War Diary
 

Well done, Coquet. Just spotted the transcription of the NF war diaries on the sister site :)

War diary.
 

Well done, just noticed it also, will make an interesting read an a valuable research document.

Thanks.

There's a vast amount of names on the additional material that came with it; killed, wounded, to hospital, drafts from other battalions, men off to courses, attachment etc.
It would be nice to sort it out as an alphabetical list of 'everyone who served' .
Something to do in future years I suppose.

So much to do.....so little time to do it. Do these names include the ORs, in which case an alpha list would be a tremendous piece of work.

The lists contain the movements of everyone I believe, to and from the battalion including deaths: Although the lists are missing prior to about the autumn of 1916; I'm guessing (hoping) they reside in the brigade records.

The first list above shows men off on attachment to the 171st Tunnelling Company Royal Engineers.
The end of that last list shows 5 men sent back to England as Ploughmen!

Coquet, if you want I'll have a go at doing an alpha transcription for you.

You certainly can have a go at it if you wish!
give me a little while to sort them out - I can reduce the size of the pictures a bit without any loss (they're about 2.6mb each at the moment) and I'll try out that 'BT Cloud' thingy for sharing.

There's the published embarkation list available too, which unfortunately does not have service numbers. Also I can do the casualty list as per "Soldiers Died in the Great War"

Tell me how we should lay it out in excel:

we will have one or two service numbers for each 'other rank', no number for officers.

rank

surname, given names.

then the notes for each soldier.

anything else?



If each of us use the same number of columns in excel it will make life easier later bringing it together?

I'll stick the embarkation roll here:

http://www.fusilier.co.uk/military/7...tion_roll.html

lots of locals in there.

no numbers, but with care you could get them from the medal index cards, these men will have a theatre arrival date of 20/4/15 or 21/4/15, and most will have a regimental number prefixed by 7, like '7/1945' for example. Risk of error? = Yes the other territorial battalions of Northumberland Fusiliers will have the same arrival date, but the numbers might help eliminate them.

I'll get back to you after I've tapped into the cerebral gold mine of him indoors. Good idea to use excel, it'll make life easier for sorting and transfer. I see the embarkation roll is already in alpha. Is that you or was that how you got it?

Trying to get my head around this a bit more. Do you see separate lists for eg embarkation, change of regiment, status etc or do you see this exercise as reproducing a "service" record for all the soldiers, on one spreadsheet, specially as the originals mostly seem to have been burnt.

A spreadsheet might then start with surname, other name; date of enlistment; number; rank; date of embarkation; arena: date of transfer; regiment; number; rank; arena: discharge date; deceased date; absent voter; medals (3?); awards; cemetery; memorial. There could be an identifier in the end columns eg date of birth or home address.

If there are any other people out there with a few brain cells it could be helpful for suggestions/ comments on all this, cos I'm off for a lie down with a cold flannel

Hi Janwhin

if you can transcribe the lists in those notebook pages then that's more than enough. Our list will of course be permanently under construction anyway, as I'm sure we would be coming across new info all the time.

I was just thinking the earlier missing casualty lists are probably duplicated in the St Georges Gazette (Woodhorn) as well, but it would be better if I could find the originals at the National Archives.

I think we should keep it simple with an excel page with columns:

1. Surname, given name. 2. Rank(s) 3. Number(s) 4. Notes.

column 4 would contain everything we have; from the lists in the war diary, from soldiers died, (born enlisted and resided if available) and/or detail from the census return if we can positively identify our man. In most cases we will have very little.


A thing to note is that by the time we reach 1918 recruiting for and reinforcing the regiment had become National in breadth, so there will be men from all over the country. Early years will have the highest percentage of Northumbrians, but very few made it through to the end.

Janwhin, I'm looking at this material and thinking this project is just too big to attempt!

I have 878 document photos. These lists could constitute 50%.. and, I have to collect the lists for last months of the war, and possibly find the lists for 1915 and the first part of 1916.

we could end up with 700-1000 pages to process.

I think we should give this a miss. It's just too much.

not all small notebook pages, many A4 with high density of names:


"Undermentioned N.C.O.s and men joined at Training Camp 20-1-17 and joined Battalion 31-1-17 are posted to Coys as shown"

I would hope that we could produce something from this mountain.....born stubborn, that's me :)
What if we took the men on the embarkation list and tried to track them through?
It could all be built up gradually. By the way, what were you thinking of doing with it all:eek:

Re the embarkation list, I wonder if Private Gladstone H of No.1 Company is actually John@theDrift's Gladstone Hardy.

The bulk of the locals are in No. 4 Company I believe Janwhin, you'll find him in there together with Pte. Hebron.

[I should add those lists are sorted by 1st letter of surname only]


edit. also see post #2 here by Graham Stewart: http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/fo...howtopic=83440
he's an authority on the NF and supplied the Casey photos I put in the other thread.

Just found this thread. Great. Been looking for any mention of my grandfather Ralph Watson as we know very little about him except he may have been gassed but survived WW1 but died young, where? my grandmother later remarried. His medal is 7-809 and there is a Corp. R.Watson on your list

I started a casualty list, he'll no doubt appear in that at some point.

http://www.fusilier.co.uk/north_east...ww1_index.html

Although it will be that big I don't know if it will ever get finished. I've hardly moved away from the 7th's first few days in the line!
It will be interesting to see how it changes from being dominated by the 7th Bn NF to later years when it should show locals in all sorts of units.
But like I say if it gets finished it will be a miracle.

[my idea was to split it into two pages, Alnwick, Rothbury and the north on one; and the south, Amble Broomhill etc on the another. Everything is on one page at the moment]

Here's a charming one for Private Fife from Alnwick:

Private J. Fife, of Alnwick,
Referred to in another column, writes to his mother from hospital in Aberdeen, saying he is progressing. He describes the journey across to France and the march through Ypres into the trenches. " I had to stop with the Colonel's horse at the village where I was wounded. I was getting some things off the pack-horse when a big 'Jack Johnson' came over and blew the horse's head right off and I got the rest. I have got 22 Shrapnel wounds in my leg, arm, shoulder and hip. The doctor says I will soon be better and home to see you all." 08/05/1915

poor horse!