wanting to find info on my grtgrandads (ohn laidlaw) time in thr=e army in the o

[MaxD]

Marcie

I am working on putting more detail on your great grandad's service history but I thought that I should tell you straight away about one part of it that I hope you will find interesting.

One of the things you wanted was a photo.  While his records, like all of them, do not contain a photo, I have found a photograph of some of the men with some of the  equipment of the company in which he served from November 1917 to the end of the war. Thanks to a fine gentleman on another forum I expect to get a high resolution copy of the photo in the next few days.  If you would like to send me a direct email address via a personal message I shall make sure you get it.

More in due course.

maxD

[isobelw]

How interesting! Thanks for the update MaxD.
I think this site is wonderful in the way it allows people with expertise in different areas to work together to hopefully discover something new for the OP. Marcie has been researching her grandfather for a long time - I hope this helps her progress a little further.
Isobel

[MaxD]

I agree.  If you hadn't connected the family info with the service record I would have continued to ignore it (I had seen it but couldn't follow the family twists and turns!!).  As it is, our combined efforts got us a bit further for Marcie.

Until I have it all buttoned up I won't go into too much detail but the unit for which I am due to get the photo worked at times through the rail station at Amesbury in Wiltshire, 200 yards from where I am now sitting and where our local supermarket is situated today!!!  Our previous house was even closer to the railway line to Larkhill which they used, gone now but the line of the railway is still a popular walk called the apple track because, allegedly, all the apple trees along the track came from pips thrown from the trains by the troops.

More to come.

maxD

[marcie dean]

bldy.... right I will thanx maxd ive tried family with no results so far todate

[MaxD]

Edinburgh Evening News 7 April 1923 reports the funeral of John Laidlaw ex 11th Hussar to take  place at Rosebank Cemetery 3 pm 8 April 1923.  There does not appear to be a crematorium there so he was buried.

maxD

[marcie dean]

thank you , again maxd;when I go up to scotland I will take a look and see if I can find his grave, take photo. see if the minster has any info that I can use. never know the family may have told him something that can help me with my quest.

[marcie dean]

His occupation when joining was horse keeper so that would fit.  As to his background, for the run of the mill soldier that would play no real part, it was the officers who tended to come from the more rarified sector of the population!  The family stories don't appear all that reliable (as it often the case), his record has an 1869 date of birth.

There is a lot of detail to be squeezed out of the various records but I need a little time.

maxD

so I now need to find william walkers death, to tie in with when he was given to william laidlaw and margaret anne laing to bring up as their son.that would then tie a lot of it together, I am getting in touch again woth thee countesses home until she died dunrobun castle , apprently she kept journals, I am hoing against hip that she may have kept a list of the servantsthat she employed and possibly msade commennts about, their work, if she dismissed any and for what reason, I font know whether they are avaible for anyone to read, it is no t as though they are her published memoirs, dont think she ever did those either, there is some works listed for some of the female members who had things published, harriet the frst dukes wife, elizabeth gotdons father williams wife byt not her mother I believe,I am also related to the seton family, alexander seton and a few others, but also the hamiltons though from what nfo I have founfd on them, people who were not necessarilly their kin, were allowed to have the patronage of their name just by wotking for them and fighting fo them ewhen and if required against their enemies of the time.

[isobelw]

Edinburgh Evening News 7 April 1923 reports the funeral of John Laidlaw ex 11th Hussar to take  place at Rosebank Cemetery 3 pm 8 April 1923.  There does not appear to be a crematorium there so he was buried.

maxD

Also mentions it would be a military funeral and mentions Roman Eagle Lodge

[Little Nell]

marcie,

Which William Walker are you referring to? There is William Walker Laidlaw - John's son born in 1904 and died the same year - or is it William Walker b 1843.  Was he John's apparent father?

There were 5 girls and 3 boys living.
William Walker laidlaw born August 1904 died the same year as birth, he was also named after another William Walker born in 1843.
Agnes Barron Brown Laidlaw 1906
Robert Clermiston B. Laidlaw 1908
Lily Laidlaw 1909
Margaret 1910
James Hutchison Laidlaw 1912
Marjory 1913?
Alexander 1915    I also think that there was a Mary Margaret not sure on birth year

The William Walker Laidlaw b 1843 might have died in 1913.  There is an entry in the index for a William Walker Laidlaw aged 70 in 1913.  There are two others for William Walker Laidlaw: one aged 7 who died in 1911 and another in the service returns in 1915 aged 21. 

Rosebank Cemetery is a municipal cemetery - no minister. And surely if there were a minister, John died in 1923 and I suspect that the minister is also long since gone.

Last time I was at Rosebank, I spoke to someone who was in the 'office' who may have been no more than a groundsman/caretaker.  He was able to point out the various sections of the cemetery.  To find where John Laidlaw was buried, you would need to contact Mortonhall - see this page:

https://www.edinburgh.gov.uk/directory_record/18725/rosebank_cemetery

The very solid information about John Laidlaw (including his birth date being earlier than you had been led to believe) that you have been given by so many RootsChatters seems to be at odds with what you have been told as part of the family history.  If I remember all the other threads correctly, the age that was given for John in census records and death records and now his attestation records was consistent with that earlier date.  If the records do not support the family stories, perhaps it might be time to re-evaluate things?

Nell