5 replies to this topic

[bjenn]

I am trying to figure out the entry of military service when you either don't know specific battles, places stationed, you just know start and end dates. I have watched the "Getting Started" video and I have also searched the forums and I can't find anything to give me guidance on this. I was going to enter a military fact and all I saw was just a date entry. My thought is it should be a "from" and "to" thing for dates. Am I thinking of this wrong? Should there be two or more military facts? As I say, I just want to enter the date entered the Air Force for example, and then the date discharged. Appreciate any guidance.

[Bob C]

You can have as many military facts as you need for an individual and I use both from/to and specific dates depending upon what it is. My father currently has 13 military facts (and rising as I work thru his personnel file from the National Archives) for his 20 years of service in the Navy. Some have from/to like ship deployments, schools or shore duty and promotions have a specific date. Mix and match as needed and you can be as detailed as you want, there is no standard.

[zhangrau]

For most of my military veterans, I have two related facts:

 - Enlistment - a custom fact with date, place & description enabled

 - Military- a built-in fact with date, place & description enabled

 

For promotions and other changes in service, I use the Miscellaneous fact.

[cj1260]

Keep in mind that any date field in RM can be a 'from/to' format. So in the military fact date field you can enter things like '1942-1945' or 'from 1942 to 1945'. RM will accept many other formats too.

[bjenn]

I think I see, so in the date cell, just enter "10 may 1982 - 2 jan 1992" and it will take that and know nearly 10 years in the military. I was just trying to avoid entering one military fact for entering and one military fact for discharge unless that was the right thing to do. In a case where you don't have all the stations or don't want all that entered, a "from-to" would be ideal. Thanks for all the suggestions to all.

[NorasMom45]

The hard-core users might cringe at this, but I enter whatever date(s) I have available, even if it's vague ("abt 1942").  If they were peace-time military, I enter their base as the "Place", but if they're actual war vets I enter the name of the war in that spot.  I've found it makes it easier to track everyone who was involved in a specific war if I do it that way.  "Place details" is their unit and rank.  "Description" is reserved for any other odd facts I have about them.  When I discover specific battles, locations, or muster rolls, then I enter them as a new Military fact.