22nd Battery Machine Gun Corps (Motors)

[pjwmacro]

20 hours ago, david murdoch said:

He's on several public family trees on Ancestry. When I looked him up before  on the 1911 Census he's shown as being 26 and a motor driver. He's shown as single and living with his mother and two younger sisters Florence and Maggie. His mother was Mary Ann Phipps (Cordwell) However on some of the trees he's shown as being married 31/3/1907 to Lillie Brien and having a son Willian (b.1910) and a daughter Florence (b.1912 d. 2004). I really can't make out the names of the beneficiaries on the soldier's effects, but for sure a married man. However there is a pension record for this man having joined the 9th West Yorkshire Regiment  as private 11975 on 1/9/1914 and discharged 3/11/1914 on medical grounds. On the record shows his wife being  Lillie Brien and daughter Florence Alice (implying the son died as a small child), and giving London address. I suspect he may have re enlisted in 1915 possibly not disclosing his previous enlistment, or possibly he was considered fit as a driver but not for infantry. On all these family trees he's shown as dying Rawalpindi 5/4/1918.

 Hi David

I think we have been finding the same trees / records. Certainly I have found the 1911 Census - which links with his Mother being Mary Ann, and him being born in early 1885. And there's a baptism record (24 Apr 85) which fits and gives date of birth as 8 Feb 85 and father (a labourer) named John. I can also find the appropriate 1901 and 1891 census returns. So I am almost sure this is the right man.

 

However - there is also a Guardsmen William Arthur Cordswell, discharged through wounds 1 May 15 - SWB. - Not the right man.

 

I have also seen the service papers (and discharge record) of the West Yorskhire Regt  Cordwell, born in Shoreditch, married to Lillie Brien, with a daughter Florence Alice. But I don't think this is the same as our William, and the papers just show William - not William Arthur.

 

And - I have just now found the record below: service number matches - so our Cordwell was married to Miriam. Regards, Paul

 

Edit: presumably married after 1911 census. But I cannot find the record. Conceivably could have been in India?

Edited 22 December , 2018 by pjwmacro

[david murdoch]

Paul.

Looks like all these family tree branches are confusing two William Cordwells. I did some looking and found the marriage. William A. Cordwell married Miriam Chaffin  last quarter of 1914 in Chelsea. Checking her  - found on the 1911 Census. Need to look some more  - Chaffin may have been her previous married name and not her maiden name. Really need to get into the Fold3 record!

Edited 21 December , 2018 by david murdoch

[pjwmacro]

13 hours ago, david murdoch said:

Paul.

Looks like all these family tree branches are confusing two William Cordwells. I did some looking and found the marriage. William A. Cordwell married Miriam Chaffin  last quarter of 1914 in Chelsea. Checking her  - found on the 1911 Census. Need to look some more  - Chaffin may have been her previous married name and not her maiden name. Really need to get into the Fold3 record!

 

 

Well found David - looking for Miriam Chaffin now. And yes - I do need to get onto Fold 3 - maybe Santa will be good to me at Christmas! Also need to check if world wide ancestry includes Fold3 - the world wide bit of ancestry would be helpful with a number of the Indian details of various people. And agreed reference Ancestry trees - I think they are possibly confusing 3 different William Cordwells - I am always very careful in looking at other people's trees, particularly where it's a common name and where the tree owner is a distant relation/not related at all.  

Regards, Paul

[pjwmacro]

It looks as Miriam was born Mary Grace Burton about 1885 ish. Looks as if she married Arthur George Chaffin in 1904 and had two sons, Albert and Robert, before Arthur died in 1911. Mary Chaffin then married William Cordwell in Q4 1914. It looks as if Mary Cordwell then died in Norfolk (Norwich) in 1924 - this may have been where she was from originally. I haven't yet established if Mary and William had children - but I am attempting to contact a tree owner on ancestry who looks as if the have links to the Chaffin side of the family.

Regards, Paul

[pjwmacro]

The page of my grandfather's album from which the photos at posts #734 and #739 are on.

Regards Paul

[pjwmacro]

Further to post #756 above - the top photo on the page in slightly better detail. I think the chap in the centre slightly right of the picture is holding a copy of The Motor Cycle magazine.

 

Regards, Paul

[pjwmacro]

@JPJamie @abowell97

Jim, Alex

Not sure if I (or someone else)  have posted this before, but it comes from my grandfathers album. The captioning suggests it was taken in 1916 - near Parachinar - probably on the Apr/May 1916 familiarisation tour around the North West Frontier (see Fielders letter in the Motor Cycle). My grandfathers captioning on the back of the picture specifically identifies it as one of No 1 Section's guns.

Regards, Paul

[abowell97]

13 hours ago, pjwmacro said:

@JPJamie @abowell97

Jim, Alex

Not sure if I (or someone else)  have posted this before, but it comes from my grandfathers album. The captioning suggests it was taken in 1916 - near Parachinar - probably on the Apr/May 1916 familiarisation tour around the North West Frontier (see Fielders letter in the Motor Cycle). My grandfathers captioning on the back of the picture specifically identifies it as one of No 1 Section's guns.

Regards, Paul

 

Hi Paul

 

I believe it's the same photo as post #573. I have this one in my album too, though from a slightly different angle, though I didn't realise it was No.1 section.

I just rifled through the loose pictures and found my copy - the caption written on the back reads "Showing mechanics of gun to officers, Kohat, 1916" so it fits into your time-frame of an initial tour of the NWF.

 

Regards,

Alex.

Edited 15 January , 2019 by abowell97

[pjwmacro]

23 minutes ago, abowell97 said:

believe it's the same photo as post #573.

Alex

 

You are correct - it's the same photo as posted at #573. And in Bill's album he has definitely written "One of Number 1 Sections guns" on the back.

 

Bill Macro's album also has (just below this picture) a copy of the picture posted at #574. I have now got this out of he album and my grandfather has written on the back "I am leaning over the gun".

 

Regards, Paul

[abowell97]

Just a couple of other photos, none of which are that important, I just felt they were quite nice ones of the locals. The first two are actually quite big photos in reality (compared to most of mine being tiny), and do look a lot better when full size.

 

 

 

"Bandits"

Edited 17 January , 2019 by abowell97

[david murdoch]

They are really interesting - showing interaction with the locals. The third one is interesting as apart from the dust masks there appears a shield on the Vickers. The gun carriers had two part shields, but almost always the upper section was not used. They just appear in a couple of 22nd Battery pictures  - one being the original battery photo in England, and one of the battery on the move (where they would have really been in transit and had to carry them).This  photo is probably also an "on the road" to somewhere shot.

[pjwmacro]

On ‎17‎/‎01‎/‎2019 at 22:45, abowell97 said:

I just felt they were quite nice ones of the locals

Alex

Possibly the Collins brothers in the first photo?

Regards, Paul

[pjwmacro]

As I indicated at post #760 James has posted the copy of this photo before from JP Jamieson's album {#574). This is the copy in my grandfathers's album. On the back he has written:

"Showing the guns to native chiefs at Parachinar. I am bending over the gun, my pal is on my left." 

 

I do wonder who his pal was? But I do now have access to the letters which grandfather wrote to his girlfriend, later my grandmother, during his time in India. Not yet had time to go through them (there are lots and they are not ordered in any way) - but hoping there may be more clues contained and some further insights into the history of 22 Bty.

 

Regards, Paul

[pjwmacro]

I reckon this is from the same occasion at Parachinar as post #751 above. I`ve cropped the photo down - but the resolution isn't good enough to zoom in on any detail.

Regards, Paul

[pjwmacro]

And these are just a couple of his photos which I like. Captioned as "Jung" in 1917 on the NWF. Still not sure where Jung actually is.

[abowell97]

12 minutes ago, pjwmacro said:

As I indicated at post #760 James has posted the copy of this photo before from JP Jamieson's album {#574). This is the copy in my grandfathers's album. On the back he has written:

"Showing the guns to native chiefs at Parachinar. I am bending over the gun, my pal is on my left." 

 

I do wonder who his pal was? But I do now have access to the letters which grandfather wrote to his girlfriend, later my grandmother, during his time in India. Not yet had time to go through them (there are lots and they are not ordered in any way) - but hoping there may be more clues contained and some further insights into the history of 22 Bty.

 

Ah, excellent. So we've got quite a few gun-stripping photographs! I found another earlier today with a bit of annotation;

 

"Natives, mostly chiefs, watching stripping guns. Banu, 1916"

Now we know they did this in Parachinar, Bannu and Kohat. 

 

A couple of others:

"Gurkhas at the station"

"The long and short of it"

 

Look forwards to hearing any more of your findings.

 

Regards, 

Alex.

 

Edit: I just missed your post with the same photo, and mine doesn't have much detail either!

 

Edited 19 January , 2019 by abowell97

[pjwmacro]

6 minutes ago, abowell97 said:

"Natives, mostly chiefs, watching stripping guns. Banu, 1916"

Now we know they did this in Parachinar, Bannu and Kohat. 

That's the same photo. Captions can be misleading. It's not one I`ve tried to extract from my album - so I don't know if there is anything on the back - but it's definitely indicated as Parachinar in my grandfathers album

 

Regards Paul

8 minutes ago, abowell97 said:

"The long and short of it"

That's a cracker - any idea who they are? I don't think either are Walter Patrick or JPJ.

[pjwmacro]

19 minutes ago, pjwmacro said:

Still not sure where Jung actually is.

The closest I can come is Jang in modern day Pakistan, SE of Rawlpindi and NE of Lahore, right on the border of Jammu and Kashmir province. I`ll try a post elsewhere on GWF.

 

Paul

Edited 19 January , 2019 by pjwmacro

[abowell97]

21 hours ago, pjwmacro said:

That's a cracker - any idea who they are? I don't think either are Walter Patrick or JPJ.

 

I'm fairly certain the taller man is Alexander Dowie from No.1 section. He's occasionally seen in a kilt in group photos and has quite a distinctive face. 

 

A few photos of Dowie (basing it all off an earlier post, and a few of mine where he is named).

I'm unsure about the smaller man, however. 

 

Regards,

Alex.

Edited 20 January , 2019 by abowell97

[pjwmacro]

3 hours ago, abowell97 said:

I'm fairly certain the taller man is Alexander Dowie from No.1 section. He's occasionally seen in a kilt in group photos and has quite a distinctive face.

Alex

 

Based on these two photos from @JPJamie's album - I agree that the tall one is Dowie. (I think I copied his application for a commission, which included his soldiers enlistment papers when I was in Kew last year - I need to check, I think the photos are on my tablet which is back in London - but if I have then they should give his height on enlistment.) You will recall Alexander had something of a chequered history - commissioned into 3 HLI in India in 1918, done for speeding in Scotland in the 1920s and eventually emigrated to S Africa. (Quite a lad!) And I have no idea either about the short chap.

 

Regards, Paul

[abowell97]

A couple of other unrelated images;

"Cobra we caught in the wash house, Rawal Pindi"

Rather over-exposed, and that's after reducing it a lot. Unsure of who the man holding the snake may be.

 

"Baby Cheetah"

What appears to be a leopard cub, not a cheetah, and again I'm unsure of who is holding it.

 

"Sandy Dowie"

By the looks of it, taken in England before departure. It also looks like the same, or a very similar model of motorbike to the one he's pictured on above in India.

Edited 22 January , 2019 by abowell97

[david murdoch]

The one of Dowie is certainly in England late 1915 or very early 1916. It looks to be taken at the same time and place as one of "Sgt Davis" and possibly taken by Davis as a second bike is just visible behind Dowie's - the one of Davis possibly being taken by Dowie if they were out for a run together. They are Triumph Model H bikes and the Battery's solo bikes in India were also Triumphs.

Edited 23 January , 2019 by david murdoch

[pjwmacro]

More interesting photos Alex thanks.

 

Seeing the stuff about Sgt Davis reminded me of post #732 reference Lt GH Pearsall who commanded tank D11 at Fler on 15 Sep.  "He enlisted at Dewsbury 6 Apr 1915 and joined the MMGS at Bisley on 14 May 1915 to become 619 Gunner Pearsall.  He was promoted Cpl on 18 Jun and then Sergeant on 14 Aug 15 with 22nd Bty.  Whilst still on their unit strength, he applied for a commission on 1 Jan 1916, which was countersigned by the CO MMGS Lt Col DW Bradley on 8 Jan.  After completing officer training at Cambridge he was commissioned into the MGC on 14 Apr 16." 

 

Could Sgt Davis have fallen into the same category - ie been a member of 22 Bty in UK, but then subsequently been commissioned. And presumably not necessarily into the Tanks, or even the MGC more widely?

 

Regards, Paul

[david murdoch]

I'm anxious to identify Sgt Davis. There are several possibilities. As you say he may have been an original 22nd Battery member who did not go to India with the Battery, or he may have been one of the instructors, or he may have been a friend who was in another battery. Either way he must have been had an MMGS number. If he stayed with them he may have ended up in MGC(M) where his original number would have continued, or commissioned or transferred and renumbered. He may not have gone overseas with his MMGS number making him hard to find. I've found a lot of those who ended up in Tank Corps have MIC and rolls only mentioning Tank Corps even though they certainly served overseas  and in some cases KIA with Heavy Branch. By the time 22nd left for India, MGC were already transferring men from MMGS to MGC (on paper). Also they closed recruitment for a while as they had a big pool of men who had been recruited over summer and autumn 1915 originally destined for MMG batteries which were cancelled or disbanded in the UK. Some who enlisted November/December through The Motorcycle process  had an MMGS number originally on attestation but were kept at home until April 1916 and called back - receiving a new MGC number.

[pjwmacro]

5 hours ago, david murdoch said:

I'm anxious to identify Sgt Davis

SOTBO I know - but trouble is - it's such a common name and without any other clues, there are several possibilities. When I get a chance to attack my grandfather's letters that may help. But in the few I`ve looked at thus far - he hasn't named any other battery members. And on initial glance the letters are from India - not from Bisley and training.

Regards, Paul