No single office holds every record of a veteran’s burial. Which one to ask depends on where the person is buried and what you need to know.
Burial location
| Buried in | Who holds the record |
|---|---|
| A VA national cemetery or state veterans cemetery | The VA’s Nationwide Gravesite Locator, and the cemetery office |
| Arlington National Cemetery | The Army, through the Arlington website |
| An overseas American military cemetery | The American Battle Monuments Commission |
| A national cemetery inside a national park | The National Park Service unit that manages it |
| A private, religious or municipal cemetery | The cemetery itself. The VA’s locator may include the grave if it has a government headstone or marker. |
Service records
Burial records say where someone lies; service records say when and how they served. Personnel files for most twentieth-century veterans are held by the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC), part of the National Archives. Veterans and next of kin can request records online through eVetRecs, or by mail or fax using Standard Form 180. Files become open to the general public 62 years after the service member left the military.
The 1973 fire
A fire at the NPRC in St. Louis on July 12, 1973 destroyed a large share of the Army personnel files for soldiers discharged between 1912 and 1960, and of Air Force files for airmen discharged between 1947 and 1964 with names alphabetically after Hubbard, James E. The National Archives describes the losses and how it reconstructs service details from other records. If a file was lost, a request is still worth making.
Headstone and marker applications
When a family or cemetery applied to the government for a headstone or marker, the application recorded the veteran’s service and place of burial. A National Archives research guide states that applications from 1879 to 1985 are held by the National Archives and that later records remain with the VA. They are a useful source when a veteran is buried in a private cemetery.
What this site can and cannot tell you
VeteranCemeteries.com lists cemeteries, not people. It does not copy or republish individual burial records. For how to run a search step by step, see how to find where a veteran is buried.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, National Cemetery Administration. Nationwide Gravesite Locator.
- U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. Request Military Service Records.
- U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. The 1973 Fire, National Personnel Records Center.
- ABMC. American Battle Monuments Commission.
- U.S. Army. Arlington National Cemetery.
- U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Veterans headstones and markers.
- U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. Headstones for veterans buried in non-federal cemeteries: research guide (PDF, 2012).