Narrowing the Search

I spent most of the day yesterday trying to figure out how to optimize my research trip to the D.C. area since I obviously can't get enough funding to listen to 197 oral histories and then go copy/photograph thousands of pages of battalion and brigade daily journals.  After all, my previous trip to Archives II showed that in two full days I can get only work through about 2,500 pages.  So what to do?

By narrowing my search of the Veterans History Project's content to the specific battalions of the 35th Infantry Regiment and the 173rd Airborne Brigade, I substantially cut down on the number of oral histories I have to deal with.  To do this, I focused on the four individuals that interest me most.  James Henry, Roy Bumgarner, James Rodarte, and Anthony Herbert.  Henry served in Headquarters Company and B Company of the 1/35th.  Of the thirty-seven oral histories members of the 35th Infantry contributed to the Veterans History Project, nine of them came from 1st Battalion.  Bumgarner served in HHC, 173rd Airborne Brigade, and Rodarte served in Company E, 2/503, 173rd Airborne Brigade.  Of the 160 oral histories contributed by men of the 173rd Airborne Brigade, 7 come from 2/503rd.  For slightly broader coverage, members of the 503rd contributed twelve oral histories to the Veterans History project.  That reduces the volume of items to a more manageable twenty-one oral histories to deal with at the Library of Congress.

This lower number means that I have a good chance of being able to get though all of the oral histories in only two days in Washington, D.C.  Given the high costs of travel, lodging, and food, it might even be cheaper to use the Library of Congress' duplication service to have copies of the oral histories sent to me.  That leaves me with the issue of how to deal with the documents up at Archives II.

A bit of poking around with the NARA website and some creative use of Google gave me some ideas about how to further narrow my search there.  The issue is that I may need information from three key set of records.  RG 472.7.2 (Division-level), RG 472.7.3 (Brigade-level), and RG 472.7.6 (tactical organizations) hold daily journals, combat after action reports, and correspondence related to every U.S. Army unit serving in Vietnam.  That's potentially several thousand pages, and NARA charges $.50 per page for copying.  Here's what's available:


1/35th Infantry

Box 589: 1/35 Infantry Organizational History: 1967 to 1969
Box 590: 1/35 Infantry HHC Daily Journal: 05/11/1966 to 12/31/1966
Box 591: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S2) Daily Journal: 10/18/1969 to 03/ 05/1970
Box 592: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 05/01/1968 to 09/31/1968
Box 593: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 08/01/1968 to 11/13/1968
Box 594: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 11/14/1968 to 01/31/1969
Box 595: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 02/01/1969 to 05/11/1969
Box 596: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 05/12/1969 to 08/31/1969
Box 597: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 08/01/1969 to 10/31/1969
Box 598: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 11/01/1969 to 01/31/1970
Box 599: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Daily Journal: 02/01/1970 to 03/ 08/1970
Box 600: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Command Reports: 1966 to 1966
Box 601: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 1967 to 1970

2/503rd Infantry

Box 1117: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1963 to 1968
Box 1118: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1968 to 1968
Box 1119: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1968 to 1968
Box 1120: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1968 to 1968
Box 1121: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1969 to 1969
Box 1122: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1970 to 1971
Box 1123: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1971 to 1972
Box 1124: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S1) Daily Journal: 1965 to 1965
Box 1125: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) After Action Reports: 1965 to 12/1967
Box 1126: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Situation Reports: 02/1966 to 11/1966
Box 1127: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Command Reports: 1965 to 1969
Box 1128: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 01/1965 to 06/1966
Box 1129: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 07/1966 to 01/1967
Box 1130: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 02/1967 to 10/1967
Box 1131: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 11/1967 to 11/1967
Box 1132: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 11/1967 to 10/1968
Box 1133: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 01/1966 to 06/1971
Box 1134: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 1967 to 1967 
Box 1135: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 05/05/1965 to 09/1965
Box 1136: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 10/01/1965 to 04/30/1966
Box 1137: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 05/01/1966 to 10/09/1966
Box 1138: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 10/10/1966 to 02/28/1967
Box 1139: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 03/ 01/1967 to 08/31/1967
Box 1140: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 09/01/1967 to 12/31/1967
Box 1141: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 01/1968 to 05/16/1968
Box 1142: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 01/01/1968 to 05/31/1968
Box 1143: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 06/01/1968 to 08/16/1968
Box 1144: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 08/17/1968 to 11/16/1968
Box 1145: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 11/17/1968 to 06/30/1969
Box 1146: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 07/01/1969 to 11/30/1969
Box 1147: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 12/01/1969 to 04/30/1970
Box 1148: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 05/01/1970 to 07/31/1970
Box 1149: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 08/01/1970 to 10/17/1970
Box 1150: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 10/18/1970 to 01/15/1971
Box 1151: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 01/16/1971 to 03/ 31/1971
Box 1152: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 04/01/1971 to 07/12/1971

Clearly, the place to start is to remove everything that doesn't fit the date ranges I need.  The Bumgarner-Rodarte incident occurred in February 1969, which means I don't need really the files for the 2/503rd after that point. That leaves me with the issue of how much information I need leading up to that point?  Is it enough to just get information for 1968 and the beginning of 1969 to develop a narrative for the activities of the unit? That would result in a document set that looks like this:

Box 1118: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1968 to 1968
Box 1119: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1968 to 1968
Box 1120: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1968 to 1968
Box 1121: 2/503 Infantry Organizational History: 1969 to 1969
Box 1127: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Command Reports: 1965 to 1969
Box 1133: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 01/1966 to 06/1971
Box 1141: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 01/1968 to 05/16/1968
Box 1142: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 01/01/1968 to 05/31/1968
Box 1143: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 06/01/1968 to 08/16/1968
Box 1144: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 08/17/1968 to 11/16/1968
Box 1145: 2/503 Infantry ACOS (S2/3) Daily Journal: 11/17/1968 to 06/30/1969

The Henry Allegation might be more difficult to nail down in chronological terms.  He discusses the murder of a Vietnamese teen in October 1967 and a massacre of nineteen Vietnamese on 8 February 1968 - just a month before My Lai.  This seems like an escalation of violence toward unarmed Vietnamese over the course of 1967 and 1968.  The question is how far back into 1967 do I need to go?  Is June 1967 early enough, or would it be better to go all the way back to January?  Here's what the revised document set looks like for the 1/35th:

Box 589: 1/35 Infantry Organizational History: 1967 to 1969
Box 601: 1/35 Infantry ACOS (S3) Op. Plan. Files: 1967 to 1970

Why are there no Daily Journals for the 1/35th during 1967-68?  Does anyone have some insight into this?  Also, any advice on getting documents covering Bumgarner and Rodarte's courts-martial?

New Years' Resolutions

2013 is the year I write my dissertation. No, really.  I have to be done writing by the end of 2013 in order to defend and edit in time for graduation in May, 2014.  Otherwise, the University kicks me to the curb, and says thanks for the cash.  So, there's no pressure at all to get this thing done.  As long as I treat this thing as a regular job, this is totally something I can do.  So here's the plan:

We're moving to Tampa mid-month, so most of this will happen after we do that and get the new apartment set up.  Our new place is large enough that it has room for my wife and I to have separate office space, though mine will include the guest bed in addition to my desk and bookcases.  That will allow me to focus on writing in an area that I've set up to my own needs while Heather studies for the Florida Bar Exam and works on starting her non-profit in her office.  

In may ways, my office will fulfill the functions of "man-cave", although a couch would be better than a queen-sized bed for that. I'll have two or three bookcases full of books (history, technology, and a smattering of novels), Xbox 360, Mac Mini file and media server, monitor, speakers, desk, and cool hockey and geek wall hangings, replica and real swords (and one of these).  I'll also have my space to start brewing beer again by stashing fermenting bottles in the guest bath room and keeping supplies in the office closet.  The printers and wireless router will go in Heather's office, but my network needs will be fulfilled by a Netgear powerline networking kit (courtesy of the Amazon gift card my in-laws gave me for Christmas).

Once the apartment is habitable, I'm heading back to Washington, D.C. and College Park for a research trip to Archives II and the Library of Congress to find information on the 35th Infantry Regiment and the 173rd Airborne Brigade.  Archives II houses Modern Military Records, which means everything after 1915.  Record Groups 472.7.2 (divisions),  472.7.3 (combat brigades), and 472.7.6 (tactical organizations) include duty officer logs, after action reports, operational records, annual historical supplements.  From what I understand, the Battalion and Brigade Journals will be the most beneficial items for by research since I can use those to look at the specific events for particular companies and battalions, which will help build the narrative that my analysis of what individual soldiers reactions to the events they witness. 

The Library of Congress has a different type of resource that I hope to use in the same way I would correspondence or memoirs - the Veterans History Project, which holds thousands of oral histories collected from interviews with American veterans.  So far I've identified 160 oral histories from veterans of the 173rd Airborne Brigade's service in Vietnam and 37 veterans of the 35th Infantry Regiment.  A good subset of these are available online as audio files or transcripts, but most require a visit to the Library of Congress to access.  The challenge is getting and using these quickly and documenting the contents, because graduate students can only find so much funding for research trips.

My plan is to spend February analyzing all of my evidence and reading memoirs so that by March I can get started on writing.  Once the writing starts, I'll be sending chapters to my dissertation committee as I finish them so that I can speed the process of getting comments back from them.  The whole idea is to speed the process of writing and revision to meet my timeline.  This isn't the optimal way to approach getting the dissertation done, but the point is to have a completed dissertation so I can graduate.

I've worked out a work schedule that I'll be following starting in February:

07:30 - 09:00 coffee, email, news

09:00 - 12:00 research and writing

12:00 - 13:00 lunch and a quick workout

13:00 - 16:00 research and writing

16:00 - 19:30 dinner, games, email, news

19:30 - 21:00 responding to students and grading

We'll see how well that works out and adjust from there, but it should work.