Striker - 2/4 York & Lancaster

[peterpiper313]

Hello all,

The occupation of my grandfather, 32861, Pte Ernest Brown was Striker. Can anyone tell me what was the official function of a striker and what equiptment he would be involved with in 2/4 York & Lancasters in France between May 1917 and the end of the war?.

Am I right in thinking it was field guns or am I completely up the wrong trench ?

David

[Kevin O'Marah]

Could he have been involved with horses, engineering, or foundry work, etc, as a striker was usually a blacksmiths assistant and would strike the metal with a hammer whilst red hot to form whatever they were making or repairing?

Kevin

[centurion]

A Smiths Striker helped the blacksmith, a Striker was a riveter,or a man responsible for the accuracy of grain measures (sometimes referred to as a Millers Striker),or a member of a sheep shearing team, or a harpoonist . In the army the term was sometimes used for the men responsible for packing up the camp, when the unit was on the march, and getting the tents etc ahead of the column to the next camp site. A tiring and thankless task.

[peterpiper313]

A Smiths Striker helped the blacksmith, a Striker was a riveter,or a man responsible for the accuracy of grain measures (sometimes referred to as a Millers Striker),or a member of a sheep shearing team, or a harpoonist . In the army the term was sometimes used for the men responsible for packing up the camp, when the unit was on the march, and getting the tents etc ahead of the column to the next camp site. A tiring and thankless task.

Thank you Kevin and Centurion, you both have me thinking on a new and different path. In civy street before the war he worked in the shipyards at Doxfords in Sunderland so he could well have been a riverters striker but from his stature ( 5 ft 6", 120 lbs on his medical record) I think there were much heavier men ready and willing to do this job before pneumatics took over. Maybe "striking" the camp could be the case. I was assuming the occupation on his discharge was his army occupation but is this not the case?

David

[centurion]

Small wirey men were often employed as riveters as they could fit in the confined spaces that you got in ships hulls (especially double hulled ships). BTW I think that the striker was the gaffer not the mate in a riveting team.

My wife's dad worked in the ship yards and he wasn't a big man - mind you he was a carpenter - in the 30's took Tebbit's dads model and got himself down to Hatfield and a job at De Havilands (ended up working on the prototype Mosquito, years ago when we visited the museum at Salisbury Hall she announced her lineage and I got to understand how Prince Philip feels)