Warfare Magazine - Pen and Sword

Pen and Sword Books have a free online magazine called Warfare. Click on the picture above or the text link, to read issue 3 now.

The War Graves Photographic Project - Latest News

I've just received the latest newsletter from The War Graves Project (TWGPP) and as one article mentions publicising the work of TWGPP, I thought I'd give it a mention here.

When I was living in India I did volunteer for the project and ended up taking quite a few shots of the memorial and graves in the Kirkee cemetery in Pune. However, my lack of travel opportunities whilst I was in India meant that I never did succeed in getting around very much, my forays pretty much limited to a few cemeteries in Bangalore.

But I heartily endorse the work of TWGPP and the excellent War Graves Photographic Project website which I refer to quite a lot. The project has already recorded over 1.6 million names and apart from anything else, is always a good bet for a name search when the Commonwealth War Graves Commission's Roll of Honour website is playing up due to a technical hitch. Unlike the CWGC site as well, you can key in a person's first name, not just the initials.

The War Graves Photographic Project website, like the CWGC site, is free to use although if you want to obtain a copy of a photo you'll need to pay £3.50 for an e-mailed version or £5.50 for a hard copy in the post. Run these sites alongside pay-per-view or subscription databases such as Soldiers Died in The Great War or the Army Roll of Honour 1939-1945 and you can build up an extraordinary amount of detail with just a few clicks.

Photo shows Ranchi cemetery, courtesy of James Day and TWGPP.

Victorian service in WO 363 and WO 364

It's a common misconception that WO 363 and WO 364 are the sole preserve of service and pension records respectively for First World War servicemen. They're not. There are thousands of pre-WW1 service records and Victorian Army service records to be found here and whilst some of the men may have still played some role during 1914-1918, or at least volunteered for service during the Great War, many did not.

Take one of my medal group men, Colour-Sergeant Charles Smith of the King's Shropshire Light Infantry, for instance. I've written Charles on my British Army Medals blog. He appears in a photo of D Company's football team after they'd won the Company Challenge Shield in 1895/1896. I first looked for him in the British Army Service Records 1760-1915 collection on Find My Past. There was nothing there. So I had a look over on Ancestry lo and behold, there he was, nine pages in the WO 364 Pension Records. I keyed in his number and as if by magic he appeared. There would have been no point searching on Shropshire for the regiment because Charles joined up in 1879, prior to the existence of the KSLI. Instead, he's indexed as belonging to the 53rd Regiment of Foot. Charles was discharged in 1908, six years before the the First World War began, but having served nearly 30 years in the Army.

And what about the man whose attestation paper I've used to illustrate this post? This particular document dates to 1850 and is the earliest attestation I've come across so far in the WO 364 Pension Records. This man would have been 82 years old in 1914!

So don't rule out the so-called First World War records just because your man had been discharged from the Army before then. There are plenty of Victorian British Army ancestors to be found in WO 363 and WO 364.

Digitisation of WW1 War Diaries

An email yesterday from the Federation of Family History Societies begins:

"The National Archives is looking for volunteers to help ensure that the pages within a popular record series (unit war diaries from the First World War, catalogue reference WO 95) are in the correct order before a conservation and digitisation project begins."

This is great news. When I was at TNA a decade ago, some of the war diaries were in a shocking state and in need of conservation even then. Not only were they being pored over by thousands of researchers, but the photocopying assistants employed by TNA were also extremely heavy-handed at times. In fact I often used to think that the silent stewards who pad through the reading rooms at TNA reminding you not to breathe too heavily on the archive, would have been better employed reprimanding their colleagues in the photocopying room.

I can't imagine that the digitisation project is one which Ancestry would be interested in, so assume that this is an in-house project for TNA and will augment the war diaries that they already have online.

Image courtesy of TNA and Jeremy Banning.

Dover War Memorial

Here's another nice tribute site which I'm happy to include on these pages: The Dover War Memorial Project. The photo is courtesy of John Latter and appears on the Panoramio site.

Chelmsford War Memorial

I'm adding pages of links to this blog - see the menu above - which will hopefully prove to be a useful resource.

A short while ago I was in my local church in Springfield, Essex and was somewhat taken by the war memorial there. I took photos, came home and after a bit of Googling came across a very impressive site commemorating the men of Chelmsford who died during WW1. It really does go into some detail and the site has been carefully and neatly constructed. A sister site commemorating the men and women of Chelmsford who died during WW2 is already underway and I wish it well. Both are fitting tributes to the men and women of Chelmsford who gave so much.

The Chelmsford WW1 War Memorial site is here (and the photo above is taken from this). The Chelmsford WW2 War Memorial site is here.

New look and new prices at findmypast.co.uk

Find My Past has a new look which promises to make navigation around the ever-populating site a good deal easier. Better still, the price of an annual subscription to the Full & Foundation package has reduced from £129.95 to £109.95, plus you still get the chance of a free 14-day trial.

The Cenotaph and the disappearing pram

Here we have several versions of the same image. and as far as the lady and the pram goes it's a case of now you see it:


Now you don't:


Now you see it:


Now you don't:


I'm not sure why it was felt necessary to remove the pram but versions with and without pram appear throughout the 1920s whilst everything else in this particular photograph remains the same.

Military glut on findmypast.co.uk

Find My Past has just released the following data sets:

1861 Worldwide Army Index
Paddington Rifles 1860-1912
Royal Fusiliers 1863-1905
Surrey Recruitment Registers 1908-1933

The 1861 Worldwide Army Index is a useful source of information if you can't find your relative on the 1861 census as it contains the name, regiment and station of nearly a quarter of a million British Army other ranks serving in Her Majesty's Army at home and overseas.


The Paddington Rifles information has been compiled from muster rolls and contains details such as enlistment date and the man's occupation.

The Royal Fusiliers data is comprised from medal rolls for the India General Service Medal (Umbeyla Campaign), Afghan War Medal, Canada General Service Medal, Queen's and King's South Africa Medal and the Tibet Medal.

Finally, last but by no means least, the Surrey Recruitment Registers contain the often rich details of men who enlisted in the British Army at various recruitment centres in Surrey between 1908 and 1933.

Hello militia

To mis-quote The Two Ronnies, "it's goodnight from armyancestry.co.uk and it's hello militia." I've abandoned the armyancestry website and will just use this blog to update new developments in British Army research. On that topic, I'm delighted to see that findmypast.co.uk has just published half a million militia records. Click on the links on this page to read more.