![]() An aluminum disc the size of a silver half dollar – imprinted with the name, rank, company, regiment or corps, worn by both officer and enlisted member in the field – suspended around the neck. 20, 1906, by General Order #204, the United States government decided upon a circular aluminum disc to be worn as an identification tag, and by 1913, the identification discs were required for all military service members. During WWI, the French wore a bracelet with a metal disk that was engraved with the soldier’s name, rank and formation. Army and Navy began experimenting with issuing metal identification tags to recruits. Dogs wore similar identification tags, so it wasn’t long before soldiers began referring to their ID tags as dog tags.īy the 1890s, the U.S. Some soldiers made their own ID tags by grinding off one side of a coin and then etching their names on it. Harper’s Weekly Magazine advertised “soldier’s pins” made of silver or gold and etched with the soldier’s name and unit. The nation debated how to address this issue to ensure Americans were properly accounted for, returned home, and given proper burial.Įventually, merchants began producing and selling metal disks to soldiers. ![]() Despite their best efforts to mark themselves, historians estimate that 50% of those killed in the Civil War were either unaccounted for or simply marked unknown. The first attempt to provide identification tags were called “name discs” or “soldier pins” of various designs, and there was no specific uniformity pertaining to the information provided. The issue was further complicated by inadequate recordkeeping of personnel assigned to and fighting as regulars or volunteers in both the Union and Confederate militaries, and lost records pertaining to burial locations. They drilled a hole in the disc and hung the disc from their neck with a piece of string. Some soldiers went to the trouble of carving small wooden discs with their names on them. They wrote their names on a piece of paper or a handkerchief, and pinned it to their clothing before going into battle. Soldiers worried that if they were killed, their families would never know what happened to them, other than that they were missing in action. During the American Civil War (1861-65), only 58% of soldiers killed in action were positively identified.
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