Examples: what can our detective work uncover?

James Edwin Brown was aged 18 years when he was conscripted into the army on 21 February 1917. The introduction of the Military Service Act in early 1916 had eliminated all forms of voluntary recruitment and all men became eligible for compulsory military service from their 18th birthday, although they could not be sent overseas until they were 19. James was called up from details that were gathered by a process of National Registration in 1915.

A medical examination took place that recorded him as standing 5 feet 5 inches tall and having a chest measurement of 36 inches. He was found fit for service.

James was employed as a labourer at the time of his enlistment. His address is given as 15 Hollywood, Barrow Hill, Chesterfield. Barrow Hill is a small town to the north east of Chesterfield. Before the war it was the location of an extensive iron and coal works belonging to the Staveley Iron and Coal Company Limited, where more than 3,000 people were employed. It is possible that James worked for the company.

He was single, and gave as his next of kin his mother Alice Brown of Hogsthorpe. It is recorded that this was near Alford in Lincolnshire, but in fact it is much closer to Chapel St. Leonards.

He signed the declaration on the attestation form, swore an oath and received the “King’s shilling”. James was then accepted into the army as a Private and was allocated number 86602. He was instructed to return home and to continue civilian life while he was formally on the Army Reserve, awaiting call up. He duly received notice and was mobilised on 17 May 1917.

James was posted to join a training unit two days later and became Private TR/5/27888. The details are not clear but it seems that he may have gone to the 7th Battalion of the Training Reserve. At this period of the war, the old regimental system of training had been abolished, creaking as it was under the strain of large numbers of conscripts. The Training Reserve was introduced on 1 September 1916. Men would complete their basic and in this case infantry training with the TR, and then be eligible for posting to a unit. The course of training lasted four months. 7th Battalion was based at Rugeley in Staffordshire, with the training being carried out at Cannock Chase.

Up to September 1916, 7th Battalion of the Training Reserve had been the 9th (Reserve) Battalion of the East Yorkshire Regiment. This may have been the influencing factor in that when he was finally posted to a regiment, James joined the East Yorks. He appears to have gone at first to the 10th (Service) Battalion, but this may not have been decided until he arrived in France. On joining the East Yorks he was renumbered, becoming Private 37222.

On 21 December 1917, James was taken onto the strength of the British Expeditionary Force in France. This is almost certainly the day he landed there.

At some point, he moved from 10th to 12th (Service) Battalion. The two units were serving in the same Brigade, so this was an easy move. It is not possible to say why or when this took place. We have seen instances where the man did not actually physically join the first unit before he went to the second. This was invariably some local juggling of the available manpower at the time.

In March 1918, James sustained a wound to his left arm. He was evacuated back to England for treatment, arriving on 3 April 1918. We would assume from this that his wounding was late in March: this matches up with his battalion being in intensive action at that time during the German spring offensive.  Unfortunately there is no remaining detail that would confirm that this was a bayonet wound. The fighting took place in the Somme area.

The next thing we know is that he left England on 5 October 1918, en route for Russia. He was by this time serving with the 2/7th Battalion of the Durham Light Infantry. In all, he had some six months in England recovering from his wound, recuperating and then re-training. We can only assume that his wound healed sufficiently for him to be rated A1 from a medical viewpoint, which was the requirement to go into an infantry unit. It is not easy to guess how long it was before he was training with the DLI, preparatory to going to North Russia. On being transferred to the DLI, James was renumbered 109781.

James served in Russia until October 1919, at which time the battalion returned home and was demobilised. He appears to have been appointed Lance Corporal while he was in Russia. James was transferred to Class Z Army Reserve on 13 December 1919. Class Z was the standard route out of military service for wartime volunteers and conscripts to the regular army. It meant that the soldier could return to civilian life but subject to being recalled if required, for twelve months after discharge. In the event, no Class Z men were recalled and the Class was abolished in March 1920.

His overseas service in a theatre of war qualified James to wear the British War Medal and Victory Medal. The medals were posted to him in December 1921.

James also received a pension of 8 shillings per week for his “20% disablement” arising from his wound and from neurasthenia which the authorities agreed was attributable to his military service. The pension was paid for 25 weeks from 30 December 1919.

Fred Westman voluntarily attested to enlist into the army in Pontycymmer on 15 October 1914. A haulier by trade, he gave his age as 24 years and 7 months. He had no prior military experience. Fred gave his sister Annie of 34 Waunbant, Pontycymmer, as his next of kin.

A document completed by Annie after Fred’s death in 1918 tells us that he had five brothers and four sisters, varying in age in November 1919 from 34 down to 10. Annie herself had married by that date and was now Mrs Annie Bowman.

During the enlistment process, he signed the declaration on the attestation form, swore the oath and received the “King’s shilling”. He also underwent a medical examination that recorded him as standing 5 feet 4 ½ inches tall, weighing 131 pounds. He was found fit for service, accepted into the Welsh Regiment as a Private and allocated number 18337. He had agreed to serve for the duration of the war.

From an administrative viewpoint he was taken onto the pay strength of the regimental depot from the day he enlisted and was ordered next day to barracks at Cardiff, where he would have begun his basic and infantry training.

There is a note that suggests he was posted to the 10th (Service) Battalion (1st Rhondda) but certainly by November 1915 he was with 13th (Service) Battalion (2nd Rhondda). Fred crossed to France with this unit, embarking at Southampton on 2 December 1915.

Shortly before this, on 24 November, he was awarded 14 days Field Punishment No. 2 for a period of absence. The punishment consisted of being shackled in irons for periods in the day.

Fred’s movements while in France are not at all easy to interpret. He appears to have been attached to No. 77 Sanitary Section, a unit of the Royal Army Medical Corps that was under the command of 38th (Welsh) Division as was the 2nd Rhondda. This is confirmed by a note saying he was struck off the strength of this unit on 13 June 1916. We can only presume he went back to his battalion at this point.

On 1 September 1916, not long after the Division had endured a terrible period in action at Mametz Wood on the Somme, Fred reported sick and was sent on to 130 Field Ambulance, where he was found to be suffering from influenza.

The next we hear of him is on 30 October 1916, when he was attached to 38th Divisional Headquarters. In what capacity we can not tell but wonder if it was in connection with his pre-war employment: could he drive a motor vehicle?

Fred was granted periods of home leave in December 1916 and October 1917, but other than that his detailed movements are unclear. He was killed in action on 25 September 1918. The Divisional HQ diary makes no remark about a casualty of one of the men attached to the HQ staff, but we would not really expect the diary of a high level formation to do so. The 2nd Rhondda reportedly had a quiet day, most of which was spent in training some way behind the forward positions.

Even so, the battalion lost eight men killed that day and one more died of wounds next day. The eight are buried in adjacent graves, and we speculate that they died together by shellfire.

Annie acknowledged receipt of Fred’s effects on 7 July 1919. This, and his place of burial, are reasonable indicators that his body was recovered (the Welsh Division was advancing at the time) and buried where he now lies.

Henry Jewell enlisted on 10 February 1916. This certainly makes him a conscripted soldier under a development of the enlistment regulations called the “Derby Scheme” which is explained later in this report.

Once he went overseas, he served with the 1/4th Battalion of the Suffolk Regiment, which was a Territorial unit. We examined the regimental volume of Soldiers Died in the Great War 1914-19 to see if we could determine any useful patterns from the fates of men who were numbered near to Henry’s original 5112. Although it is far from an exact science it is sometimes possible to draw conclusions about a man’s service from patterns seen among casualties numbered near to him, the assumption being that they would have been recruited at the same time and followed a broadly similar military career.

Looking at men numbered within 100 either side of Henry, we found 9 who had died, most serving with the 1/4th Battalion. The earliest casualty among them died on 11 January 1917. This suggests that that men numbered in this series had not been overseas for too long before this date, although allowing for the norm of about four months training Henry would have been ready any time from mid 1916. The majority of the men are shown as having previously had “earlier” numbers around the 4000 mark; the cause of their renumbering is far from clear.

It is likely that he carried out his training with the 4th (Reserve) Battalion. Henry would have been moved to France with a draft and was formally posted to the 1/4th Battalion after spending a few days in a transit camp near the coast on arrival.

It appears from the medal roll that Henry served with the 1/4th Battalion until he was captured. Later in this report we give a brief history of the battalion.

It is very difficult to guess when he might have been taken prisoner. As will be seen, the battalion was frequently in action and there were several occasions where the probability of capture was high. Clearly it was well before his repatriation in June 1918 and we would hazard a guess at the Somme in 1916 or Arras in 1917.

On 1 January 1917, all infantrymen serving with the Territorial Force were renumbered. This included those who were in enemy hands. At this point, Henry became Private 219817.

We know that Henry was repatriated in a prisoner exchange in June 1918. He was discharged from the army on 16 July on medical grounds, for he had impaired movement of his left arm (given as “paresis”) presumably the result of a wound.

On being discharged, Henry was awarded the silver War Badge. It came with a parchment scroll and was a device instituted in 1916 as an outward mark that the man had been honourably discharged. The badges were individually numbered: Henry’s was 410687.

Henry’s military service qualified him to wear the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. Essentially the BWM was awarded if a man left his native shore for service and the VM if he also served in a theatre of war. The medals did not have to be claimed – they were automatically sent to him, c. 1921.