Casualty Lists

[the_ageing_young_rebel]

Hi

    Is there a resource anywhere that allows you to find all the people lost on a particular day from a regiment? I was trying to research the 1st/4th Gloucestershire regiment on the 22nd August 1916

    Thanks for any advice

[charlie962]

Lost. Do you mean just the killed or do you include wounded and missing ?

Presumably war diary hasn't such a list?

[the_ageing_young_rebel]

3 minutes ago, charlie962 said:

Lost. Do you mean just the killed or do you include wounded and missing ?

Killed and missing would I presume be easiest, but wounded would be useful as well! The War Diaries (for this regiment at least), note the amount of active officers and other ranks, but not names of anybody. Meaning that if 10 people returned to duty from leave and 10 died, it would appear that the numbers never changed and nobody came or went

[charlie962]

You can search cwgc database for deaths on a given day and distinguish the unit. But same unit was not always written the same for each man on cwgc so need to be careful.

Also died of wounds could be a day or more later? 

Charlie

[the_ageing_young_rebel]

Thanks for that, I'll give that a go now. I didn't realise the CWGC had that functionality. Its a shame there isn't a wounded register that I can find but this is a good start

[charlie962]

Try a search using

'unit' 1st/4th

'regiment' Gloucestershire Regiment

 'date of death' 22/08/1916 

 

I got 22 results but I don't know how to give you the link so have a go yourself!

Edited 11 April , 2023 by charlie962

[charlie962]

Those wounded on 22/8/16 would normally appear in a Daily Casualty List that was published about one month after the event. These lists show rank and regiment but not battalion. Nor do they show original wound date.

However I found a couple of 1/4th men wounded 22/8/16 by looking at hospital admissions (on FindmyPast). These do show battalion and original wound date but these records have mostly been destroyed.

Anyway checking these two men back to the daily Casualty Lists I find they both appear in the same list published 2/10/1916. This is a good week later than I would expect but may be for a variety of reasons, not least the huge volume since 1/7/16! 

The two men I know to be 1st/4th and to be wounded 22/8/16 are:

4512 Horseman G, private.

2608 Neal WS, Corpl. 

Here is the Daily List published 2/10/16. But note it will include men from a number of battalions. So your task, if you are really keen, is to check each man on the list for possible surviving service records etc that might confirm his battalion and his actual date of wounding. A slow process an inevitably incomplete. Complicated by the fact that these men's 4 digit service number will be changed in 1917 for a six digit number and they may even have gone to another Regiment or the Labour Corps which would mean yet another number. Their record if (a big if) they survive could be under any of these numbers!

Example..From that Daily Casualty List take Bakehouse 5560. He has a surviving service record that confirms he too was 4th (but doesn't say 1/4 or 2/4) and wounded 22/8/16. He was renumbered 1917 to 201954 under which number his service record can be found. 

It's up to you how far you want to dig. It will never be a totally comprehensive exercise if you don't have the battalion's own casualty list prepared at the time! But it will, I think, throw up some interesting records that might enlighten your research?

Daily Casualty List 2/10/16 courtesy The Genealogist  

Ps . Further in same List are some possible shellshock and missing men but I've not listed them because I don't yet know if I've put you off! 

Charlie

Edited 11 April , 2023 by charlie962

[charlie962]

Just noting that the 2nd/4th bn had two men wounded 22/8/16 per their war diary so important to identify down to this level.

Just possible that Aston in the Daily Casualty List is one of these two men in that he was transferred to 2/4th on 1/7/16? 

[Bernard_Lewis]

I think you can get a good idea of those killed and those missing and later found to be dead from the DVD(s) "Soldiers Died in the Great War". This used to be sold by the Naval and Military Press I think but was a bit pricey. I used a copy in my local library to research Swansea Battalion casualties. It's not foolproof but is a good starting point if it's still around...

Bernard

[charlie962]

9 hours ago, the_ageing_young_rebel said:

Killed and missing would I presume be easiest, but wounded would be useful as well! The War Diaries (for this regiment at least), note the amount of active officers and other ranks, but not names of anybody. Meaning that if 10 people returned to duty from leave and 10 died, it would appear that the numbers never changed and nobody came or went

In this case the diary shows strength dropping from 682 to 543. I've net reduction 140.

That will be those killed,missing, evacuated wounded and evacuated sick. We don't know how many joined, if any. Those slightly wounded, not requiring evacuation, would still be on strength. All very unsatisfactory. 

With over 20 killed one might expect perhaps 100 wounded(?) 

There may be a casualty figure recorded at Brigade level. Certainly the totals were being reported.

edit. Looked at Brigade. Nothing. Perhaps Division?

Edited 12 April , 2023 by charlie962

[charlie962]

6 hours ago, Bernard_Lewis said:

I think you can get a good idea of those killed and those missing and later found to be dead from the DVD(s) "Soldiers Died in the Great War". This used to be sold by the Naval and Military Press I think but was a bit pricey. I used a copy in my local library to research Swansea Battalion casualties. It's not foolproof but is a good starting point if it's still around...

Bernard

I bet that gives a different answer to the cwgc interrogation !

There will be diffs due to the battalion name used, possibly date of death etc. 

 

[the_ageing_young_rebel]

1 hour ago, charlie962 said:

I bet that gives a different answer to the cwgc interrogation !

There will be diffs due to the battalion name used, possibly date of death etc. 

 

Thanks for all the work you’ve put into this! I’ve used the CWGC to draw up a list of all those lost on that day and a day either side. 
 

I might see if I can start by trying to find any service records surviving for these men. And the service records of the wounded men that you managed to find. 
 

Then I might start working through that list of wounded you posted. 
 

Thanks again

[AndrewSid]

If you have access to the medal rolls you can usually ID men from the casualty list by battalion.  

Taking bakehouse he appears as 1/4 bn under his new number 201954.  As has been said with research, the wounded lists can give you a lot.   

Often reports were grouped by battalion but not always 

 

 

Edited 15 April , 2023 by AndrewSid

[RaySearching]

SDGW list the following men on the 22/8/16   

 

 

 

 

hope this helps

 

Ray

Edited 14 April , 2023 by RaySearching
edit correcting error

[charlie962]

Note that those on SDGW with six digit numbers were probably not declared officially dead until 1917 by which time their TF 4 digit numbers had been changed.

ie initially posted as missing.

[RaySearching]

Also a number of those listed  on sdgw are recorded simply as "died"

you should be able to look up the individual entrys on sdgw on ancestry

[RaySearching]

4 hours ago, charlie962 said:

Note that those on SDGW with six digit numbers were probably not declared officially dead until 1917 by which time their TF 4 digit numbers had been changed.

ie initially posted as missing

 

An example is 201563 Gilbert Brain  reported as missing 22/8/1916 (source WFA pension ledger card)

[RaySearching]

15 minutes ago, charlie962 said:

I think you've duplicated the list?

So i had I have amended my post  above

Thanks Charlie

[the_ageing_young_rebel]

Thanks @RaySearching and @charlie962, Thats really helpful. I've started my own excel doc of men lost on these days with all the info I can't find about them, so these lists are great to cross reference against!