If your ancestors served in the Canadian Expeditionary Force during WWI and you want to see their service files online, you may have to be very patient.
In January 2014, genealogists cheered when Library and Archives Canada (LAC) announced it was “undertaking the digitization of 640,000 personnel service files of the First World War’s Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) members with a view to ensuring the long-term preservation of these frail paper documents.”
We were told that once completed, more than 18 million pages of service files will have been digitized and available online. LAC expected to complete the project sometime in 2015.
Unfortunately, the task appears to have been greater than LAC anticipated.
At the top of the Digitization of Canadian Expeditionary Force Service File web page, LAC says the project is now “scheduled to be completed by the end of 2018.” If this information has been posted for a while, I missed it until Marylene and Yvonne brought it to my attention.
Still, the good news is that LAC is digitizing the service files. In fact, that’s great news. The bad news is we genealogists can be an impatient bunch.
Follow Genealogy a la carte’s board Genealogy à la carte Blog on Pinterest.
Actually not a surprise. It is an ambitious project and they don’t enlist help. I wonder if they will have it done by November 11, 2018. If not it will take them longer than the Great War did. I have been unable to access a file for a soldier whose name starts with an ‘E’ for the last year and a half.