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The Great War (1914-1918) Forum

Remembered Today:

Jill Knight's research papers


SiegeGunner

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Jill Knight, author of ‘The Civil Service Rifles in the Great War’ and a member of this Forum, sadly died in April 2005. Her research papers relating to that project have recently been deposited for the benefit of future researchers in the archives of the Centre for First World War Studies at Birmingham University, together with her papers on the reinstatement of the Board of Trade memorial at the Department of Trade & Industry. Her research into the 305 men commemorated on the Board of Trade Roll of Honour is accessible via the DTI’s ‘Virtual Memorial’ website (also Jill’s creation) at https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20070603172549/http://www.dti.gov.uk/about/aboutus/warmemorial/index.html

Since Jill’s death and the retirement of other members of the original DTI Memorial Group, a new generation of volunteers has come forward to continue the work of maintaining and adding new information to the website, headed by AlanH, a member of this Forum, who is its webmaster.

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Thanks for the glowing introduction, I am honoured to be associated with carrying on Jill's Project and would be extremely grateful for any help that Pals could offer, in order to make this "Virtual Memorial" as detailed as possible.

Alan

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I am very pleased to read this as it important an author's work and research is passed on - I wish you every success Alan.

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Paul

Many thanks for your good wishes. I have been associated with this project since November and have, up until now, just been catching up, either with the research Jill had not added, or with information received via the Memorials' e-mail address ( which took some time for me to get read rights from our IT contractors), so I am only now, in a position to carry on my own research and I propose, in the first instance to try looking each individual ( at least the English or Welsh born) on the 1901 Census, to try for some family background, do you think this is the right way to go?.

Thanks

Alan

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Alan

Absolutely the right "next step".

Once I've identified a casualty on one of my local war memorials, it is virtually the first thing I then do. Possibly more than anything else, it's the key to information that makes the casualty a "real person" - that is someone who had family, lived in real place, etc. When I first started I used the "free" bit of the Census which was fine as far as it went. I now periodically sign up to Ancestry which gives me unlimited access to the on-line actual images. This is much more useful in terms of family information and, in some cases, spotting other likely family members who might live, say, next door. All that said, my project is about folk who lived in particular place not worked in a particular place.

John

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John

Thanks for the advice. As I already have a subscription to Ancestry, I shall work my way through the list, before moving on to any other areas of research.

Alan

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Alan

Another thought... you might also want to enlist the help of Pals around the country to see if they can seek out any newspaper obituaries for their local men. Put me down for North Cheshire.

John

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  • 2 weeks later...

Paul,

ref LRB - do you have the LRB list of photo sources from Murphy's Register ?

PM me if you would like a copy

Peter

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Just attached a scan of 2/15th officers named under doc and photo requests. Interestingly, none of the officers shown was a casualty.

Peter

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Am just about halfway through the T's in my searches through the 1901 census for names on DTI War memorial ( although I will still have to add this info to the site, an even longer job!!) and have still a long list of those either born in Ireland or Scotland or just refuse to be found. But I came across this one, which I could seriously do with some help on , if at all possible (info copied from site):

A.C. Shotton

Age at death: ?

Born: ?

Full name: (see Footnote below)

Service, Regiment, ?

Corps, etc: Northumberland Fusiliers

Unit, ship, etc: 19th Battalion

Enlisted: (see Footnote below)

Rank: Private

Decorations:

War (and theatre): WW1

Date of death: 28 March 1918

Manner of death: MPD

Family details:

Residence:

Home department: Board of Trade - Labour Department (Northern Division)

Civilian rank:

Cemetery or

memorial: (see Footnote below)

When we set up this site in November 2002, the only details available to us about A C Shotton were from the Board of Trade file on the war memorial (in the series BT 13 at the PRO). The fact that we found no trace of him on the Commonwealth War Graves (CWGC) Debt of Honour Register or in Soldiers Died in the Great War suggested to us that some of the details we had may be incorrect.

A C Shotton is also commemorated on the Memorial to the Staff of the Ministry of Labour, now hanging in Caxton House, Tothill Street, London SW1.

Thanks

Alan

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Regarding your post below on A.C. Shotton

Age at death: ?

Born: ?

Full name: (see Footnote below)

Service, Regiment, ?

Corps, etc: Northumberland Fusiliers

Unit, ship, etc: 19th Battalion

Enlisted: (see Footnote below)

Rank: Private

Decorations:

War (and theatre): WW1

Date of death: 28 March 1918

Manner of death: MPD

Family details:

Residence:

Home department: Board of Trade - Labour Department (Northern Division)

Civilian rank:

Cemetery or

memorial: (see Footnote below)

When we set up this site in November 2002, the only details available to us about A C Shotton were from the Board of Trade file on the war memorial (in the series BT 13 at the PRO). The fact that we found no trace of him on the Commonwealth War Graves (CWGC) Debt of Honour Register or in Soldiers Died in the Great War suggested to us that some of the details we had may be incorrect.

A C Shotton is also commemorated on the Memorial to the Staff of the Ministry of Labour, now hanging in Caxton House, Tothill Street, London SW1.

Thanks

Alan

Hello Alan

I'm Tessy and I've just dicovered this site and as the 19th Northumberland Fusiliers was my grandfather's regiment I obviously have searched for that first and your post came up. My father has a book which is the Historical Records of the 19th Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers - I can't find a puplishing date but it's very old and was printed by The Mayflower Press, Plymouth. Anyway I digress. I looked up A.C. Shotton in the list of members of the Battallion and he's there - his Reg. No is 497 and he is stated missing 28.3.18 Dernancourt, France.

I hope that little bit of information helps.

TEssy

Regarding your post below on A.C. Shotton

Age at death: ?

Born: ?

Full name: (see Footnote below)

Service, Regiment, ?

Corps, etc: Northumberland Fusiliers

Unit, ship, etc: 19th Battalion

Enlisted: (see Footnote below)

Rank: Private

Decorations:

War (and theatre): WW1

Date of death: 28 March 1918

Manner of death: MPD

Family details:

Residence:

Home department: Board of Trade - Labour Department (Northern Division)

Civilian rank:

Cemetery or

memorial: (see Footnote below)

When we set up this site in November 2002, the only details available to us about A C Shotton were from the Board of Trade file on the war memorial (in the series BT 13 at the PRO). The fact that we found no trace of him on the Commonwealth War Graves (CWGC) Debt of Honour Register or in Soldiers Died in the Great War suggested to us that some of the details we had may be incorrect.

A C Shotton is also commemorated on the Memorial to the Staff of the Ministry of Labour, now hanging in Caxton House, Tothill Street, London SW1.

Thanks

Alan

Hello Alan

I'm Tessy and I've just dicovered this site and as the 19th Northumberland Fusiliers was my grandfather's regiment I obviously have searched for that first and your post came up. My father has a book which is the Historical Records of the 19th Battalion Northumberland Fusiliers - I can't find a puplishing date but it's very old and was printed by The Mayflower Press, Plymouth. Anyway I digress. I looked up A.C. Shotton in the list of members of the Battallion and he's there - his Reg. No is 497 and he is stated missing 28.3.18 Dernancourt, France.

I hope that little bit of information helps.

TEssy

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Morning Alan,

Great to see progress on some of the names that eluded us first time round. If A C Shotton is the correct form of this chap's name, I can't think why we couldn't find him on CWGC or in SDGW.

Take a look on the 'Soldiers' forum at a thread on the second page re 'RBS Memorials' - RBS is undertaking a database/website project similar to the DTI's and I've alerted their project leader to the existence of the virtual Memorial and the fact that you're a member of the GWF.

regards

Mick

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Mick

He appears as Cecil Arthur on CWGC with the sn 19/497, but in the medal index cards he is Arthur C

and I have now found him in 1901 and 1891 censuses. Have finally finished census lookups, am now compiling a list of 'can't finds' and Scots/Irish born.

I am always willing to help RBS or anyone else if I possibly can.

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  • 3 months later...

Well I have finally finished tranferring the DTI War Memorial Site to it's rather more restricted new home. It is not as I would have wished, but as DTI can't support anything outside it's new system I have to live with "wot I got" ;). I do need to do a bit more in the way of tiding up, but is basically up and running. New site is http://www.dti.gov.uk/about/aboutus/warmemorial/index.html

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Alan,

Is it just the DTI memorial you are working on, or are you handling the Civil Service Rifles information as well?

If you are, then this fellow:

Name: DAVIES, LESLIE

Initials: L

Nationality: United Kingdom

Rank: Captain

Regiment/Service: London Regiment (Prince of Wales' Own Civil Service Rifles)

Unit Text: 15th Bn.

Age: 22

Date of Death: 15/09/1916

Additional information: Son of Mary E. Davies, of 16, Warwick Crescent, Upper Westbourne Terrace, London, and the late John Arthur Davies.

Casualty Type: Commonwealth War Dead

Grave/Memorial Reference: XVI. G. 14.

Cemetery: CATERPILLAR VALLEY CEMETERY, LONGUEVAL

appears on my Roll for HBOS plc, as he worked for Clerical Medical. I notice there are several pictures of him in Jill's book, which I have in my ever-increasing "to read" pile. Is there perhaps any information you can add for him?

Cheers,

David

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Alan,

Congratulations on completing the transfer. The old link still seems to work, but I will go through my previous posts and edit in the new link in those that mention the Memorial website.

Mick

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Mick

Don't want to take the old static site down until I'm positive the new site is working properly, plus I'm still awaiting a backup of the old site for records.

Alan

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