5th Royal Irish Regiment

A nice result for a client this morning which, amongst other things, identified the company her ancestor served with when he joined the 5th Royal Irish Regiment.

The invaluable Long, Long Trail website notes that this battalion embarked from Liverpool on the 7th July 1915. However, this man's medal index card records a departure date (rather than an arrival overseas date) of 8th July 1915. Checking the war diary reveals that the regiment, less A Company, embarked on HMT Transylvania. A Company and details (6 officers and 263 men) embarked the following day on HMT Mauretania.

Furthermore, checking the medal roll for this man shows the departure date of 8th July crossed out and replaced with the 22nd  July. This is actually still incorrect. The war diary reveals that HMT Mauretania docked at Mudros on the 19th July. B, C and D Companies landed on the 22nd July 1915 and joined A Company at Pisperaghon.

The image above, courtesy of Wikipedia, shows men of the 10th (Irish) Division at Basingstoke in July 1915.

Need help researching your British Army ancestor? See the RESEARCH tab on this blog.