Pictorial Index - Textual Index

The little stones mark the graves of the unidentified soldiers.

On the eve of battles some soldiers pinned paper notes with their name and home address to the backs of their coats. Other soldiers stencilled identification on their knapsacks or scratched it in the soft lead backing of the Army belt buckle.

A New Yorker named John Kennedy wrote to the U.S. Army in 1862, offering to furnish discs for all officers and men in the Federal Army, enclosing a design for the disc. The army refused without explanation.

The U.S. Army first authorized identification tags in War Department General Order No. 204, dated 20 December 1906, which essentially prescribed the Kennedy identification tag.