The Public Record: Where to Start
When a family starts looking into a veteran's service — their own, a parent's, a grandparent's — the first search results are rarely the right ones. There is a whole industry of third parties standing between people and records that are, in most cases, available directly from the government. This post is a short map to the front doors.
Three ground rules before the list. First, these are starting points, not instructions — every one of these institutions publishes its own current guidance, and that guidance outranks anything written here. Second, this blog links; it does not advise. Third, verify everything with the official source. Requirements, forms, and procedures change, and the institution's own site is the only authority on what it currently requires.
VA.gov — benefits and records requests
- What it is: The Department of Veterans Affairs' official site, at va.gov.
- What you can actually get: The official channel for anything benefits-related — and the place to request VA-held records, including through its online tools for military and VA records.
- One caveat: The VA holds VA records. The historical military service file itself is generally held by the National Archives, so a records search often involves both institutions. Start with whichever holds what you actually need, and let their sites tell you which that is.
The National Archives — the service records themselves
- What it is: The National Archives and Records Administration's veterans' service records portal, at archives.gov/veterans, which fronts the National Personnel Records Center in St. Louis.
- What you can actually get: Copies of military service records, including the DD-214, requested through Standard Form 180 (SF-180) or the eVetRecs online system. Veterans and next of kin have access rights that the general public does not; older records progressively open to public research.
- One caveat: Access depends on who is asking and how old the record is, and some mid-century records were affected by the documented 1973 fire at the records center. The Archives explains both situations, and what reconstruction is possible, on its own pages — read them before requesting.
The branch history offices — the unit story
- What it is: Each service branch maintains an official history organization — the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and Coast Guard each have one, findable from their official .mil sites.
- What you can actually get: Published unit histories, lineage and honors information, command chronologies, and historical reference material — the context around an individual's service that a personnel file does not contain.
- One caveat: These are history offices, not records centers. They generally cannot pull an individual's personnel file; that request still goes through the National Archives.
That is the whole map: VA.gov for benefits and VA records, the National Archives for the service record itself, the branch history offices for the story around it. No paid intermediary is required to reach any of them.
Start at the front door, read the official instructions, and verify — always — with the source.