Map Coordinate Question

[brownegaz]

John Reed has kindly provided maps of areas where my grandfather served with 95 Brigade RFA.

I need assistance in how to interpret the last part of a coordinate.

From the 95 Brigade war diary my GFs battery moved to position J 16 b a 5 on the attached map.

I understand that J 16 b puts him in the top right hand corner of square J, I also understand that each smaller square, a b c and d are then divided into ten squares and that these are used to fine tune a location but I cant get my head around how to locate thse positions.

Is it possibe to then get these locations in lat and long so that they can be found today with a GPS unit.

Is it possible to buy a copy of a full size map of this area in order to get a better overall picture of the area he served in.

Thanks for any assistance

Gary

[johnreed]

Gary

I will give you 9 locations on map square J16:

Top Left Hand Corner of Square J16: 50 degrees 18.564 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.222 minutes East

Top Right Hand Corner of Square J16: 50 degrees 18.573 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.988 minutes East

Centre of Square J16: 50 degrees 18.320 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.610 minutes East

Bottom Left Hand Corner Square J16: 50 degrees 18.070 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.235 minutes East

Bottom Right Hand Corner Square J16: 50 degrees 18.078 minutes North - 3 degrees 01.004 Minutes East

Centre of Square J16a: 50 degrees 18.444 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.415 minutes East

Centre of Square J16b: 50 degrees 18.444 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.804 minutes East

Centre of Square J16c: 50 degrees 18.197 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.418 minutes east

Centre of Square J16d: 50 degrees 18,201 minutes North - 3 degrees 00.804 minutes East

John

[Chris_Baker]

Gary, the "a 5" at the end of the reference is not right. It should be a number followed by 5. Then, starting from the left bottom of square b, count along to the right by the number, then up by 5.

[brownegaz]

Thanks for your replies Chris and John

On looking at the war diary again the a is abviously an 0

Thanks

Gary

[laughton]

Good lesson, but where are the letters "a", "b", and so on - I don't see them?

Can you mark up an example?

If you have to convert your GPS on the fly, I use this little Excel spreadsheet I made on my MotoQ9h:

http://www.censol.ca/uploads/Shared%20Prog...0Conversion.xls

[Smithmaps]

Good lesson, but where are the letters "a", "b", and so on - I don't see them?

Can you mark up an example?

If you have to convert your GPS on the fly, I use this little Excel spreadsheet I made on my MotoQ9h:

http://www.censol.ca/uploads/Shared%20Prog...0Conversion.xls

Richard,

By convention, each square, (say square J17) is split into four. Each is refered to as (a top left), (b top right), (c bottom left), and (d bottom right)

These squares are then subdivided by 10 on each x and y axis to get the position.

Guy

[laughton]

Thanks Guy, that is clear. I thought I was blind.

Cheers

[johnreed]

Does this help?

John

[laughton]

Perfect - the newest posting to my bulletin board where I won't forget!

[brownegaz]

Thanks for everyones responses, a good lesson learnt.

Gary

[brownegaz]

Just one last question, is it possible to get a larger scale copy of a WW1 map of the areas around Noyelle-sous-Bellonne and the Croisilles area or should I just buy a modern day AA map of the area??

Im in Western Australia, has anyone any got suggestions on a website etc where I may be able to download or buy a copy of a larger map ??

I just want to get a better over all picture of where my GF served.

Thanks again for any replies

Gary

[laughton]

Gary:

I see from the communities that you have mentioned of Noyelle-sous-Bellonne and Croisilles that the area that you are looking for is covered by Nicholson's Map #12 and the area to the east of that is covered by Nicholson Map #15. These are unfortunately maps that show the Canadian Expeditionary Force in the Great War but they may be of assistance, as at least the terminology for the area should be circa 1917 and 1918.

You can find all the Nicholson Maps on the CEF Matrix here:

http://cefresearch.com/matrix/Nicholson/

Now to see the area where your grandfather served I would also look at these same maps in the Google Earth overlays, as there the map is shown (you can adjust the transparency to whatever you want) over the top of modern day France. Compare that to the war diaries and you will have the whole story.

You will see that in the Nicholson Matrix Utility that there are KMZ files for the individual maps, but to get all of them in a package I would suggest you go on the Internet to the Google Earth Community and there you can just click on the links. All of them are at this address:

Google Earth Community - Nicholson Map Overlay Project

You will see in the titles that the maps are numbered. The ones that are not numbered are the general area maps of Europe during the war that formed the inside front and back covers.

If you do not have Google Earth it is easy to download and it is free!! Use the slide bar at the bottom of the PLACES window to change the transparency of any map so you can see the earth below. Also, you may need to click or un-click maps in the package if they all download at once as activated. You can layer maps on top of each other as well.

If you need assistance, let me know.

Richard

[laughton]

I have taken John's coordinates to see how that works out with that map and Google Earth. Part of what is going on at the post on matching GPS co-ordinates to WWI maps, so this was a case with data.

The KMZ file for this to show the results in Google Earth are here on the Google Earth Community:

Google Earth Test of WWI Map Coordinates 95th RFA

And here is the snapshot: