CAUTION: Watch for the application of CWGC CORRECTIONS to their database.

[laughton]

31 May 2020

 

As a result of returning to a case in May 2020 that was first investigated in January 2020, the implication of the application of database corrections by the CWGC was so significant that I believe it is worthy of a special note to fellow researchers.

 

I have marked the case of Zantvoorde British Cemetery Case #6: 1914 Border Regiment Lieutenant with a number of "purple square notes" that highlight the issue and the implication to the research projects. I welcome the comments of fellow researchers on how this situation has impacted their research, identification of cases where there now may be changes to the results previously reported (mine and others) and suggestions as to how we encourage the CWGC to make the necessary changes so that problem does not persist.

 

In the process that I use, I often first investigate a cemetery, from which I then generate potential case list based on what is shown in the GRRF or COG-BR documents. That was exactly the process that was used in the case example here, where I first created the topic on the Zantvoorde British Cemetery, which then led to a number of "child topics", one of which was Case #6 for the Border Regiment Lieutenant.

 

In the later stages of that case investigation, the number of errors (or inconsistencies) in the CWGC database were so significant that I submitted these to Roy Hemmington (CWGC Records Data Manager) for review. Roy and his team accepted the report and made a number of changes to the CWGC database. Five months later (today) when I returned to review the case as a potential submission for an "UNKNOWN IDENTIFICATION", I myself was initially completely confused when the CWGC data in the links in my posts was returning information that did not correspond to the text that I had previously written (January 2020). It was then that I realized that I was seeing what the CWGC database NOW SHOWED and not what it PREVIOUSLY SHOWED and there was no indication that any corrections had been made to the database. It is quite possible that if I had not posted a copy of the emails with the RECORDS GROUP into the topic, I may have completely forgotten about the corrections process. As such, I can imagine that anyone who read the topic would think that I was absolutely "out to lunch" when I first posted the topic back in January 2020.

 

There are doubtless many other cases in the list of ongoing investigations where these changes have been made and perhaps not recorded in the case reviews. I recall, for example, that there were many corrections in a number of cases for the Royal Marine Light Infantry (listed here as *see) that may now appear as very confusing if the records correction process was not recorded. What makes this even worse is that some of the changes may have been suggested by one researcher which has implications on any number of cases previously reported or investigated by other researchers. I had to imagine what I would have thought if I re-read my January 2020 posts on this particular case today, it the changes to the database were the result of a submission from a fellow researcher and not by myself. I would never know and so most definitely I would think that "I had lost it"! 

 

One of the immediate solutions to this as GWF researchers is to post the CWGC data as it appears at the time of the review and posting, so that immediately appears in the post if the CWGC database changes. For example, here is the summary of what changes resulted during the correction of the entries for this short list of Officers of the Border Regiment for this case alone:

 

surname	forename	May CWGC	January CWGC	War Diary	rank CWGC	rank AT DEATH
ASKEW	HENRY ADAM	18/12/1914	19/12/1914	18/12/1914	Captain	Captain
ANDREWS	CHARLES GEORGE WILLIAMS	26/10/1914	28/10/1914	26/10/1914	Captain	Captain
CHOLMONDELEY	CHARLES ALMERIC JOHN	26/10/1914	28/10/1914	26/10/1914	Captain	Captain
GORDON	ROBERT NORMAN	23/10/1914	28/10/1914	22/10/1914	Captain	Captain
LEES	EDMUND HASTINGS HARCOURT	26/10/1914	28/10/1914	26/10/1914	Captain	Captain
LAMB	CAMERON	29/12/1914	29/12/1914		Captain	Captain
GERRARD	HARRY VERNON	2/11/1914	2/11/1914		Captain	Lieutenant
HODGSON	GEORGE WILLIAM HOUGHTON	6/11/1914	6/11/1914	6/11/1915	Lieutenant	2nd Lieutenant
EGERTON	PHILIP JOHN	17/10/1914	17/10/1914		Lieutenant	Lieutenant
COOCH	CHARLES ROLLO	17/12/1914	17/12/1914		Lieutenant	Lieutenant
SURTEES	CHARLES GORDON VILLIERS	26/10/1914	26/10/1914		Lieutenant	2nd Lieutenant
WARREN	JAMES BOOKER BROUGH	26/10/1914	28/10/1914	26/10/1914	Lieutenant	Lieutenant