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Remembered Today:

Preposition to follow "attested"?


rolt968

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A question of grammar:

 

If I am writing that a man attested to join a particular unit, which preposition should follow "attested". My immediate inclination for some reason is to use "for", but what do other people think?

 

RM

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I would usually say attested 'in to the' or attested 'for service with the '.

 

Whether I'm grammatically right or not...

 

Craig

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20 minutes ago, ss002d6252 said:

I would usually say attested 'in to the' or attested 'for service with the '.

 

Whether I'm grammatically right or not...

 

Craig

Thanks Craig,

"Into" would have been my second choice.

 

RM

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I am not sure that a man "attested for" or "attested to join" or any other variation. What he did do was was sign an attestation that the information he was giving was correct and also swore an oath.(both with a view to enlisting).

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13 minutes ago, horatio2 said:

I am not sure that a man "attested for" or "attested to join" or any other variation. What he did do was was sign an attestation that the information he was giving was correct and also swore an oath.(both with a view to enlisting).

To some extent this reflects the problem I am having.

 

Provided that I have the attestation form I know where and when a man attested. However in very many cases once the recruitment process settled down he had enlisted somewhere else a few days early and was given a document telling him to report to X within a certain number of days. (This came out in another thread some time ago.) The somewhere else often but by no means always appears in SDGW. As result in my write up I can often be certain where and when a man attested, but not necessarily be sure where he enlisted (or do I mean "was recruited"?).

 

Having said all that the men I am dealing with at the moment were Scots Guards who seem to have been recruited as Scots Guardsmen and seem to have been filling out attestation forms for the Scots Guards.

 

RM

Edited by rolt968
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Personally I would support "attested at (place)" or "enlisted into/for service in (regiment or corps)."

 

Ron

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"Attested for service in the military..." I would have thought. I dare say some lads would attest without a clear preference regarding a unit? 

 

Bernard

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I'm not sure that it's attested anything.

Just attested.

You can add "at" or "on" to show place and time when the event occurred, but I don't think you attest "into" or "for".

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Am I finicky about current use of the word “military”? Most of those we discuss thought they were joining the army, navy or Air Force, but I suspect some influence from over the pond has, as usual, prevailed.

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My wife’s grandfather served with the Northamptonshire Regiment from 1906 until 1919. The Surrey recruitment registers 1908-33 show that on 26/07/1920 at the age of 33 years and 8 months he attested again with the same Regiment. Does this indicate that he re-joined the Regiment?  Or might the ‘attestation date’ refer to something else? 

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3 hours ago, daggers said:

Am I finicky about current use of the word “military”? Most of those we discuss thought they were joining the army, navy or Air Force, but I suspect some influence from over the pond has, as usual, prevailed.

A little bit finicky, daggers. The Army was governed according to the Manual of Military Law, and there were military attaches alongside naval attaches at the embassies in foreign capitals. The word military comes from the Latin miles, meaning a soldier.

 

I think that they use the word "military" across the pond to describe what we call the Armed Forces. That title might not be appropriate in the USA where policemen are routinely armed.

 

Ron

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3 hours ago, Geoffbr said:

My wife’s grandfather served with the Northamptonshire Regiment from 1906 until 1919. The Surrey recruitment registers 1908-33 show that on 26/07/1920 at the age of 33 years and 8 months he attested again with the same Regiment. Does this indicate that he re-joined the Regiment?  Or might the ‘attestation date’ refer to something else? 

I think you will get more (and better?) replies to this if it was separate thread. Perhaps the mods will oblige?

RM

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On 07/11/2018 at 15:43, Geoffbr said:

My wife’s grandfather served with the Northamptonshire Regiment from 1906 until 1919. The Surrey recruitment registers 1908-33 show that on 26/07/1920 at the age of 33 years and 8 months he attested again with the same Regiment. Does this indicate that he re-joined the Regiment?  Or might the ‘attestation date’ refer to something else? 

He would have joined the regiment on a twelve-year attestation, and been retained for an extra year because of the war. In the immediate aftermath of the war, the Army was looking for short-service soldiers who had already served, so as to enable the Army to fulfil its ongoing peacetime commitments. It looks as if he was one of those who took advantage of this offer to go back into the Army (there was a cash bounty) and he would have been attested again, even if he joined the same regiment, because the terms of service were different.

 

Ron

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I don't know for certain about the service number but I imagine the answer would be yes, because the Army started using seven-figure numbers around that time, unique across the Army and no longer issued by the regiments.

 

It is possible that his post-war record is still held by the MoD. Details should be available, to the next of kin only, for a fee.

 

Ron

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Thank you for all the contributions about "attested". I will think about the suggested longer forms. Unfortunately I am still trying to escape the style developed over several years of academic work - pack as much into the word allowance as possible.

RM

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