"Among the stacks of Curtis' headquarters books I found a book containing the NAMES and FAMILY RELATIONSHIPS of every slave freed by the Army of the Southwest during its march across eastern Arkansas to Helena. What a boon to family researchers, but as far as I can tell, no one except me has ever seen it."

That should be a project that such people as the Latter Day Saints and their genealogy program should be interested in doing. Or maybe Ancestory.com, Or Rootsweb. The problem of it is as you have pointed out they probably don't know such genealogical information exists within those military records.

I would if someone like the Civil War Preservation Trust could obtain a government grant to preserve, cataloge and maybe even microfilm or scan them into a computer database. In my estimation Knowledgeand information is Preservation, because access to information creates interest.