I recently started researching the Civil War service records of my great-great grandfathers. I’ve been into genealogy for a while, but I really started getting excited about my ancestors’ military service as we prepared for out recent trip to Gettysburg. I’ve known that two of my great-great-grandfathers served in the Civil War for a long time, but I was curious how and where they served. Family lore was that one was a sharpshooter and the other was in the cavalry, served under Custer and fought at Gettysburg.

While reading about Gettysburg National Battlefield, I found the Soldiers and Sailors Database – a great resource on the National Park Service website. I was able to enter in my ancestors’ info, confirmed the results with my own research, and found instructions and links to request their records from the National Archives.

I requested the records for my great-great-grandfather Frank Thayer, the sharpshooter. I knew that Frank had served with the 27th Iowa infantry, but without the muster records, there was no way to know where he was and what he did. I didn’t confirm that he was a sharpshooter, but I did find out which battles he fought in and that he spent many months sick in the hospital. I also found that he enlisted as a minor, and that his father had to give consent.

(Click the button under the zoom tools to see the map full screen)

I created this map showing Frank’s battles, as well as the sites of his enlistment, hospital stays and where he mustered in and out of service. This map was created with CartoDB. I recently started working with CartoDB quite a bit at work. CartoDB is a SaaS platform that provides GIS and web mapping in the cloud. I am impressed with its ease of use – especially when compared to the competition. There has been a definite learning curve, but I am really excited about this technology. I have published my own maps online before, but CartoDB makes it so easy to embed and share maps that I am not sure why I would use anything else.