Devonshire Expertise Needed

[Peter Shand]

My grandfather, John Wilson, served in the Devonshire Regiment for a period. His MIC shows a number 103660 or 10366. His medals are inscribed with the 103660 number.

Unfortunately, searches for any of his service papers through Ancestry have drawn a blank.

Using Geoff's Search Engine, I have found that the majority of Devonshire casualties in the CWGC registry have a five digit service number. A few six digit numbers do show up but all have 203 as the first three digits (e.g. 203xxx). This suggests that his real number was 10366 and may point to him being with the 8^th Battalion.

His RGA SWB roll checks out (thanks, Sotonmate) and indicates that he entered service on December 12, 1915. Other sources suggest that his RGA service number indicates a transfer to the RGA about October, 1916.

Can anyone with knowledge of Devonshire numbering shed light on this and advise if there is any way of determining which battalion he served with. I believe he qualified for his medals through service with the Devonshires in some theatre of war. I'll be in London in April and any information might help in a visit to the NA.

[billyfiske]

Hi Peter,

If you don'y receive a reply from another forum member in the meantime I will check the Devonshire medal rolls for you after work this evening. This should detail the battalion.

Billyfiske

[billyfiske]

Hi Peter,

I have been through the medal roll and can find no trace of this John Wilson. Sorry.

Billyfiske

[Peter Shand]

Thank you for trying.Regards, Pete

Hi Peter,

I have been through the medal roll and can find no trace of this John Wilson. Sorry.

Billyfiske

[kevinrowlinson]

Peter,

Unfortunately the MICs are some times wrong. Either the regiment or number may be wrong, or both. To complicate it some more the date mentioned on the SWB roll may be his attestation date, and not when he joined. This is explained on the LLT under Derby Scheme. Surprisingly there were relatively few Devonshire Regt. men transferred to the RGA, and those that were, were mainly near the end of 1917 onwards. If you have the SWB roll, and also the medal roll page and neither gives any further information I could only suggest that you have to find another regiment that were using this number at the end of 1915, beginning if 1916. One would have to eliminate the usual transfers, RFA, RE and ASC and work from there. There may not be that many possibilities.

It is unlikely to be 10366 for the Devonshires.

Kevin

[Peter Shand]

Kevin, Thanks for your comment. It makes the waters even murkier. If I understand it correctly, he may not have served with the Devonshire Regiment, even though his medal inscriptions and the RGA SWB tie in with his MIC data and the RGA medal rolls have the same regiment and number.

You may be right; I don't know why a man born and living in Kendal, Westmorland would have joined the Devonshires. I would have thought the Border Rgt. or one of the Lancashire based regiments would have been more likely.

Regards, Pete

[Paul Nixon]

It is unlikely to be 10366 for the Devonshires.

Pete

Actually I would have said that it is very likely to be the Devonshires. That number fits in perfectly with numbers being issued in late August 1914. 10350 was issued on the 28th August, 10451 on the 31st.

The fact that that number appears on his MIC suggests that he was with the Devons when he arrived overseas and then transferred to the RGA.

Paul

[kevinrowlinson]

Pete & Paul,

Not if he attested on the 12 Dec. 1915, which was my point. I have already given that likely date for the Devonshires on an earlier thread before knowing the later date. There appears something wrong with the available records. The mistake was just being duplicated on the rolls and MIC. Strangely the date is one of the only things I could believe on the SWB roll.

Kevin

[Muerrisch]

The 1915 date might be when he transferred to RGA?

[kevinrowlinson]

Quote,"The 1915 date might be when he transferred to RGA?"

No.

Kevin

[themonsstar]

From The SWB roll

115168 Gnr J.Wilson

Unit RGA.

SWB No B121,014

Enlistment date 15/12/15

Discharge date 7/2/19 (para 392( XVI) K.R. Para 2(a) (1).

Age 38

Overseas Yes

Badge was issue out after 7/2/19

[Paul Nixon]

Pete & Paul,

Not if he attested on the 12 Dec. 1915, which was my point. I have already given that likely date for the Devonshires on an earlier thread before knowing the later date. There appears something wrong with the available records. The mistake was just being duplicated on the rolls and MIC. Strangely the date is one of the only things I could believe on the SWB roll.

Kevin

My apologies Kevin; yes I missed the Dec 1915 attestation date in the initial post. You're right, that Devons number does not fit a post Aug 14 date of issue.

[Graham Stewart]

Be advised the dates given on SWB's can be at fault too, as I've found on many occassion with soldiers relating to lads in the Tyneside Scottish and Irish and other Northumberland Fusiliers. Men clearly enlisting in 1914 are according to the SWB enlisting in 1915, when I know from other sources for this to be wrong - clearly clerical error when typing up hundreds of SWB sheets per day.

[Muerrisch]

But Graham, are there any erroneous 1916, 1917, 1918 dates? If not, why type 1915 for 1914? OK, the numbers are next to each other on QWERTY keyboard, but so is 13. Any 13s?

[SteveE]

Can I suggest you PM forum member Ivor Lee and ask his advice. Using Ivor's excellent book "No Labour No Battle" I rather suspect the number 103660 is a Labour Corps one indicating he was a member of an Infantry Labour Company and is from the sequence (103201 to 103800) issued to 8th Infantry Labour Company Devonshire Regiment.

Regards

Steve

[Graham Stewart]

But Graham, are there any erroneous 1916, 1917, 1918 dates? If not, why type 1915 for 1914? OK, the numbers are next to each other on QWERTY keyboard, but so is 13. Any 13s?

The 1914's are easier to identify from the hundreds of lists produced in local newspapers showing those enlisting and which continued into early 1915, before ceasing. So you end up with loads of names which can be put to numbers and battalions and so you know these odd guys were already in, despite what the SWB tells you.

For 1916,17 and 18 enlistments the SWB lists are harder to determine simply because many have been transferred in from other units, however oddments can be eliminated when found in groups who all enlist during a particular period or place, i.e. if say you have a group of lads who came from Durham with enlistment dates covering a particular month in 1915, with sequencial numbers and one out of the whole lot said 1916, then you have to say the SWB list is wrong.

This why databases can be so useful in helping determining regimental numbers.

[kevinrowlinson]

Pete,

Steve's suggestion is sound advice, although I had previously thought that the timing is still out, having checked the nearest record available; 58256 Oxley. Gnr. Wilson's name would certainly fit in well, http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documen...mp;mediaarray=* .

The only excuse for this happening would be that he was actually renumbered with the Labour Corp number after he had already transferred to the RGA.

Kevin

[Peter Shand]

Thank you all for your interest, comments, and advice. I did contact Ivor Lee who clarified that the numbers mentioned in SteveE's post #15 are Labour Corps numbers and not Devonshire Regiment numbers. So, the mystery remains, and I don't think there is any way of determining whether the MIC Devonshire number (or regiment) is a clerical error.

Cheers, Pete.

[Ivor Lee]

Pete

I have been taking a closer look at the Medal Roll an, as a result, I think Steve may well be right about 103660 being a Labour Corps number.

My thinking is based on the fact that all the numbers around this are men with the surname Wilson. In addition they are alphabetical by first name so 103659 is Charles Wilson and 103661 Robert Wilson.

In view of this I suspect there is an error on the Medal Card and that, as Steve suggested, he initially went overseas with the 8th Infantry Labour Company, Devonshire Regiment becoming 103660 in 173 Company, Labour Corps in May 1917.

If this was the case he would have arrived in France in March 1917.

However there is no way I can tell you when he would have been transferred to the RGA.

Regards

Ivor

[kevinrowlinson]

Pete,

If by this time you are still interested then I would say the following is the most likely.

John Wilson actually enlisted into the RGA at Fort Brockhurst around the 6th to 9th October 1916.

He was then transferred to the Devon Regt. Lab Coy. Without this number it is impossible to say when, but as Ivor says was given his new Labour Corp number May 1917.

It is then possible that he was later transferred back to the RGA perhaps during 1918.

To see another mans records, who up to a degree had a similar path, see (except he later went to the REs) : http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documen...;resultcount=35 .

Kevin

[Peter Shand]

Ivor and Kevin: I appreciate your analyses and comment. I think Ivor's version fits in better with the information available, assuming that the clerk did hit the keys accurately. John Wilson married my grandmother Margaret Dixon on July 2, 1914 when he was 33. My mother was born in April 1915, so I don't see it likely that he rushed off to war in 1914. If the RGA SWB medal roll date of enlistment of 15 December 1915 is correct, he would have volunteered ( attested?) as a married man under the Derby Scheme, with its proviso that married men would not be called up until after the reservoir of single men had been used up. He is then called up, probably in 1916, to the Devonshires and with his age around 35 is placed in the Labour Company. In 1917, he is taken up in the newly formed Labour Corps and later that year is transferred into the RGA.

What is missing is trace of the exact sequence. If he had a 5 digit Devonshire number at the head of his MIC before the 103660 number which should have been identified as a Labour Corps number all would be clear. The RGA medal roll for the Victory and BW medals identifies him as initially serving in the Devon's but inserts his Labour Corps number, possibly because the form only has room for one entry of two lines Unit, Rank/ Service number, RGA, Rank. This may be an error of omission made by a tired and bored clerk filling in medal rolls and subsequently entered into the MI card.

Unfortunately, without any surviving service papers, this can only be a best guess.

Thanks again, Pete

[kevinrowlinson]

Pete,

There is further information available, and that is the records of men who may have taken a similar path. I have found you the MIC and records for one such man, but if you wish to ignore it then that's entirely up to you. With more research you may find more. I stand by what I wrote about his likely enlistment and transfers.

What we should learn from this is that the first line of some MICs are not necessarily the regt. the man first enlisted with, but the regt. he first went overseas with. Many MICs do not even show the first regt, an example; http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/i...=115289&hl= . The MICs are not necessarily in chronological order.

Kevin

[SteveE]

Pete

This is always going to be difficult to prove without a service record but I believe both Kevin and Ivor's hypotheses are sound.

Checking a few RGA numbers around the 1151xx range shows that they were being APPROVED at Fort Brockhurst in early October 1916 as Kevin suggested in post #20. There is one particular record that is interesting, that of 115154 Harold Walter Brooks, because it shows he ATTESTED 8th December 1915 and was APPROVED after mobilisation on 8th October 1916, so a Derby Scheme man whose details could well mirror those of John Wilson.

I propose that John Wilson Attested to the RGA in December 1915, was placed on Army Reserve until mobilised in October 1916 and was subsequently transferred to the Devonshire Regiment ILC (later Labour Corps) with whom he first went overseas as per Ivor's details before being transferred back to the RGA sometime later.

The only question I have, and perhaps Kevin is best suited to answer this, is whether the RGA would have re-issued him with his OLD number?

Hope this helps.

Steve

[Muerrisch]

Pete

This is always going to be difficult to prove without a service record but I believe both Kevin and Ivor's hypotheses are sound.

Checking a few RGA numbers around the 1151xx range shows that they were being APPROVED at Fort Brockhurst in early October 1916 as Kevin suggested in post #20. There is one particular record that is interesting, that of 115154 Harold Walter Brooks, because it shows he ATTESTED 8th December 1915 and was APPROVED after mobilisation on 8th October 1916, so a Derby Scheme man whose details could well mirror those of John Wilson.

I propose that John Wilson Attested to

re-issue of previous number, having left, been transferred etc, not on, according to my reading of Regs and AOs.to the Devonshire Regiment ILC (later Labour Corps) with whom he first went overseas as per Ivor's details before being transferred back to the RGA sometime later.

The only question I have, and perhaps Kevin is best suited to answer this, is whether the RGA would have re-issued him with his OLD number?

Hope this helps.

Steve

Re-issue of old number not according to Regs and AOs.

[SteveE]

Re-issue of old number not according to Regs and AOs.

Cheers Grumpy, that's what I thought and is, I'm afraid, the stumbling block to the whole hypothesis.

Steve