Yes George.

As we know, NARA sometimes put more than one unit on a roll. For small units, especially Cavalry and Artillery units, it simply was not efficient to have a separate roll of microfilm for each unit.

However, NARA did put all the records for Battery A together, including the CMSRs filed alphabetically, followed by all the records for Battery B, then Battery C ,etc.

What Fold3 has done is put all the records on each roll of microfilm in just one alphabetical list. The officers lists, record of events etc. can sometimes appear anywhere on the roll, not necessarily at the beginning of the proper unit. As long as you are looking for one man, whose name you know, this is not much of a problem, but if you need to see the records on all the men in say, Goldthwaite's Battery, Fold3 requires you to look at the first card (actually the envelope containing the cards) for every man on the roll. With the original (NARA microfilm), all the men in Goldthwaite's Battery will be together. Doing this kind of search on Fold3 can be very time consuming, as Fold3 pages sometimes are slow to open.

Likewise, NARA sometimes put the end of the alphabet of even large infantry regiments (say T to Z) of the 3rd Regt, on the same roll as (say A to D) for the 4th Regt. Fold3 will again put everybody on that roll in one alphabetical list, regardless of unit affiliation. Fold3 also does not make it obvious (you have to know where to look) what units are on each roll.

This problem may make it difficult to find records on some men.

Having said that, please remember that some records on NARA microfilm simply are not found at all on Fold3, as I stated earlier.