A blog announcement posted by Dick Eastman brought to my attention the fact that a new website with 55,000 early War Department digital documents has now gone online.
Early War Department papers as such have been hard to come by, as it seems that on the night of 8 November 1800, a fire in the War Office wiped out all the papers, records, and books stored there. Papers of the War Department 1784-1800, is a digital project, making about 55,000 reconstructed documents of the early War Department available.
Although many of the documents refer to the military, the documents record far more. Between 1784 and 1800, the War Department was responsible for;
- Indian affairs,
- Veteran affairs,
- Naval affairs (until 1798),
- and Militia & Army matters.
Prior to 1800, the Secretary of War spent seven of every ten dollars of the federal budget. It was the largest single consumer
of fabric, clothing, shoes, food, medicine, building materials, and weapons of all kinds. “Follow the money,” it is said. The money trail usually led to the War Office. Because of this, the War Department papers refer to many of our ancestors. Just for fun, I did a search on the surname, Keeler.
I got several hits, including pay information for one Thadeus Keeler. However, I found two files that both referred to a John Pierce, one claiming that a certificate received by him is in fact counterfeit, being a fraudulent duplicate of a certificate issued to Captain Samuel Keeler. Captain Keeler is then ordered to reveal the personal information of the person to whom he sold his certificates including the time and place where they were sold. While not genealogical, the documents give us a window upon an event long-forgotten, but surely of interest to the family historian.
Do a search in the “Papers of the War Department 1784-1800” for your ancestor.