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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

Soldiers Records WW1


Boforsgun

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If you want to access a post 1921 record, you have to apply to the Ministry of Defence, by filling in a form, and paying an application fee. The records are not available online.

 For details,  perhaps explained in a different way to the link in post 2, see the FIBIS Fibiwiki page British Army, section Army personnel serving after January 1921

https://wiki.fibis.org/w/British_Army#Army_personnel_serving_after_January_1921

There is a finding aid available for men who were born prior to 1901 which is explained.

 

Cheers

Maureen

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Hi Mel,

 

I'm not quite sure what you are after, but if you mean the index of files that the MoD released for 'declared' files in their possession for men born before 1901, who had service after the early 1920s, they can be downloaded as the 8 'attachment' documents from here. It does take a little bit of time to do, but what some on the forum have done is to download the individual files, then merge them to make searching easier. If you get a 'hit' where the surname, initials, and DoB match the person that you are looking for, it would then be a £30 gamble to apply to the MoD for the (probably heavily weeded) record. The mechanics of doing that are linked above. There is a helpdesk phone number here.

 

If you post some more details of what you're looking for, and what you already know, I'm sure that Pals will try to help.

 

Regards

Chris

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Hi Chris,

I did a search with the MOD 2 years ago but they only turned up my Grandfathers WW2 service record , but I happened upon this [ Pre 1921 MOD retention records]

item in Forces war records.I put in the name and DOB and was given---     Further Information  Account: 11006. Item Code; ADH001064976

Archive Reference----- surviving-ww1-service-records ,Does this mean his WW1 records could still be available.

He was William Melville   1887-03-21  service nos.  5790    D/21193   7018432

service   1906-1919           1940-1944.

Many thanks ,

Mel.

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Hi Mel,

 

I think that the Forces War Records record is just a reference to the MoD index, and would guess that those are the papers that you've already obtained.

 

image.png.e500470c9d19a87fb8889fd665fb1a24.png

 

3 hours ago, Boforsgun said:

He was William Melville   ...  service nos.  5790    D/21193

 

Looking at the British War & Victory medals roll his overseas WW1 service seems to have been...

image.png.c53aa82f22c03d3fc127fc806d843d4f.png

Image source: Ancestry.co.uk

 

He was also entitled to the 1914 Star medal having disembarked in active theatre on 9th October 1914, where his 'qualifying' unit was the 2nd Dragoon Guards. 

 

image.png.cf2470218da3b770f0135fa183c17a6c.png

 

image.png.8003ee153f2c1e9622d741881169de83.png

 

image.png.1e63212b6da443627a6958ff3c2546ae.png

Images sourced from Ancestry.co.uk

 

The war diary for the 2nd Dragoon Guards is here at the National Archives, or here on Ancestry. It shows that they arrived in France in mid August 1914, so it would appear that William arrived as an early reinforcement.

 

From his British War & Victory medals roll, I'm not sure what "6 DN/" means. I think that it is different than "D. Gds." (Dragoon Guards), and might be short for 'Dragoons'. N.B. The 6th Dragoons, and the 6th Dragoon Guards were different units. In terms of his WW1 overseas service, I did wonder if it might indicate that he was sent to France from another unit (or from the Reserve), but was redirected to the 2nd Dragoon Guards on arrival.

 

If he was born in/near Belfast, there seems to be a good candidate in the 1911 census - a 24 year old William Melville, in India with the army. Unfortunately, it only records him as "cavalry", rather than a specific unit.

 

Regards

Chris

Edited by clk
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Hi Chris,

Thank you for this information it is a great help and has no doubt saved me wasting a lot of time. The 6/DN is the 6th Inniskilling Dragoons.

Once again thank you for your time it was much appreciated.

Mel.

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