Implications of existence of soldier's will?

[AdrianBruce]

Apologies if this has been covered elsewhere - I did try to check but couldn't find quite the flavour of my question.

If a will exists for a soldier, does this imply that the soldier's body was recovered after their death?

Specifically, from the new Soldiers' Will service, I have a file headed, on page 1 of the document, "Informal Will", then a page headed "13(?) Will" with the hand-written text of the will (one sentence) below and signature, rank & regiment, date below that.

Is it possible (or reasonably possible?) to say from this, that his body was recovered after his death (he died in 1917 at the Battle of Messines but is recorded on the Menin Gate), or could the document have been held at battalion HQ?

Thanks

Adrian

[Ron Clifton]

Hello Adrian

A soldier would not usually take his will into action with him. It would normally be left behind, precisely so that effect could be given to his wishes if he died, even if his body was not found.

Provision was however made for the searching of recovered bodies and the extraction of any will before burial, the will then being forwarded to the base for onward transmission and appropriate action.

Ron

[battiscombe]

you will commonly find in service files various receipts and documents/dockets relating to (1) the deposit of a will when going on active service, and (2) the return of the will on discharge. I work mainly with royal artillery records but i would imagine such was normal practice. I would have thought wills would be left in UK?. So in this case if a soldier was killed his original would have remained with his service record ?? and presumably a copy could be supplied to next-of-kin, also listed on the service record.

[hazelclark]

The ones I have seen were part of the soldier's paybook which I thought he carried with him, although that does seem odd.

Hazel

[centurion]

I suspect that the existence of the will and the man being on the Menin Gate memorial could be explained by a number of possibilities including

• a] He did not take the will into action with him so although his body was not recovered the will was still in existence
• b] He had the will on him and his body was recovered and the will removed but the grave was subsequently lost so he has no known grave

Both are quite possible (I have seen accounts of men doing things like leaving their will etc with the padre before going into line and graves being obliterated in subsequent actions is not uncommon) so I don't think that you can draw any firm conclusions from the mere existence of the will alone.

[roughdiamond]

Hello Adrian

A soldier would not usually take his will into action with him. It would normally be left behind, precisely so that effect could be given to his wishes if he died, even if his body was not found.

Not true Ron, most soldiers carried their "Informal Will" with them at all times as it was part of the Soldiers paybook, there were "Formal Wills" that were left behind, but many of those coming to light are the informal ones.

Adian

Most of your questions will be answered in this thread http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=198685&hl= it's 7 pages, but just persevere as many questions are about the new service.

Sam

The ones I have seen were part of the soldier's paybook which I thought he carried with him, although that does seem odd.

Hazel

Correct Hazel, it's all in the link in the post above.

Sam

edited to add: Where the post states "Informal Will" this is due to the wrong description given on the National Archives of Scotland, it should read "Short Form of Will".

[centurion]

The problem with all the above is that its blinking well so imprecise. "Most soldiers" is not All soldiers. Some soldiers did other things so that both the scenarios that I posited are possible (as well as doubtless some others). As with so much we'll probably never know for sure.

[AdrianBruce]

Thanks guys - if I've got it right, this document is an Informal Will (that's what it says in the document) and it sounds like such a document was part of the Pay Book, which the soldier retained. Though I'm unclear whether the Soldier's Small Book version might look like this and who held that... Conversely, if I've got it right, the Formal Wills would be left with some appropriate authority.

But, as with any situation, there might have been exceptions and even Informal Wills might have been extracted and left behind. I think...

[AdrianBruce]

As with so much we'll probably never know for sure.

Quite so. My real objective here is knowing whether Great-uncle Tom's body was found - I think the type of will makes it highly likely but even so, by no means certain.

Adrian

Remembering Private Thomas Henry Taylor, 35278 10th Bn, Cheshires; d. 7 June 1917, Battle of Messines.

[Tom Tulloch-Marshall]

If a will exists for a soldier, does this imply that the soldier's body was recovered after their death?

No.

Tom

[roughdiamond]

No.

Tom

Tom

If an "Informal Will" exists, it came from the Soldiers Pay Book, the Book and the Will is only removed on Death, therefore the Soldier Died and his Will was removed, therefore there was a body to remove the Pay Book from, if there is no grave then the remains weren't buried for a multitude of reasons or the grave lost.

Sam

edited to add: Where the post states "Informal Will" this is due to the wrong description given on the National Archives of Scotland, it should read "Short Form of Will".

[SiegeGunner]

My great-uncle disappeared on the first day of the German Spring Offensive in 1918 and has no known grave, but I have just obtained a copy of his Informal Will under the new service. He made it in the UK while he was with a training battalion.

[johnboy]

What dates are on the wills? I have read that soldiers were encouraged to make wills before they went into a battle. Some are dated just a couple of days before they died.

[AdrianBruce]

What dates are on the wills? I have read that soldiers were encouraged to make wills before they went into a battle.

In the case of great-uncle Tom, he died 7 June 1917 but the will is dated 6 July 1916. So far as I can see that's 10 days before he was posted to France.

[johnboy]

If the will is from the Pay Book then it was removed from the body at time of death. Unless full or lost Pay Books were replaced. Maybe someone can help explain what happened with lost or damaged books.

Somewhere on the will sheet is an army form No. If you post this or a copy of the will someone should be able to confirm where it came from.

[centurion]

So the evidence is inconclusive either way - he might have left something behind or his pay book might have been recovered in France. There was nothing that said a soldier HAD to put the will in his pay book [that was a private matter] it was merely made (recommended as) an option.

[SiegeGunner]

Somewhere on the will sheet is an army form No. If you post this or a copy of the will someone should be able to confirm where it came from.

My great uncle's Will is on Army Form W 3297. It is accompanied by an Informal Will form recognising it as a valid will.

[johnboy]

Just come across the following;

Army Form No 243 entitled Form of Will No 1

for a soldier wishing to leave the whole of his effects to ONE person.

I don't know if this is the one from a Pay Book or not.

[SiegeGunner]

Army Form W 3297 states "Use either this form or the form overleaf, but not both. Form of Will to be used by a soldier desirous of leaving the whole of his property and effects to one person. (See overleaf for Form of Will leaving legacies to more than one person.)"

[roughdiamond]

Already posted this guide to Soldiers' and Airmen's Wills http://www.nas.gov.uk/guides/soldierswills.asp on the 7 page thread that already exists on wills, many questions have already been answered on that thread and this one really should be combined with it.

Sam

edited to add: Where the post states "Informal Will" this is due to the wrong description given on the National Archives of Scotland, it should read "Short Form of Will".

[AdrianBruce]

.. the 7 page thread that already exists on wills, many questions have already been answered on that thread and this one really should be combined with it.

Please not, Sam. That 7-page thread consists of two different topics - the service (and its teething troubles) and the wills.

[AdrianBruce]

---

Somewhere on the will sheet is an army form No.

But that's it - there isn't. It only says "

---

13 WILL" at the top. See attached image:

The (highly useful) NAS Guide gives an example of an informal will from a pay book that is pretty much a dead ringer for this but also mentions a Soldier's Small Book without giving an example of one of them. So I'm still uncertain where it came from originally. (Of course, it might be that an SSB is just another name for a Pay Book????)

[johnboy]

Thanks for posting it Adrian. I will check again but if this came from a Pay book it should have an Army Form No. I doubt it would have 13 pages as it was supposed to be a loose form in the back of the Pay Book. Is it one you got from the wills service?

[Tom Tulloch-Marshall]

Tom

If an "Informal Will" exists, it came from the Soldiers Pay Book, the Book and the Will is only removed on Death, therefore ...

I'm sorry, but that is simply incorrect, - certainly as a blanket statement.

The "guessing" which is going on in this thread is truly dreadful.

Tom

[johnboy]

Tom

What's your guess then on the will shown post #22?

And this one from Flickr