FIRST DAY OF THE SOMME .

[steve140968]

Hi , can anyone please tell me whereabouts i can get a full casualty list for those who died during the first day of the somme . Many thanks , Steve .

[Paul Reed]

Haven't you already answered this question yourself here? :-

http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/i...mp;#entry825918

[auchonvillerssomme]

I have never bothered with this book, not been interested because I was told it didn't contain any more info than SDGW. What information does it hold? Mick

[Peter Woodger]

Steve,

May I ask what you want it for? If you are conducting serious research into the casualties or cemeteries of the Somme battle I can provide a list, if you just want to own a list then I cannot (will not) help.

In my research I have downloaded, from CWGC website, the names of all the burials in every Somme cemetery that has burials with DoD between 01/07 and 30/11/16. For those within the dates I have then annotated each with their battalion, brigade and division. Where I have found Officers or men who were attached to other battalions than their parent I have changed their entry to the battalion they died with not the battalion they are buried as. My data is only as good as the CWGC data and since the extraction was completed about 2 years ago it does not contain any corrections made since then. The data is in spreadsheet form and hence is very easy to sort by date, regiment, battalion etc. I shudder to think how many hours I spent on this but it has kept me sane for a long time. The copyright conditions of the CWGC would apply to this data for any use other than private research. I hope this explains my attitude given in the first paragraph. If you do not want to disclose publicly your intended research use then send me a PM.

Peter Woodger

[Max]

The copyright conditions of the CWGC would apply to this data for any use other than private research.

There is no copyright on this data as it is all public domain information.

[Paul Reed]

I have never bothered with this book, not been interested because I was told it didn't contain any more info than SDGW. What information does it hold? Mick

It is simply a list. There are no personal details for each man. We have to remember the context it was written in, however. Long before the net, and long before Soldiers Died was widely available. The (late) author was always embarrassed that it only included about 80% of those who actually died on 1st July 1916; the problem with Soldiers Died is that for many men who died on the 1st, their records office had their date of death down for the last day their battalion was in the line (as they were missing), which for most was 2nd July. A good example of this are many soldiers from 31st Division; hundreds of them are recorded in Soldiers Died as 2nd July, when their unit was only in action on the 1st. I must confess that I always found it a useful book, even if the perfect binding fell to bits!

[steve140968]

Thankyou all very much , Paul Woodger , i have pm'd you . Steve .

[4thGordons]

even if the perfect binding fell to bits!

Yours too?

Chris

[bmac]

The other issue about 'Soldiers Died on 1st July 1916' is that it includes men from 2nd battalions when only the 1st battalion of that regiment was actually involved. For example, there are several London Regiment men listed who were not at Gommecourt but with the 2nd battalion somewhere else on the Western Front. Of course, the author wrote the book before access to the CWGC lists were available and so he would have had no way of checking this detail.

[steve140968]

Very good point ! I wonder how many other soldiers died on the 1st of July that were not involved in the Somme offensive . Steve .