Week 10 - Continuing Research

This week, I made continued progress in my research on the men of the 7th Connecticut regiment. Thanks to the valuable Record of Service provided by Dr. Gannon, I  was able to search and link all the men's names to the corresponding page numbers in the research spreadsheet. Moreover, I am planning to dedicate this weekend to meticulously examining the service records of the 54th Massachusetts men.

While most of the men could be traced through the Record of Service, there were a few individuals whose information I couldn't find there. To fill in these gaps, I've been exploring alternative sources like the National Archive and Ancestry. Interestingly, I discovered that the search results varied significantly depending on the format of the names. For instance, searching "John Smith" yielded no results, but when I reversed it to "Smith, John," I found several relevant records. To ensure a comprehensive search, I've been exploring various name formats on each repository, incorporating relevant regimental information.

Unfortunately, due to an emergency, I couldn't attend the team meeting this week. I  emailed Dr. Gannon my status updates and she suggested that I prioritize finding evidence and applicable sources for the men, rather than focusing on crafting their biographies. The biographical aspect will likely be handled by future interns, who can draw from the sources I've compiled during this internship.

Currently, I've begun laying out the framework for my final paper. My plan is to begin with 3 to 5 pages of historiographical background, followed by an in-depth discussion on the challenges of memorialization and research, detailing the methodology I employed throughout this internship to investigate the men of the 35th USCT, 7th Connecticut, and 54th Massachusetts regiments.

I'm also excited about the collaboration with fellow Olustee interns, Brett Nystrom and Adaeze Nwigwe. We're preparing to map out our showcase presentation and initiate work on them in the coming days!

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