Hello Everyone, I am pasting in a self-explanatory post on this subject I did for the Southside Virginia list earlier this year. Janet (Baugh) Hunter CNIDR Isearch-cgi 1.20.06 (File: 24) ========================================================================= Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2001 17:28:16 EST From: <Janmim@aol.com> To: VA-SOUTHSIDE-L@rootsweb.com Message-ID: <a0.f15eb44.279f5f80@aol.com> Subject: Re: [VA-SOUTHSIDE-L] How to Access DAR Info..Footnote on "Bound OUt" Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit What follows is based on my personal experience at DAR, a place where I could go in and not come out for ten years and still have more to do (it has complete census records by the way just like the Natl Archives only much better microfilm readers and they actually have the lights turned on so you can see if you want to write a note), but it doesn't have the original pension files or actual land grant sales records, not included at the BLM website...Sorry if I ramble. In a message dated 1/23/01 12:54:39 PM Eastern Standard Time, slyfox38@juno.com writes: << I am trying to figure out how to obtain info (actually copies of approved applications for membership)from the DAR regarding the membership of my late aunt and the person whose application she "piggybacked on" to prove her descent from a Revolutionary War soldier. >> Clay and everyone else, I live in Alexandria VA and have been lucky enough to research at DAR (and the Natl Archives) without paying their exorbitant fees. (Of course, I CAN'T from here get the Missouri info my mother wants..) I called them and have an answer for you. First, they have two types of information available..(1) The application itself and then (2) the backup documentation, such as bibles, wills,etc. They must be requested separately. There is an online form to request a copy of an application, no blood tests required to determine your sex. It is at http://www.dar.org/natsociety/RGR-1000.pdf This is a PDF document which requires an Acrobat reader, which many folks with older, slower computers don't have. If that is the case then you CAN simply write a request letter including all the information that you might have, including the name of the person's whose application you want. In your case, that would be the original applicant, not the piggybackers I guess. Include the name of the soldier, where he served,where he died, his wife's name, and the DAR member number. The letter should go to: National Society Daughters of the American Revolution Office of the Registrar General Attention: Record Copy 1776 D Street, NW, Washington, DC 20006 It should be accompanied by a check for $5.00 made payable to Treasurer General NSDAR Now for the supplemntal, supporting documentation files they charge a ,omo,i, $30.00/hour members, $40/hour nonmembers nonrefundable search fee. Information is here and as I said above it a separate process: http://www.dar.org/library/search.html I do not know whether to advise any of you to use this route or not if you need supporting documentation, as I was supplied with everything I needed, but the last two generations. from a cousin. What I do know is that I have requested many files as a cheap-for-me way to get a hold of wills (as opposed to writing to the courthouse in Henry Co VA). However, I would say about 50 percent of the time the files have been empty. Many of the rest have included a mumbo-jumbo of mixed documents, MANY with nothing before about 1850 or so, and then from my 7th cousins in faraway places. (FYI, I have many ancestors who fought in the Rev War and don't think I have an ancestor that arrived after about 1730. Except maybe for my never-to-be known Warren Co TN gg grandmother who gave birth in 1840 to an illegitimate child, maybe died in childbirth, undoubtedly sired by a future Congressman, three months before he was married to 15 year old daughter, half his age, of a prominent military man. The Congressman's descendants, well actually his father's descendants, have accepted us by the way. But he was raised , never acknowledged, by another family and letters he much later wrote from MO, to which he ran at age 14 when his step mother remarried and he was BOUND OUT..forgot about that in our recent discussion...make it clear that the female in that household was "like a mother for all intense (sic) purposes).) Sorry for the digression, but I just remembered my most recent case of a bound-out ancestor and its consequences on a headstrong 14 year old boy (for whose probable ancestors there are several DAR memberships btw) and whose marriage to the daughter of southern sympathizers caused a major family breach,pictures turned to the wall and admonitions not to speak to speak to her, though we think her mother may have ignored her father's shenanigans... As local DAR chapters have the initial say-so in who becomes members, you might check with your local chapter on their eligibility requirements. DAR has links for the states here: http://www.dar.org/cgi-bin/natsociety/chapters.cfm?State=Index The bottomline is that the $30.00 search fee for supporting documentation is really a crapshoot. If DAR membership is your goal and you don't have contact with the other family members, it is probably worth it. If you have already identified your ancestor, however, and want a will or something, you are better off paying the money to a courthouse. Best Regards and the best of luck Janet Hunter ______________________________ ------------------------------