Private J W Coulson 42265 South Staffordshire Regiment

[Dean Witherington]

Hi - I'm looking for details of the 7th Btn South Staffs in WW1 from 02/17 to 04/18.
 

My Grandad was wounded 0n 03/04/18 and, whilst I have some documents about his service, I'm not clear on which battles he would have fought in. He died when i was a teenager and as a lad I spent many hours trying to get snippets from him.

 

Any help appreciated.

[charlie962]

Hello Dean and welcome to the Forum.

 

If you are an Ancestry subscriber (or can get to your local library) then the War Diary is available here

 

Otherwise you can download the relevant bits from National Archives at 3.50 a go here

 

Charlie

[Coldstreamer]

welcome to the forum

Id suggest looking for the war diary for the 7th to give you a good idea of what was going on for them

also try looking in local papers - FMP have some as do the BNA

[Dean Witherington]

Thankyou both - very much appreciated

 

[charlie962]

Dean, looking at the very limited Service Record that survives, I read it that he was in France from 13/12/17 to 24/2/19.

 

He served with the 2/6th from 14/12/17   until posted to the 7th Bn on ?/6/18

 

Of the 2/6th South Staffs, the LongLongTrail here tells us:

9 May 1918 : reduced to cadre strength and transferred to 66th (2nd East Lancashire) Division.
31 July 1918 : disbanded in France.

 

So this affects the War Diaries you should look at.

 

The 2/6th Diary is here on Ancestry and here at National Archives

 

War Diaries do not cover Home Service

 

Charlie

Edited 5 February , 2020 by charlie962

[charlie962]

War Diary 2/6th south staffs:

15/12/17 , RUE,  Draft of 30 ORs arrived.                          -This probably includes Coulson.     edited see later post

Note that the Bn had suffered very heavy losses in November.

 

The 2/6th were with the 59th division when the German Spring Offencive was launched 21/3/18

 

Whether he left with the bulk of the Bn on 9/5/18 or remained with the 2/6th Training Cadre (they were training some Amercan units) I don't know.

 

Charlie

 

 

 

 

Edited 9 February , 2020 by charlie962

[charlie962]

1 hour ago, Dean Witherington said:

7th Btn South Staffs in WW1 from 02/17 to 04/18.

Why did you pick those dates and that Bn ?

 

 

I see the subsequent DailyCasualtyList 6/5/18 reporting of his April 1918 wounding:  South Staffordshire  Coulson 42265 J. W. (Enderby)

 

I'm now getting confused because the 2/6th War Diary suggests on 3/4/18 that the Bn were in reserve, training etc and no report of casualties.

Nor is there anything obvious in 7th Sth Staffs Diary.

 

Edit- I post (thanks to FindmyPast) the relevant bit of his service record in case someone else can make sense of it:

 

The Medal Roll agrees with 2/6th followed by 7th SthStaffs but doesn't give dates

 

 

Another thought. The 2/6th suffered heavily on 21/3/18 and reported 23 officers and about 600 ORs missing. Could he have been one of these who ended up temporarily with another Bn where he was wounded 2 weeks later ? seems unlikely ?

 

Edited 5 February , 2020 by charlie962

[Dean Witherington]

Thanks Charlie

 

I have a few docs from Ancestry which I've used for reference - I hadn't seen reference to 6th anywhere. 

 

I appreciate your help 

 

Edited 6 February , 2020 by Dean Witherington

[Dean Witherington]

Thought I'd share his photo - he's the short one at right:

[Dean Witherington]

[Dean Witherington]

[charlie962]

On 05/02/2020 at 21:12, Dean Witherington said:

My Grandad was wounded 0n 03/04/18

Ah- That is not what it says on the copy documents you've posted. He is shown as wounded 21 or 22 March 1918 and that makes sense with the 2/6th War Diary activity that day as I've already noted above. I will look for those Ancestry papers They give useful extra info and with those I've already seen on FindmyPast perhaps I can perhaps clear my outstanding concerns.

 

So do you have anything else that supports 3/4/18 wounding or have you perhaps misread the Service File (which is not the clearest of documents)? I think you have picked up the left hand column date, the administrative report date, rather than the right hand column 'date of casualty' event .

 

Charlie

PS  thanks for sharing photo. Always good to see who we are talking about.

[Dean Witherington]

Thanks Charlie - What Regiment do you think he was in when he was injured? It looks maybe that he was posted to 7th South Staffs when he came back after his injury do you think. Also I can't make out where he was shot - any thoughts. Again appreciate your help on this.

[charlie962]

13 hours ago, Dean Witherington said:

What Regiment do you think he was in when he was injured?

Strictly speaking the 'Regiment' was the South Staffs. The Battalion, within the Regiment was the 2/6th; he was then posted to the 7th battalion within the same regiment after he had recovered from his injuries- but as I said I will look at the Ancestry documents and give you a better timeline.

 

You had confused me with your initial assertation that he was wounded 3/4/18 with 7th Bn. We now know he was wounded with 2/6th Bn on 21/3/18. This was the day the German Army started their major Spring offensive, 'Kaiserschlacht', which initially overran the British 5th army and caused significant losses to certain battalions.

 

A bit of background is available here on wiki to help you understand the context. The War Diary for the 2/6th that I linked above will give some good detail of what the battalion went through at that time.

 

charlie

[charlie962]

From the service record that you have seen on Ancestry and I now find on Findmypast, I have extracted the following details:-

 

John William Coulson
b Oct 1898
Son of Walter Coulson of John St, Enderby

 

Attested Leicester 23/10/1916
To Army Reserve  23/10/16
Mobilised  27/2/17
Posted Depot  Leicester Regt 27/2/17
38067  267 Inf Bn Leicester Regt

Rivenhall End 267th Inf Bde 'Offence- Out of Bounds etc' 21/9/17

  ??????? 14/11/17
Posted Base Depot 12 Calais 13/12/17
?????
Joined unit Posted C Coy, in the field, 31/12/17  (this will be the 2/6th Battalion,  South Staffordshire Regt)
wounded 21/3/18
2 Can Gen Hosp admitted SW back 22/3/18
72 Gen Hosp admitted 26/3/18
15 Convalescent Depot admitted 13/4/18
15 Convalescent Depot discharged base Depot Calais 26/5/18
K IBD  joined   30/5/18
K IBD Posted 7 S Staffs 4/6/18
joined Bn 10/6/18
granted leave via Calais 13-31/11/18
to Harrowby for demob via Boulogne 21/2/19

 

So you will see that he arrived in France 13/12/17, was posted to Base Depot, then next day posted to 2/6th Bn South Staffs where he joined C Company on 31/12/17.

On 21/3/18 he was wounded in the back and hospitalised, and remained in hospital or convalescence after his wounding (with 2/6th)  until he was posted, via the base depot in France, to the 7th Bn on 4/6/18 which he actually joined on 10/6/18 and with whom he remained until sent back to England for demobilization in Febryary 1919.

 

I will now look again at the relevant war diaries........

 

Charlie

[Dean Witherington]

This is great stuff - thanks again 

[charlie962]

On 08/02/2020 at 14:11, charlie962 said:

Joined unit Posted C Coy, in the field, 31/12/17  (this will be the 2/6th Battalion,  South Staffordshire Regt)

The 2/6th sStaffs War Diary for 31/12 says:

Dec 31st;  Reinforcements arrived: 5 Officers and 450 ORs arrived 3am from Depot Battalion.  A,C and D Coys reorganised.

OC C Coy- Capt W.S.Lynes

 

I suggest you read the war Diaries now for the relevant periods as they are an interesting read.

 

Charlie

 

 

Edited 9 February , 2020 by charlie962

[Dean Witherington]

Thanks Charlie

I think he was lucky to survive 21/03 - first day of the Spring offensive. The 2/6th look like they were right in the front Line of  the Operation Micheal. C company officers were included in missing / dead.

A real nasty first taste of war for a 17 yr old lad - puts things into perspective .

The 7th were pretty busy reading the diaries, it’s a shame his war record has no detail following his return to action. He told me he had a Lewis gun and got gassed and shrapnel wounds.

Thanks for your help.

 

 

 

[charlie962]

17 minutes ago, Dean Witherington said:

I think he was lucky to survive 21/03 - first day of the Spring offensive

 

A good book describing that first day of the Spring Offensive is by Martin Middlebrook- The Kaiser's Battle

 

Charlie

[clk]

Hi,

 

From the A&Q diary, an initial casualty record for the first few days of the Spring Offensive...

 

Image sourced from the National Archives

 

For those that I've looked at, a large number of men that went 'missing' on 21st March were actually taken PoW when their unit was overwhelmed.

 

Regards

Chris