Pension certificate

For Civil War and later pensions, an applicant first got an application number in the soldier's original (SO) or widow's original (WO) series. Once the pension office approved the claim, it issued a certificate number and moved the whole file into the soldier's certificate (SC) or widow's certificate (WC) series, and the old number became void.

A case file is stored under its last certificate number, so copy every number from the index card when ordering. The widow's certificate series also holds claims of minor children and dependent parents.