not have sufficient information to locate the files. I believe this is an administrative error.
In contrast, the National Archives maintains their pension files in the main building in Washington, D.C. Once you’ve filled out the request form with the numbers from the file card, the original record is retrieved and delivered to a research room for viewing. The whole process takes about two hours.
If the pension files in possession of the VA were permanently transferred to the National Archives, the entire group would be reunited with the government agency best equipped to deal with fragile documents, and with a public request procedure that is efficient and timely.
posted by Ron Coddington at 11:43 AM
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