Lloyd’s Register Foundation Heritage & Education Centre

[Sean Clemenson]

Good afternoon,

 Can i just start by saying how fantastic the Great War Forum is! Brilliant stuff.

Anyway, my name is Sean Clemenson and I am the Research Specialist & Digital Content Manager for the Lloyd’s Register Foundation Heritage & Education Centre. If you haven’t heard of us, we are the custodians of Lloyd’s Register’s library and archive, offering its resources to the public for free. Our purpose is to enhance public understanding in marine and engineering science and history.

 

Last week, ahead of Armistice Day and Remembrance Sunday, we launched our brand new First World War crowd sourcing project – HEC needs you!

 

The project aims to uncover any information regarding the 15 members of staff named in our First World War Memorial at 71 Fenchurch Street. Using materials from our archive, the Heritage & Education Centre team have published the employment and military information of the 15 members of staff that are named in our First World War memorial. The severe loss of life during the First World War often means that the individual lives of those that fought are forgotten. However, the team realise that our archived material, whilst offering a unique glimpse into the past, can only tell so much.

 

Subsequently, we’re contacting any regimental military groups, heritage centres, ancestry groups asking for any information regarding these 15 men:

 

1. John E Davis – Gunner, Royal Garrison Artillery

2. Ernest Grainger – Private, 7^th Battalion Middlesex Regiment

3. William Greig – Private, 14^th (County of London) Battalion – London Scottish

4. William F Hutchison – Sergeant, 10^th Battalion Essex Regiment

5. Clifford J Macey – 2^nd Lieutenant 28^th Couny of London Regiment, Artists and 1^st Battalion Dorsetshire Regiment

6. Archibald MacLean – 2^nd Lieutenant, King’s Own Scottish Borderers

7. Reginald J Prescott – 2^nd Lieutenant, 18^th Battalion Lancashire Fusilliers

8. Joseph E Russell – 2^nd Lieutenant, Queen’s Royal West Surrey Regiment

9. James H Sandhall – 2^nd Lieutenant/Captain, Royal Garrison Artillery

10. Joseph C Smith – Honourable Artillery Company

11. Charles T Squires – 2^nd Lieutenant, 11^th Battalion Royal Sussex Regiment

12. J Henry A Walker – Private, 7^th Battalion, Essex Regiment

13. Maurice G Wells – 2^nd Lieutenant, Royal Field Artillery & Royal Horse Artillery

14. Leslie G West – 2^nd Lieutenant, 5^th Battalion, London Rifle Brigade

15. Maurice G Boyer – Captain, 116^th Heavy Artillery Regiment

 

If you think our project would be of interest to any of your associates, please do not hesitate to circulate this email. Furthermore, if you would like to find out more about the Heritage & Education Centre’s activities/resources/events, please visit our website. Alternatively, you can also find us on Twitter, Facebook & Vine.

 

If you have any enquiries about the project please contact me directly via email.

 

Many thanks & kind regards,

Sean.

[ss002d6252]

I hope we can be off some help - I will take a look at the war gratuities for the men where I can as this will give you the length of service. I'll add the details to this post to keep them together.

 

John E Davis
#115731
Estate paid to his widow, Maria
War gratuity of £6 10s net - £8 10s gross. This indicates 19 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

With 233 Siege Battery, Royal Garrison Artillery, at time of death.

 

Ernest Grainger
He appears to be Ernest Grainger, died 10 Sep 16, with the 5th (City of London) battalion as #10776. He started off as #3042 with the 7th Middlesex and later transferred.
Estate paid to his mother, Martha
War gratuity of £9 net - £11 gross. This indicates 24 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

Medal rolls shows he served overseas with 7th Middlesex:
15 May 1916 to 2 Jul 16
5th London
03 Jul 16 to 10 Sep 16

 

William Greig
#1644
Estate paid to his father, Robert.

William Hutchinson
#29502
Acting Serjeant at the time of his death.
Estate paid to his parents, William and Jessie E (were both his mother & wife called Jessie ?)
War gratuity of £14 10s net - £17 10s gross. This indicates 31 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

 

J H A Walker - served as Henry Walker

#300809 (previously #3608 prior to the 1917 re-numbering of the men)

Estate paid to his mother, Mary.
Effects records state he was killed in Syria.
War gratuity of £11s net - £14 gross. This indicates 30 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

 

 

Craig

Edited 15 November , 2016 by ss002d6252

[Sean Clemenson]

Many thanks Craig. It's my first time posting on the forum so hopefully we can find out as much as possible!

[ss002d6252]

3 minutes ago, Sean Clemenson said:

Many thanks Craig. It's my first time posting on the forum so hopefully we can find out as much as possible!

Already on it for you ! I'll post some info soon for you which should help.

Craig

[johnboy]

Do you know age , year of birth and where they lived?

Edited 15 November , 2016 by johnboy

[Sean Clemenson]

5 minutes ago, johnboy said:

Do you know age , year of birth and where they lived?

Yes, for quite a few of the men we know where they lived, when they were born and roughly in some cases their ages upon death. I encourage you to have a look at the website though, as it has all the relevant information. 

 

However, for some, our archived materials just don't show anything, which is why we're contacting anyone we can!

[Sean Clemenson]

26 minutes ago, ss002d6252 said:

I hope we can be off some help - I will take a look at the war gratuities for the men where I can as this will give you the length of service. I'll add the details to this post to keep them together.

 

John E Davis
#115431
Estate paid to his widow, Maria
War gratuity of £6 10s net - £8 10s gross. This confirms 19 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

 

Ernest Grainger
He appears to be Ernest Grainger, died 10 Sep 16, with the 5th (City of London) battalion as #10776. He started off as #3042 with the 7th Middlesex and later transferred.
Estate paid to his mother, Martha
War gratuity of £9 net - £11 gross. This confirms 24 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

Medal rolls shows he served overseas with 7th Middlesex:
15 May 1916 to 2 Jul 16
5th London
03 Jul 16 to 10 Sep 16

 

William Greig
#1644
Estate paid to his father, Robert.

William Hutchinson
#29502
Acting Serjeant at the time of his death.
Estate paid to his parents, William and Jessie E (were both his mother & wife called Jessie ?)
War gratuity of £14 10s net - £17 10s gross. This indicates 31 months qualifying service at the time of his death.

 

 

 

Craig

Craig this is brilliant stuff! I can't thank you enough. 

[ss002d6252]

1 minute ago, Sean Clemenson said:

Craig this is brilliant stuff! I can't thank you enough. 

No worries - I shall add more as I can.

 

Craig

[Sean Clemenson]

4 minutes ago, ss002d6252 said:

No worries - I shall add more as I can.

 

Craig

Thanks Craig. May i ask, how do you have this information? Is it through a subscription to ancestry.co.uk or through other means?

[ss002d6252]

10 minutes ago, Sean Clemenson said:

Thanks Craig. May i ask, how do you have this information? Is it through a subscription to ancestry.co.uk or through other means?

Ancestry and Find My Past - the length of service details I calculate myself from the net war gratuity amount (show in the soldiers effects records & paid based on length of service) - my website on war gratuities shown in my signature may be of interest to you in future.

 

Craig

Edited 15 November , 2016 by ss002d6252

[Sean Clemenson]

8 minutes ago, ss002d6252 said:

Ancestry and Find My Past - the length of service details I calculate myself from the war gratuity amount (show in the soldiers effects records & paid based on length of service) - my website on war gratuities shown in my signature may be of interest to you in future.

 

Craig

Just having a look at it now Craig, interesting stuff i must say.

[Phil Wood]

2/Lt A Maclean, 1st Bn, KOSB, Died 18 Aug 1918 in the capture of Hoegenacker Ridge, south of Meteren.

[kenf48]

2/Lt Joseph E Russell served in the 7th Bn of the Queen's.  You can read an account of the action where he was reported missing in the war diary here

 

The diary shows he joined the Battalion on the 20th October 1916, literally a 'six week subaltern'.

 

CWGC give his parents address in Dulwich and confirm his body was probably 'brought in' at the end of the war.

 

The Red Cross POW records enquiry form 

http://grandeguerre.icrc.org/en/File/Details/125171/3/2/

names him as Eric Russell and give his date of birth as 24th October 1893.

You need to navigate to PA10114 which shows he died on 23.11.1916 at Cagnicourt where he was buried

He died at 'Res.Feld.Lar' which was probably a medical facility near the front line - Feld=Field.

 

Ken

Edited 15 November , 2016 by kenf48

[charlie2]

Res.Feld.Lar = Reserve Field Hospital

[Sean Clemenson]

14 hours ago, Phil Wood said:

2/Lt A Maclean, 1st Bn, KOSB, Died 18 Aug 1918 in the capture of Hoegenacker Ridge, south of Meteren.

Thanks for this Phil!

[Sean Clemenson]

10 hours ago, kenf48 said:

2/Lt Joseph E Russell served in the 7th Bn of the Queen's.  You can read an account of the action where he was reported missing in the war diary here

 

The diary shows he joined the Battalion on the 20th October 1916, literally a 'six week subaltern'.

 

CWGC give his parents address in Dulwich and confirm his body was probably 'brought in' at the end of the war.

 

The Red Cross POW records enquiry form 

http://grandeguerre.icrc.org/en/File/Details/125171/3/2/

names him as Eric Russell and give his date of birth as 24th October 1893.

You need to navigate to PA10114 which shows he died on 23.11.1916 at Cagnicourt where he was buried

He died at 'Res.Feld.Lar' which was probably a medical facility near the front line - Feld=Field.

 

Ken

Ken, this will be a great help. The response so far from various forums, including this one has been great.

Speaking of other forums, are there any similar forums that are as active as the Great War?

[Sean Clemenson]

14 hours ago, Phil Wood said:

2/Lt A Maclean, 1st Bn, KOSB, Died 18 Aug 1918 in the capture of Hoegenacker Ridge, south of Meteren.

Much appreciated Phil. I've attached a few more images of interest so that everyone can have a look. You can also find out about the role of Lloyd's Register during the First World War here: www.lrfoundation.org.uk/public_education/Staff-bible-project/LR-First-World-War.aspx. One of our Register Books even appeared in a German Propaganda film after being stolen in Portugal...

[David_Underdown]

The officers should for the most part have records in the record series WO 369 or WO 374 at The National Archives.  These are all fully name searchable on Discovery http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk, though the records themselves are not digitised and so can only be seen in the reading room at Kew.  Having said that, I just looked for Boyer and couldn't find him, but I wander if he actually served with French forces, the British Army did not have units designated as Artillery Regiments during the First World War (it would have been battery or brigade).

 

As a working example Macey's record is WO 339/30342 http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C1084246.  You can use the search box part way down this page http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/british-army-officers-after-1913/ to search the relevant series

[Sean Clemenson]

2 hours ago, David_Underdown said:

The officers should for the most part have records in the record series WO 369 or WO 374 at The National Archives.  These are all fully name searchable on Discovery http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk, though the records themselves are not digitised and so can only be seen in the reading room at Kew.  Having said that, I just looked for Boyer and couldn't find him, but I wander if he actually served with French forces, the British Army did not have units designated as Artillery Regiments during the First World War (it would have been battery or brigade).

 

As a working example Macey's record is WO 339/30342 http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/C1084246.  You can use the search box part way down this page http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/british-army-officers-after-1913/ to search the relevant series

I have found a number of articles in the National Archives, of which i do plan to visit at some point. Thank you for the information on Boyer, i'll be sure to update his portal!

[kenf48]

5 hours ago, Sean Clemenson said:

Ken, this will be a great help. The response so far from various forums, including this one has been great.

Speaking of other forums, are there any similar forums that are as active as the Great War?

 

Some would say this is the first and only Great War forum, but I couldn’t possibly comment.  

The forum was born out of the Long Long Trail website where there is much more information on researching a soldier of the Great War
http://www.longlongtrail.co.uk

 

There are forums dedicated to individual Regiments, these are often associated with Regimental Museums, or run by private individuals with an interest.

There are a couple of us on here interested in the Queen’s but not really a quorum to make a forum!

 

These days most of the regimental sites are on social media which you can search in the usual way. In some respects, and it has been discussed before on here, a ‘forum’ is old school but to the ‘old sweats (anoraks or addicts), we seem to like it that way.

 

Returning to 2/Lt Russell a bit more information:-

Joseph Eric Russell was the the youngest of the three sons of Warwick and Marion Russell.  His father was a printer and stationer.  They also had a daughter, Vera who was the second eldest of the four siblings.

The two youngest boys attended Dulwich College and there are entries for them in the Dulwich College Register available on Find My Past (subscription).

http://search.findmypast.co.uk/record?id=gbor%2fsch-dulw%2f475%2f8371

 

The entry for Joseph reads:-

 

7198.RUSSELL, Joseph Eric, b.24 Oct.1893;br of 6253;fr Stanley House Sch., Cliftonville;XI 1910; L.July 1910; U. 4th M.; Lloyds Register of Shipping 1911-1914.  Great War, Pte 10th Bn R.Fusiliers, Aug 1914; France July 1915; 2nd Lt. 7th Bn.Q.R.W. Surrey Regt. Sept 1916; totally wounded and p. at Grandcourt; unm; d. 23 Nov 1916 in a German hospital Cagnicourt, Pas de Calais

 

The entry for his elder brother (6253) Cyril Ernest Shaftesbury Russell (b.4.4.88.)shows he was commissioned in the RFC 2nd Lt March 1916 and went to France in October 1916.

 

FMP has the transcript of the 10th (Stockbrokers) Bn of the Royal Fusiliers and this shows Joseph enlisted in August 1914 as a private and was given the number 1097.

 

His service record is, as David suggests at TNA 
WO 339/69650
http://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/results/r?_q=WO+339%2F69650

 

The 10th Bn Royal Fusiliers was part of the recruitment process for Kitchener’s second army that led to the formation of ‘Pals’ Battalions (though the Stockbrokers would eschew that term).
More correctly they were locally raised Battalions as part of Kitchener’s Second Army (K2).  In essence these were groups of men who shared a common background.  There are accounts of men joining K1 who were shocked at the attitude and behaviour of their comrades who, in the main were drawn from the common recruiting pool of the Army.  The locally raised battalions were recruited independently from the War Office and  privately financed until handed over  to the Army when up to strength.

 

Given their background many of these early recruits  to the Stockbrokers were to be commissioned later in the war.

The main body of the Battalion went to France as part of 111th Brigade 37th Division on 31st July 1915.  

 

Pte Russell entered France on that date and served with the BEF until 7th August 1916 when he returned to the UK for officer training.

He was commissioned on the 1st October 1916. (RF Medal Rolls).

He was awarded the 14-15 Star, British War  Medal and Victory Medal. The medals were claimed by his mother.

 

Ken

 

and thanks again Charlie for the translation

Edited 16 November , 2016 by kenf48

[Steven Broomfield]

I'll ask the regimental Archivist about Greig. He will have been (I suspect) a pre-war Jock so may well have useful info.

[Steven Broomfield]

I'll ask the regimental Archivist about Greig. He will have been (I suspect) a pre-war Jock so may well have useful info.

[Sean Clemenson]

12 minutes ago, Steven Broomfield said:

I'll ask the regimental Archivist about Greig. He will have been (I suspect) a pre-war Jock so may well have useful info.

Thank you Steven!

[kenf48]

As to be expected it seems at least some of your men originally enlisted as private soldiers in the ‘posh’ TF Battalions of the London Regiment(s) in August 1914.

 

Clifford James Macey was Pte 1116 1/28th London Regiment (County of London) Battalion (Artist Rifles) (not 2nd Lt as shown on the Lloyd’s site).  He was commissioned to the 1st Bn Dorsetshire Regiment 8th May 1915.

He went to France on 26 October 1914 and was entitled to the 1914 Star.

 

Reginald J Prescott also enlisted as a private in the Artists Rifles.  His regimental number was originally 1925 and when the TF was renumbered in early 1917 he was renumbered 760195.
He originally went to France with the Battalion on 28.12.1914.
He was commissioned 24 March 1917.
Service record at TNA 
WO 374/55085

 

Charles Thomas Squires was a L/Sgt in the Honourable Artillery Company 2464
The records of the HAC are also on FMP.

 

Archibald Maclean was Pte 474 King Edward's Horse (probably ‘C’ Squadron based on his entry into theatre 21.4.1915) before he was commissioned.

 

Leslie Gower West was commissioned on 27 March 1918.
Correct title for his unit was the 5th (City of London) Battalion (London Rifle Brigade), he was previously L/Cpl 304888 in the same Battalion, though it may have been the second line unit.

 

Ken

 

[Sean Clemenson]

Once again thank you for all the information. I've been inundated with information from different insitutions/groups/forums. For future reference my replies may be slightly late due to the research workload!

 

All the best,

Sean.