The county sheriff visited each Confederate veteran on record in his county and asked a series of questions from the schedule. Unless the veteran was in poor health and could not respond, the information came from the veteran. On the other hand, a pension application could be written by almost anyone as long as the paper was submitted under the veteran's signature or mark.

Pension applications were made to secure financial support. They often contain errors, mistakes and sometimes deliberately false information. The census, on the other hand, had no reward or penalty. There was no reason to embelish or falsify. A veteran offered information as he remembered it, and that was that.