South Africa 1899 - 1902

[charly]

Hello everyone,

Could anyone please give me, or point me in the right direction to find information on 2nd Royal Lancaster Regiment 1899 - 1902, Relief of Ladysmith.

I am trying to find information regarding my great grandad, whom I think was in this Regiment at the time

Thanks for any imput that anyone my have

Charly

[cockney tone]

Charly,

your thread may well be closed by the Moderators as it is not Great War Related.

I have an interest in the Relief of Ladysmith as my Grandad was involved, I will have a look through a couple of books I have and get back to you.

If this thread is closed please PM me to remind me as i am off to bed now!,

Regards,

Scottie.

[cockney tone]

Charly,

first thing I did was to obtain my Grandfathers service record from the Public Record Office at Kew, this was years ago when they would actually research it for you free of charge and send it out to you, I believe nowadays that you have to either attend there yourself now to trace it or pay a researcher to undertake this for you. This record gave me a lot of useful info of dates abroad, where served etc.

With regard to your enquiry I can find the 2nd Royal Lancaster Regiment who were attacthed to 'Woodgates' (11th) Brigade, they served alongside;

2nd, Lancashire Fusiliers,

1st South Lancashire regiment,

1st York & Lancs Regiment.

With my Grandads research I often found mention in books etc of his 'Brigade' being in action and not his specific Regiment, so keep a look out for mentions of 'Woodgates' 11th Brigade.

I have had a look in a book from the Battleground South Africa collection 'Ladysmith' by Lewis Childs (isbn 0 85052 611 6) and there are several mentions of your Grandfathers Regiment and it appears that they were involved in one of the most famous battles of the Boer War at Spion Kop 23rd/24th Jan 1900. There is a great picture of his Regiment in there marching towards Spion Kop! (might even show your Grandfather in it?)

It would be worth doing a search (I think at Kew) on the Medal index rolls for the Boer War as the Medal had a bar issued to each area the holder fought which again helps pin down what he was involved in. There where two Medals issued for this war, The Queens South African and the Kings South African.

Don't know if your Grandfathers Regiment has a Musuem but I found my Grandfathers (Border Regiment) had one and there help with copies of Battalion Diaries was priceless.

Anyway hope this helps and good luck with your research, let us know how you get on,

Regards Scottie.

[charly]

Hello Scottie,

Thanks for the information......... I am in your dept,

I will certainly let you know how the research goes.

Again many thanks,

Regards

Charly

[weightmanrm]

It may not be wholly relevant if you are only interested in the 2nd LNL, but there is an interesting story about Kekewich who was commander of the 1st LNL, and was in charge of the Kimberley garrison during that siege, and was at loggerheads with Cecil Rhodes.

You can read about this in 'The Boer War' by Thomas Pakenham (ISBN 0 349 10466 2). Half a batallion of the 1st LNL were there during the siege, and I should imagine there would be photos of them (as there certainly are of Rhodes). The other half of the battallion fought at the Modder river.

Hope this helps/is of interest....... Richard