You can use one of the many APIs to connect to / edit / create / modify / delete databases and their components. For instance, MySQL provides an API MySQL++ for use with C++ language. Likewise, depending upon your choice of Database you can get them from their official sites.
As for simple accessing and create/edit/modify/delete of its records/tables, you can use generic drivers, Visual C++ would have help files on those, check them out. I have only used these functionalities from within Visual Basic so I do not know the C++ requirements.
Simply search databases on MSDN's C++ page perhaps, if your domain is Windows. If Unix, you should find enough docs in /usr/share/doc already
P.s. If its a small one just use simple hash tables