Uniform WW1 Royal Garrison Artillery

[FILEE54]

Hi
 Please can anyone help with identifying this uniform.
 The man in the centre and not in uniform is my grandfather who was conscripted into the RGA in Aug 1916. He survived the war but I am trying to find out where he served. His war records are not available and there are 4 gunners with his name in the medal rolls. I would like to look in war diaries but don't know where to start. Are there any clues from these pictures please?

Thanks

[MaxD]

Welcome to Rootschat!

You won't want to hear that the RGA is one of the most difficult to research if no service records are available!  The first photo are all artillerymen, almost certainly RGA.

However, the number 246 on the first photo may indicate 246 Siege Battery although only twelve men is nowhere near the number of men in a battery so if it is it would be one of the gun deatchments at a guess.

246 Battery served in Mesopotamia (Iraq) from September 1917 although it was raised in 1916 and the second photo looks as if it was taken in that that sort of climate, shorts, topees.

Could you post his name for a look at the medal info to see if other clues are there.  Where did Grandad come from?

MaxD

[FILEE54]

Thanks for your response. He came from Blackpool, name of Ernest Lee. The first photo of him in uniform taken with his wife just before he went was August 1916. My father's birth certificate in December 1916 states he is in the RGA.  I found 4 Ernest Lee's in the medal rolls. Gunner 346221 RGA/115B, Gunner 192776 RGA/216B Gunner 72209 RGA/136B and Gunner 69559/RGA134B. There are 2 others but the dates are too early.
Does the number eg 216B tell you the siege battery they were in?

[MaxD]

No, they are simply the medal roll numbers on which they appear.  The only record that has a clue to his battery is 72209 whose medal roll shows he served in 132 Siege Battery.  They went to Salonika in August 1916 and the uniforms in the second pic could well have been taken in that area.
I think 346221 can be dismissed.  His number suggests he was in the Edinburgh Fortress RGA at least for a part of his service.

Need to do a bit more digging.  Back later.

MaxD

[FILEE54]

Thank you so much.

Did you find that from the National Archives database? I have Ancestry membership but don't seem able to get beyond the reference in the medal roll eg the RGA/216B reference. I would be interested to know how to do that.

I asked my mother if she knew where her father in law had been in WW1 and she said Ypres maybe or Salonika maybe. She also thought he had been gassed at some point as he always had some trouble with his lungs, although he survived until 1958.
Thanks again for your help searching.

[MaxD]

I am not entirely sure what it is you can and cannot see on Ancestry.
I think you have the medal cards which have the roll number (RGA etc..) in a box on the middle left side, the number that follows is the page.  In the same area where you looked up these four cards, you will find the "UK WW1 Service Medal and Award Rolls 1914-1920".  The cards are the man's individual record, the rolls are (in this case) lists of all the RGA men where "RGA 216 B" is the one that 192776 is on. There are no further records for your 4 men.
In some cases, the medal records give clues that with the information on Siege Batteries and the Territrial Force renumbering on https://www.longlongtrail.co.uk/ can help further.  Although I earlier discounted the Edinburgh Fortress man in fact the Fortress units were used for training men who later went to other batteries overseas for their active service so he should stay in the mix. However, apart from 72209 whose battery is given as 132 Siege, there are no further clues.

Without knowing a man's battery, it really isn't worth looking for war diaries.  Soldiers are rarely named in the diaries and as many of them are not digitised and would have to be copied, the cost would most certainly not be worth it.

While we have a very small number of clues, none of them take us to his battery with any certainty.  Both 132 SB (72209) and 246 SB (the photo) served in Salonika but not on the western front so Ypres plus Salonika wouldn't apply to those two.  I know it is frustrating but that it how it is with four (maybe more) possibles and no real connections.

I'll keep looking in odd corners but so far I'm afraid that appears to be the story (or lack of it).

MaxD

[FILEE54]

Thank you so much  for all your research.

I have one more photo which might exclude one of these 4. The attached photo , taken I believe before he went away is dated on the back Aug 7 1916. If one of the batteries left the UK in Aug 1916 is it unlikely it would be that one? Surely they had some training before they sent them overseas. He was a tailor so would have had no background in armaments.
Not sure if this uniform picture would give any more clues but it is the only other one I have.

A trip to Blackpool might give me something from the local papers. My only other thought is the photo with 246 on it. Are there any official photography records that you know of? My cousin believes he suffered from malaria too, so I will look into whether he could have got that in Salonika.
I did manage to access the same records you did on ancestry, so I believe it's not necessary to go to Kew.

Once again thank you very much.

[MaxD]

Indeed.  The only two battery numbers we have so far are 132 and the (possible) 246 on the photo.  246 did not go to Mesopotamia until 1917 whereas the only date I have so far for 132 is "August".  I'll see if the date can be narrowed down (their war diary doesn't begin until October).

I am kicking around another thought.  I have seen reference to men leaving one battery as sections ie not on their own either from training or from an active service battery.  The 246 could
be indicating that this bunch of men (who presumably includes your Ernest, were the ones going to 246 and the various sections were photographed, with the number of the battery they were going to, as they were ready to leave.  I'll  follow this up.

The photo does give a clue that doesn't really help (if that is a clue!).  He is wearing the type of tunic from early in the war with a shoulder patch and pleats in the pockets.  The group photo has a mixture of older and newer tunics which might support my idea that they were men moving from one battery to another.

As to photos in general, there is no repository of photos official or otherwise.  They appear as if by magic or luck almost always from people's own families.

Newspapers - good idea.

More in due course.

maxD

[FILEE54]

Yes, just to clarify, in the photo labelled 246, Ernest is the one in the front row not in uniform!
Not sure if that is significant or not!