Washington taking command of the American Army at Cambridge, National Archives Identifier 532874
Two years ago, in partnership with the National Park Service, we set an audacious goal to transcribe the more than 2.5 million pages found in the Revolutionary War Pension Files by America’s 250th on July 4th, 2026. Together with the National Park Service we spread the word and recruited volunteers. In our first year, Citizen Archivists transcribed 65,000 pages and we were so excited to see the stories of America’s first veterans that they uncovered.
A lot has happened in our second year.
We introduced a tagging mission to improve access to the transcribed pensions by adding tags with standardized names, battles, forts and topics. Volunteers were also asked to add tags for National Park Service Sites from the Revolutionary War. Watch the video: How to Add Tags to Revolutionary War Pensions.
Through a partnership with FamilySearch, 30,000 pages of pensions transcribed by our Citizen Archivists were used to teach their AI language model how to transcribe this 19th Century cursive writing. The Partner Contributed transcriptions generated by their AI language model for the entire series are now available as Extracted Text in the National Archives Catalog. This became an excellent jumping off point for our transcribers to use for their transcriptions. Explore our November 2024 newsletter - AI and the Revolutionary War Pension Files.
Citizen Archivist and the Revolutionary War Pensions File Transcription Project made national and international News in January and February. New volunteers came our way when they realized that they had a superpower, reading cursive. We saw a jump of more than 7,000 new Revolutionary War transcribers in one month!
Our new and veteran transcribers transcribed an extraordinary number of pages and completed pension files at a dizzying speed! Since last June, they transcribed 400,814 pages (Six times as many as in year one!) and completed 13,300 pension files (Six times as many as in year one!).
We began sharing some of the amazing stories uncovered during transcription. Each week we add new stories about Revolutionary War Veterans to Stories from the Pension Files.
Our partners at the National Park Service have been recruiting volunteers too. Nearly two thousand people have changed their user names to identify themselves as NPS volunteers. Want to change your username? Watch the video - How to Change Your Username
Ranger Daniel Engelgau during the Battle of Guilford Courthouse anniversary event in 2025 offering guests the chance to try transcribing words and phrases from pensions and learning about the project. Photo courtesy of Guildford Courthouse National Military Park.
In May 2024, Guilford Courthouse National Military Park launched a volunteer project to transcribe the roughly two thousand pension records of veterans of the battle. Since then, over 800 volunteers from 48 states and 3 countries have answered the call and contributed over 8,000 hours to their mission. With their support, the park has achieved remarkable success, transcribing over 60% of the files in just a year.
Ninety Six National Historical Site launched their effort in October 2024. Since then they have 36 active volunteers from 22 states plus DC, with more applying each day. They have contributed 1233.75 hours and completed 127 pension files of veterans who fought in the Siege of Ninety Six.
A big thank you toall of our Citizen Archivist volunteers for two remarkable years! Join us to help break all previous transcription records as we prepare to celebrate America 250!
Check out our previous newsletters highlighting the Revolutionary War Pension File Project:
America 250 is right around the corner now. We'd love to have every veteran's story transcribed by July 4, 2026! Will you join in and help us reach our goal?
New Volunteer? Learn how to Register and Get Started on the project page
Looking to start a conversation with other Citizen Archivists working on Revolutionary War Pension Files? Check out what History Hub members have been talking about in the History Hub Community for Citizen Archivists:
Are you starting research of your own? Make History Hub your first stop! You can ask—or answer—questions on History Hub, or see if your question has already been answered! Check out our featured edition for more details, information, and instructions aboutusing History Hub for your research.
