What is a CMSR? It stands for Compiled Military Service Record. The National Archives in Washington, D.C. keeps these and has microfilmed them. Several fee-based organizations have since scanned them and digitized at least some of the descriptive information.
Anatomy of a CMSR
CMSR's include bi-monthly rolls and sometimes loose "returns" stating a soldier's status or orders. If the soldier died, they may include a set of documents called "Final Statements" mostly from the hospital. They may contain "Compensation Claims" from a former enslaver hoping to be reimbursed for the loss of an enlisted slave. They may include enlistment papers. They generally include a descriptive roll slip, summarizing the vital information for each soldier.
Where to find the CMSR's online
The two main sites I use are Ancestry.com, for searching Colored Artillery, Cavalry, and Infantry Regiments numbered 1-55. For Infantry Regiments numbered 56-138, I use Fold3.com. Fold3 covers the lower numbered regiments as well, but only the soldier's name can be searched, as opposed to several other details like age, enlistment date and origin on Ancestry.com. As of now at least, the Ancestry.com searchable data does not include the higher-numbered regiments. Each regiment has lettered companies, A-Z, and the companies are large.
Most of the Civil War enlistees in these regiments were between the ages of 16 and 35,
and they enlisted mostly in 1863 and 1864. So you are looking for male
ancestors born between 1828-1848. In many instances people were just
estimating their ages though, so this is all very rough. I dismissed a
few ancestors whom I had thought were too young to enlist and found
later that they had. So in the 1870 census, these ancestors are going to
be 22-42 years old and in the 1880 census they are going to be 32-52,
again just roughly.
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