Looking for my biological father, Vietnam Era Vet
Submitted by rbernavich on 30 June 2008 - 1:06am.
Hello. When I was six months old my real father went to Vietnam and my mom left him and we went to the West Coast and I never saw him again. She knows he came back and married again. Recently she has dug up some information she has kept for me when I was curious and now I am attempting to find him.
I have his Service Number from when he was in the Army and I know his name. I am hoping this will be a good start.
Can anyone please help me by telling me where I can go with an ex soldiers dog tag ID and find information on him?
I would so appreciate this.
Thank you,
Rob.
The National Personnel Records Center
The National Personnel Records Center, Military Personnel Records (NPRC-MPR) is the Federal repository of millions of military personnel, health, and medical records of discharged and deceased veterans of all services during the 20th century. (Records prior to WWI are in Washington, DC.) NPRC (MPR) also stores medical treatment records of retirees from all services, as well as records for dependent and other persons treated at naval medical facilities. Information from the records is made available upon written request (with signature and date) to the extent allowed by law. They can also forward a letter to his last known address, and if he's retired from the military, they should know his present address.
http://www.archives.gov/st-louis/military-personnel/
http://www.archives.gov/veterans/evetrecs/index.html
Also, more than likely, your mother has your fathers full name and SSN somewhere in the paperwork. Army service numbers were converted to social security numbers in 1969, so if your fathers dog tag was issued after 1969, it probably has his SSN on it. Take your father's name and SSN to the local Social Security office and they should be able to tell you (at a minimum) if he is deceased. They may be able to help you even more because they should have his current address in their records.
There are also numerous online people search companies that can do a background check (for a small fee) with the information you have from his records and your mothers memory.
Good Luck.