War of the Rebellion

About the Collection

The Official Records of the War of the Rebellion is the most thorough collection of primary source official documents from the American Civil War.

They include first-hand accounts, orders, reports, maps, diagrams, and correspondence drawn from both the Confederate and the Union governments:

• Series I of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies contains the formal Union and Confederate reports of all military operations in the field, along with the related correspondence, orders, and returns.

• Series II contains the correspondence, orders, reports, and returns, for both the Union and Confederate sides, relating to prisoners of war, and State or political prisoners.

• Series III contains other correspondence, orders, reports, and returns of the Union authorities (including their correspondence with the Confederate officials) not covered in Series I or Series II. It includes the annual and special reports of the Secretary of War, of the General-in-Chief, and of the chiefs of the several staff corps and departments; the calls for troops, and the correspondence between the National and the several State authorities.

• Series IV contains the correspondence, orders, reports, and returns of the Confederate authorities, excluding the correspondence between the Union and Confederate authorities already published in Series III.