Tracing family military history

[Lordfrontpaw]

I’ve been thinking about my grandfather today. He died when I was 4.

He was at the opening of Bergen Belsen and I’ve heard snips of what he did/where he was during the war (he said very little beyond ‘I could run faster than the Germans’ and ‘I had a loud voice so got promoted’.

I don’t think he even told my grandmother very much either. We never did hear how he had a German dagger/bayonet hidden away (I only saw it briefly once as a small child and he just said he ‘got it off a German’). We know he was cut off with his unit in France at one point and was evacuated from Dunkirk.

He signed up on the day war was announced and left after the war (threw his uniform into the Thames). We had a badge from possible bomb disposal unit that he served in at one point (don't know where that got to after mum died).

As I get older I find it harder as harder to imagine what he - and my grandmother, who was a nurse - went through. Mum told us about life in London as a child and that sounded scary and sad.

How can we go about finding out where he served and can we see his military records? Where do I start? There is no family who I can ask (just siblings who don’t know much more than me).

The website Find My Past has military records. I think you need to pay to find details, but it might be somewhere to start.

Google Army war records and start from there. I did this but with RAF records. I needed his name place anddate of birth. Good luck with your search.

The National Archives in Kew might have a lot more information, or the regiment he served with. They may be happy to open up records specifically applying to your grandfather if you can prove you're directly descended, and that he has died.

There is a privacy issue around records which identify other people who are potentially still living, but general stuff you should be able to access. You will need his full name, and other information like his date of birth, town he was from - will make finding the right person easier if he had a common name like David Thomas or John Brown.

Good luck and be prepared to become obsessed with your ancestors!

I only discovered his real name after mum died and we found a heap of birth certificates.

He never went by his given first name - when grandma was very old she did call him by that name a couple of times but she had dementia and we thought she was getting confused. Mum must have known but never said anything!

www.gov.uk/get-copy-military-service-records

You can apply directly for service records, I think it takes a little while from what I've read on groups that I'm on (genealogy nerd!)

Ancestry and FMP do have some records, Ancestry also has a sister site called Fold3 that also has a lot of military records but when you search on Ancestry it tells you if the information is there. Some sites do free access weekends, over bank holidays for example.

If you have a regimental number that will very much help your search. Good luck!

In that case I'd search using both names - it's more likely that he'll have used his "proper" name when registering with the military but you never know. Assume nothing!

Remember that a lot of sites will let you do a wildcard search - so if for example your relative was John but known as Jack or Johnnie, you could put in J* and then the surname and it would return all the results with the first initial of J. If you have a year and place of birth, it should narrow things down considerably.

Sorry to interrupt. Does anyone know anything about the ordinary soldiers in the 4th dragoons around 1800. It was an Irish regiment, but wondering if the ordinary soldiers were drawn from Ireland, UK or both.

I've just remembered that I worked with an old Colonel - I might get in touch with him and ask hit to get my hands on info!

Are any of the subscription services any good?

WW2 records haven't been released yet, but should be soon I think. You can get some info as closest relative from the MoD but it's expensive and limited info, so if I were you I would wait for it to be transferred to TNA.

Are any of the online search sites worth a try?

Ok so trying a genealogy site - so far I can't find me, my dad, my sister (with a rather unusual name) and my son's surname is spelt incorrectly... This is going well!

... or my brother. If I was the suspicious type, I'd think my parents were in witness protection!

OP most sites are to trace ancestors not current relatives, that's why you're not appearing.
If you have your grandfather's name and date of birth (and place if possible) then post them on here and I'm sure someone will be able to pick something up

I found my mum though! Also found DS (albeit with the name spelt incorrectly). The problem is that I don't know my grandparents DoBs or even real names (an annoying family habit of no one calling anyone the bloody correct name!). That's why I was hoping to get mym and dad birth certificates (I'm sure who they were) and working back from there!

I found my granddad! He wasn't Edward (as everyone called him - he was George (bloody family).

So you need to go via the GRO for actual certificates etc, and not rely on ancestry sites which contain user uploaded info which is often wrong.

And my great aunt's listed name was nowhere near what we all called her. She had a nickname which everyone called her - but her 'real' name isn't even remotely close to the actual real one.

This is going to be a long slog.

Use the official link which @Schlobbob posted. I did this for my Grandad and Great Uncle and received copies of their military service records.

Once you have details such as regiment, you may find they have a regimental museum or archivists who can then help decipher more details.

Oh for the love of god - so my great aunt (who was known by her nickname but supposedly christened something else) - her 'actual' name was, in fact, her mother's name - but she (great aunt) was christened something else completely.

This is why I always thought my mum was messing about when she talked about her dad's side of the family. Now, I know that my grandmothers side is even weirder.

My experience was a bit different to @Ellmau 's. As next of kin, I had no problem getting the full service record, which was for WWII. It cost £30 which I didn't think was too expensive. I can't remember how long I took. Perhaps a month.

I have a relative on the other side of the family who tried to get a WWI record though and unfortunately they didn't have anything as the place where the records were stored was bombed in WWII and the records lost.

Sounds like your family is complicated! I think the key thing i have learned from family research is assume nothing and believe no-one.

If you have your parents; birth certificates then that will list the official legal names of their parents, including the maiden surname of your mother. Use that as your starting point to search for marriages, births and backwards from there.

I think I’m going to give up. Found another brother to my grandfather who I vaguely remember mum mentioning ‘uncle Joe’ but since no one ever seemed for speak to anyone it’s impossible! Also a potential other name for my great aunt. All my dads siblings and their wives are now dead and mum didn’t really have any family.

I need a large glass of port and I might start again!

Is anyone else’s family at batshit as mine?

There's a lot of batshittery around.

FIL is called (for example) Charles Robert. He is known within the family and to everyone else as Bob. His business cards said Bob. Everything is Bob. When he was admitted to hospital last year quite ill and very confused, he got very upset about the nurses getting his name wrong and calling him Charles or Charlie.

We did ask him about it once he recovered and he said that his parents started using his middle name because he already had an uncle and two cousins all called Charlie. Which begs the question why didn't they just call him Robert Charles and be done with it?

Nuts the lot of them. My own dad is know in his family by his middle name because his older brother as a toddler couldn't pronounce his first name properly (Philip) and my granny worried that people would think he was saying Fuck. Because that's a really common name to give a child.

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