Pte. Colin Urquhart 38817, Royal Scots

[Reinking71]

New here, hoping to find some help. Looking for info on Pte. Colin Urquhart 38817 of the Royal Scots. I found his medal card but doesn’t give any other info such as his unit within the Royal Scots. Checked on find my past and service number doesn’t come up nor do any records for him. Don’t know if he served in another unit or if his records were lost at some point. 
 

would like to identify his unit and service history.

 

Thank you for the help.

[RussT]

His medal roll shows that he served overseas with the 15th Battalion and then the 2nd Battalion Royal Scots.

 

Regards

 

Russ

[david murdoch]

 

4 minutes ago, RussT said:

His medal roll shows that he served overseas with the 15th Battalion and then the 2nd Battalion Royal Scots.

 

Regards

 

Russ

.15th Battalion being "1st Edinburgh" service battalion. Went to France January 1916 and disbanded in August 1918.

Colin Urquhart shows up on a large Royal Scots casualty list 9th October 1917 as wounded but does not note his battalion at the time. He may have changed battalions and been sent to 2nd after recovering from wounds.

[RussT]

I would estimate his number being allotted in early January 1917, so perhaps he was not long in France before getting wounded.

 

Russ

[Reinking71]

Thank you so much! Appreciate the information. I had been looking on the National Archives site and using family search without much luck.

[clk]

Hi Reinking71,

 

Welcome to the forum.

 

Unfortunately, as you have already found, it looks like his service file was lost as the result of a fire in WW2

 

There is good advice on how to try to research a soldier here.

 

On Ancestry, the medal roll record which Russ referred to is here. What is noted is the overseas Battalions he served with. What it doesn't tell you is when he joined up; which UK based unit/s he served with before going abroad; the date that he was sent overseas; and the date/reason for his transfer between the two Battalions shown, You can say that he went to France/Flanders after 1915 as he doesn't appear to have qualified for a Star medal award. Where Russ said that he estimated that his service number was allocated in January 1917, I guess that he did some 'near number' sampling - i.e. looked for records for men from the Regiment to see what they showed. That isn't necessarily the same thing as saying that is when Colin joined up, as it is at least possible that he may have followed a different service path, serving at home with a different unit (under a different service number) prior to being transferred to the Royal Scots for overseas service.

 

Whilst they are unlikely to mention Colin by name, the Bn war diaries are available as free downloads from the National Archives - see here and here. There is some basic info on the Royal Scots here.

 

The Casualty List that David mentioned can be seen at the National Library of Scotland here. NB the date of the published War Office list, would usually post date the date of actual wounding by several weeks.

 

Good luck with your research.

 

Regards

Chris

 

 

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[Reinking71]

Thanks for the help. Usually I have pretty good luck researching but this one had me stumped. I let my ancestry subscription lapse, apparently I should renew it.