NARA Offers Records Information for WWII Soldiers

NARA, the National Archives and Records Administration, offers several databases related to WWII. There are two in which I think you'll be particularly interested. There's the "ARMY SERIAL NUMBER ELECTRONIC FILE: MERGED PROCESSED FILE ENLISTMENT CARD RECORDS," covering almost 9 million records for men and women who enlisted in the Army and Women's Army Auxiliary Corps. Then there's the "ARMY SERIAL NUMBER ELECTRONIC FILE: MERGED PROCESSED FILE ENLISTED RESERVE CORPS STATISTICAL CARD RECORDS", which includes about 300,000 reservists in the Enlisted Reserve Corps. You can access them both at http://aad.archives.gov/aad/file_unit_description.jsp?file_id=3475&coll_id=null .

The databases allow you to search by several factors, including serial number, name, state of residence, place of enlistment, and year of birth. I searched by name for John Agar and got three results in a table which included name and codes for place of enlistment, day of enlistment, and state of residence. Click the checkboxes you want to see and it'll show you a lot of information for that enlistment including rank, term of enlistment, year of birth, education, civilian occupation, marital status, and component of the Army.

Note that each item on a listings has a "Notes" link. Each of these is clickable and will give you additional information about where the data comes from and how that data was noted. You may wish to read the Army Serial Number File FAQ, linked to on each results page for additional information on how to best search this database.

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