Pvt Leonard John Monks, RAMC War History

[GWF1967]

2 minutes ago, PJS said:

 

I have some incremental information regarding Ernie Leppard's service in his 1st year in Egypt. I noticed that the B.103 for 44329 Pvt JE Cordaroy exactly matches that of Ernie Leppard - at least up to 10 Aug, 1916. Based on that, I would say that Ernie Leppard:

• Arrived Egypt 13 June, 1915 Assigned to 17 General Hospital
• Embarked the HS Guildford Castle on 28 Aug, 1915 at Alexandria
• Disembarked HS Guildford Castle and Embarked the HS Vita in May 1916. Most likely at Basra or Bombay.
• Disembarked HS Vita and Embarked the HS Neuralia in July 1916. Most likely at Basra or Bombay.
• Disembarked HS Neuralia and assigned to Base Depot @ Mustapha 10 Aug, 1916.

The logs for the Neuralia and Vita do not start until 1917 but the Guildford Castle logs cover November 1914 to January 1919 (although there is a large gap between Dec 1916 and Aug 1917). A summary of the logs for the time Leppard and Cordaroy were onboard is below:

 

HS Guildford Castle
23-08-15    Arrived Alexandria
29-08-15    Left Alexandria
31-08-15    Arrived Mudros
01-09-15    Left for Imbros
02-09-15    Arrived Imbros. Took on board 670 cases.
05-09-15    Mudros. Handed over 670 cases to SS Scotian, Sumila(?) & Hospitals on shore
06-09-15    Suvla. Commenced to take in cases.
08-09-15    Left for Mudros arriving at 6pm with 557 cases onboard
09-09-15    Left for Malta
11-09-15    Arrived Malta. Disembarked all cases.
17-09-15    Arrived Mudros.
21-09-15    ANZAC Beach. Left with 600 cases onboard.
22-09-15    Mudros. Left to Alexandria with 520 cases onboard 120 being on decks
25-09-15    Alexandria. Arrived in dock. Disembarked all cases.
29-09-15    Embarked 384 sick & wounded. Left for Southampton.
06-10-15    Gibralter. Arrived - only waiting long enough to hand over embarkation stats.
11-10-15    Southampton. Arrived in dock disembarked all sick & wounded.
12-10-15    London. Arrived in East India dock. Repairs & Alterations.
25-10-15    London. Left East India dock anchored for the night off the NORE.
27-10-15    Boulogne. Arrived in dock. Took on board 75 Indian troops destined for India & 300 for Marseilles. Left for Marseilles.
02-11-15    Marseilles. Arrived in dock. Disembarked 300 Indian cases for General Hospital. Took onboard 130 Indians for Alexandria.
10-11-15    Alexandria. Arrived in dock. Disembarked all 205 cases.
16-11-15    Mudros. Arrived in harbour.
20-11-15    Mudros. Left for Suvla.
23-11-15    Suvla. Left for Mudros with 410 sick & wounded onboard.
24-11-15    Mudros. Left for Malta.
27-11-15    Malta. Arrived in harbour. Disembarked 224 cases likely to be well in six weeks & took on 210 cases for England.
28-11-15    Malta. Left for Southampton.

 

Next entry in the Guildford Castle's log is August 1916 after they disembarked.

 

I suppose it's also remotely possible that the man in the photo is Cordaroy. At least he is a contender.

 

Peter
 

Thank you Peter.

 

[PJS]

I took a closer look at the Service records of the men with MIC disembarkation dates of 30-5-1915 and went through the same exercise (pullled the names and records) with all the men with MIC disembarkation dates of 29-5-1915. Below is what I found:

 

The 120 men with MIC disembarkation dates of 30-5-1915 were mainly part of the No 21 General Hospital mobilization, which arrived in Alexandria in June 1915. However, some men in this list were instead assigned to the No 17 General Hospital, which had arrived in Alexandria in March 1915.

 

The 117 men with MIC disembarkation dates of 29-5-1915 were mainly part of the 25 CCS and 26 CCS mobilizations.

"Between the 25th and 29th May 1915 three more casualty clearing stations, Nos. 24, 25 and 26, arrived at Mudros from England. They were employed for a time in staffing the mine sweepers and for temporary duty on shore on the Peninsula, but all three were landed at Mudros between the 20th and 22nd June. No. 25 was sent to Kephalos, on the island of Imbros, and remained there till it left for Salonika at the beginning of October. No. 26 opened as a convalescent depot at Mudros until it was transferred to Suvla Bay with the 10th Division in August.", (from Medical Services General History, Vol IV).

 

With both groups of men, 100% of those that listed their initial deployment in the UK underwent basic training at Aldershot. Additionally, with the exception of those few men with prior medical training (dispensers) 100% of men were assigned to their respective units upon arrival in Egypt for just a month or two before moving on to their next, more permanent, assignment. In other words, being assigned to No 17 General Hospital, for example, simply means that the men started out there before being moved on to where they were actually needed.

 

A quick analysis of the service numbers shows a strong correlation of attestation dates with ranges of service numbers:

 

1.      Of the 15 men attesting in October 1914, all had service numbers starting with 43xxx, 44xxx or, (in 2 cases at the end of the month), 46xxx.

 

2.      Of the 11 men attesting in January 1915, 10 had numbers starting with 10xxx or 11xxx and 1 had a number starting with 51xxx.

 

3.      Of the 10 men attesting in February 1915, 2 had numbers starting with 11xxx and 8 had numbers starting with 5xxxx.

 

My conclusion is that based on the 11xxx series numbers it seems likely that LJ Monks, 11434 RAMC attested in early to mid February 1915 and went to Aldershot for his basic training.

 

 

Note: It is also clear from the Service Number analysis that Pvt Joseph Coady, 61077 would have attested much later than everyone else in this group; which is borne out by his service record.

Edited 29 July , 2018 by PJS

[PJS]

Attached is a spreadsheet of the raw information used in the above post. It contains the full list of RAMC men who’s MIC shows an arrival date in Egypt of 30-5-1915 and 29-5-1915. There’s a 3^rd tab that contains just those men, from both lists, who have more information (at least an attestation date).

 

The spreadsheet (.xlsx) can be downloaded here.

Edited 25 July , 2018 by PJS

[TEW]

I downloaded your spreadsheet last week and have been using it in conjuction with service/pension files to see what can be gleaned in regard to the incorrect dates of entry given in the medal rolls.

 

I've just checked 56514 Battick's service record. His MIC and Roll gives 29/5/1915 (3) which is Egypt. However, his B.103 form shows he embarked Southampton 1/6/1915 and disembarked Havre 2/6/1915. He only seems to have service with 15 CCS which is a France only unit. So he never went to Egypt at all!

 

56516 Hutchings is in the same position, never went to Egypt but MIC & Roll says he did.

 

There must have been one big foul up somewhere. I did think perhaps the Record Office EEF lists supplied (1917/1918) to verify date of entry might have been cobbled together, the original lists having been lost perhaps?

 

But that doesn't explain how men who only served in France and have no mention of Egypt in their service files ended up with medal records indicating Egyptian service.

TEW

 

 

[PJS]

1 hour ago, TEW said:

I downloaded your spreadsheet last week and have been using it in conjuction with service/pension files to see what can be gleaned in regard to the incorrect dates of entry given in the medal rolls.

 

I've just checked 56514 Battick's service record. His MIC and Roll gives 29/5/1915 (3) which is Egypt. However, his B.103 form shows he embarked Southampton 1/6/1915 and disembarked Havre 2/6/1915. He only seems to have service with 15 CCS which is a France only unit. So he never went to Egypt at all!

 

56516 Hutchings is in the same position, never went to Egypt but MIC & Roll says he did.

 

There must have been one big foul up somewhere. I did think perhaps the Record Office EEF lists supplied (1917/1918) to verify date of entry might have been cobbled together, the original lists having been lost perhaps?

 

But that doesn't explain how men who only served in France and have no mention of Egypt in their service files ended up with medal records indicating Egyptian service.

TEW

 

 

 

There are actually 3 men that I found in the 29-5-1915 MIC list that appear to have really been BEF rather than EEF men, (43221 Debell, also shows the same pattern). That's 3 out of 20!  It's interesting that all 3 men show the same embarkation date of 1-6-1915 and that for the two men with B103's they were both assigned to No 15 CCS. My feeling is that this is such a huge mistake that somehow some of the men sent to 15 CCS got accidentally mixed up with the men sent to 25 CCS at some point in the record keeping process. I've read enough bad cursive handwriting over the last six months to make me wonder if someone simply misread a badly written "15" as "25" and there was no double-check in place to catch it.

 

Of course, that does not explain some of the other inconsistencies like Coady, 61077.

 

Peter

 

[charlie962]

Some good research. If there was no secondary confirmation one would just accept that all these men went to Egypt on the same date. How wrong one would be.

Charlie

[PJS]

It appears that my Grandfather was part of the group that was mobilized with 21 British General Hospital because I received these photos earlier today from an album of his:

 

 

 

 

 

 

[charlie962]

ie fits with yor post 77.

 

 

[PJS]

13 hours ago, charlie962 said:

ie fits with yor post 77.

 

 

Yes, the men with a MIC disembarkation date of 05-30-15 were sent to Egypt for the mobilization of 21 BGH. Several other men (Leppard & Cordaroy that we know of) who's arrival date was actually 06-13-15 (leaving Devonport 06-01-15) and who were assigned to 17 BGH were incorrectly lumped into the 05-30-15 group. 

 

Note, there is no official RAMC MIC disembarkation date of 06-13-15 (i.e. there is no such date listed in the Rolls) so perhaps the issue was that there was no "correct" place to put these men.

 

Unfortunately, the War Diary for 21 BGH does not start until February 1916 so tracking him from 21 BGH to Basra, on to Persia and eventually to the HS VITA is posing a challenge.

 

Peter

[CassieRae]

Thank you both, Charlie 962 and Tew. A bit odd isn't it?  Glad I asked.