Compete Instructions

The Larchmont Historical Society has scanned, indexed and posted online all of the pages of Soldiers of the Great War (SGW)relating to fallen soldiers during World War I from New York State. The images are stored in and displayed from a digital archive which can be searched by the name of the soldier or the name of the soldier’s residence.

Basic Instructions

To search for a soldier in the archive, enter either the last name – example “Jones” – or the community name – example “Albany” – and all of corresponding records will come up.

Search

The project uses a digital image database which displays the search results. The database displays scans of pages from SGW. Clicking on any small image of a page brings up a full-page display.

Search Strategies

Please note that SGW does not include all of the names and pictures of fallen soldiers in World War I. As explained in the Introduction:

“We soon learned it would be impossible to obtain the photographs of all the soldiers who died in the great war. Many left no photographs, the relatives of many others were reluctant to part with the picture they had, and in some cases conditions were met most unfavorable to the enterprise, but with an abiding faith in the value of this record to the relatives and friends of the departed soldiers, and to the public as a historical record, the association continued its labors with an increasing degree of success. The collection of materials continued for the period of over one year, during which time they were made ready for publication.”

It is also important to note that the place of residence listed in SGW is the place where the soldier lived when joining military service, not necessarily the soldier’s home town where his or her name is memorialized. Thus if one searches with the name of a community, not all of the soldiers in the database will be identified. It may be useful, as a search strategy, to determine the names on a community World War I memorial, and search based on the names.

Search Tool

Enter a family name or place name here:
Search

Instructions