The Compiled Service for Henry C. Markham of the 37th Iowa did not make any mention of the train incident referred to in the Civil War Pension of William Kile who also served in that unit. Documentation and correspondence his file relate to his appearance on muster rolls, application for a leave due to illness, and some reassignments of his position.
Readers may remember that Kile and others in his unit indicated that Markham refused to give the men an order to move which reportedly resulted in the death of at least one soldier and injuries to several others. None of the correspondence in his file appears to have been the result of the train incident.
The question at this point is: "How interested am I in this incident?"
Like many discoveries we make, one has to balance the interest in the discovery with the likelihood that researching the discovery will result in new information about the people of interest. At this juncture, I'm not certain that knowing more about the incident will result in more knowledge about William Kile.
And there's the question of the cost of obtaining copies of unmicrofilmed copies of records from the National Archives. Will it be worth the expense?
There's parallels in this dilemma when one considers obtaining any record or document. One has to contemplate the perceived benefits with the costs.
Of course, blog readers may be interested to see if more can be discovered and learning in general about records in the National Archives is a good thing. So...I may go ahead and take the plunge and obtain the copies of the records.
And hope that readers are interested in what additional information may potentially be obtained.
Stay tuned.
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