RootsChat.Com
General => Armed Forces => World War One => Topic started by: billsanderson on Thursday 10 January 19 07:39 GMT (UK)
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Hello everyone. I’m trying to find ANY details of the WW1 army service of my wife’s uncle, Walter Anderson, from Liverpool. Walter was born at 42 Danby St, Everton, on 12th March 1889, son of James Anderson from Scotland (d 1895) and Margaret (d 1900), nee Bewsher. In 1891 they lived at 47 Rendall Street, Everton.
Walter went on to be a shipping clerk in the sugar works, where he was working in the 1911 census. After his parents died he went to live with his Bewsher grandparents in 68 Landseer Road, and this was his address when he got married to Martha Gamble on 29th August 1914. He had not joined up by then, nor had he in July 1915 when he witnessed his brother’s wedding: it seems likely that he was conscripted in late 1916/ early 1917. In the 1919 voter records he is listed as being away on military service. This is our only evidence that he served. After the war he and Martha, who lived throughout their marriage at 35 Baltic Street, Anfield, had two children (1921 and 1922), and he died in 1928 of a heart condition, aged 39.
The family has a photo of a man in sergeant’s uniform of the King’s Liverpool Regiment whom they believed to be Walter. However, on-line KLR records only show a private Walter Anderson who was killed in 1918. There are no medals still around, that we are aware of. His brother William Anderson was in the KLR (S/N 9271, Liverpool Scottish, later transferred to the Gordon Highlanders), but his medals and record show that he was a private, not sergeant. (There was a sergeant William Anderson but with a different S/N.)
Based on this very limited information, can anyone help me to find out where Walter served?
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Welcome to RootsChat! ;D
Nearly 70% of the Service Records from WW1 were lost in a WW2 bombing raid ::)
Have you tried something like Ancestry or FindMyPast to see if any other records survive?
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The loss of service records KGarrad refers to and the lack of an identifiable medal record may well indicate service but not overseas. His death at a relatively young age from a heart condition albeit 10 years after the war may indicate a less than fully fit man. Supposition but a scenario that should not be discounted.
MaxD
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I was directed here by a FB genealogy site, implying that I was more likely to find answers here than on general genealogy sites like Ancestry of FindMyPast, which I have indeed searched. I'm well aware of the WW1 records situation but it seems that a lot has been pieced together from other sources. I was told that this forum specialises in "roadblocks". Am I in the right place?
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I was told that this forum specialises in "roadblocks". Am I in the right place?
You certainly are ;D
The family has a photo of a man in sergeant’s uniform of the King’s Liverpool Regiment whom they believed to be Walter. However, on-line KLR records only show a private Walter Anderson who was killed in 1918. There are no medals still around, that we are aware of. His brother William Anderson was in the KLR (S/N 9271, Liverpool Scottish, later transferred to the Gordon Highlanders), but his medals and record show that he was a private, not sergeant. (There was a sergeant William Anderson but with a different S/N.)
Based on this very limited information, can anyone help me to find out where Walter served?
Maybe it is not Walter. You can always post the picture here in case there is something you are not seeing
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I can't see how it can be Walter as there's no matching KLR record. But then where did Walter serve? Hoping this is the place where the experts hang out!
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While Rootschatterers have indeed broken down roadblocks none of us can magic up records where they have been lost or don't come up on searches!
You have already seen that there are no records that can be him on Ancestry or FindMyPast. The only KLR Walter Anderson is the one you found who died May 1918. A trawl of medal records at the National Archives gives the same result. A trawl of the registers which hold records of soldiers which, because they served on after 1920, are still held by MOD came up blank on his name and date of birth.
I know I said it before but service that did not take him overseas makes a man essentially invisible, lost record and no medals. No sign of him in the pension area either. No sign in newspapers.
The photo certainly is a KLR man with what look like Sgt's stripes but again, as you've seen (or not seen) the records don't turn up a William Walter that fits. He won't be the first man of whom no definitive trace can be found unfortunately.
I shall be the first with praise for a fellow member who can find him positively.
MaxD
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Just to be clear that it's Walter we are looking for, not William. The health angle is again unclear. On the one hand he was given a desk job in the sugar works that may imply he was not that physically fit - there was also TB in the family, of which his dad died. On the other, the family story is that he died from whooping cough (pertussis), which in those days was a serious disease that could stretch the heart and lungs to breaking point. Walter's death certificate states "heart failure from mitral incompetence and aortitis" - no mention of pertussis.
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My typo - it was indeed Walter I have been trawling for, I have amended my post.
MaxD
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While Rootschatterers have indeed broken down roadblocks none of us can magic up records where they have been lost or don't come up on searches!
You have already seen that there are no records that can be him on Ancestry or FindMyPast. The only KLR Walter Anderson is the one you found who died May 1918. A trawl of medal records at the National Archives gives the same result. A trawl of the registers which hold records of soldiers which, because they served on after 1920, are still held by MOD came up blank on his name and date of birth.
I know I said it before but service that did not take him overseas makes a man essentially invisible, lost record and no medals. No sign of him in the pension area either. No sign in newspapers.
The photo certainly is a KLR man with what look like Sgt's stripes but again, as you've seen (or not seen) the records don't turn up a William Walter that fits. He won't be the first man of whom no definitive trace can be found unfortunately.
I shall be the first with praise for a fellow member who can find him positively.
MaxD
I asked elsewhere about the completeness of the KLR database. I don't know where this was compiled from, given that the central records were destroyed as we know. If Walter did not go overseas and joined up late in the war, can I still be sure that his absence from the database means he was not in the KLR? If not, the picture could be what the family say it is.
Otherwise, there's the question of who actually is in the picture. The other side of the family was called Gamble: Walter's wife was one of 11 children of whom some served in WW1. I don't remember if I came across a sergeant Gamble - but I don't think so.
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You pinpoint another of the basic problems, the completeness (or not) of the KLR database. The heading to a search says: The information on the database is gathered from various sources, but is not taken from soldier's service records. National Museums Liverpool does not hold service records. Further information regarding an individual's service may be available from the Public Records Office and other sources listed on this website. It would be fair to infer that the museum would not pretend that it is complete and that a negative search just means a man is not on the database.
The database does throw up some Gamble names including one corporal. A corporal promoted to acting sergeant would wear the stripes of a sergeant but would/should appear in official records in his substantive rank of corporal. Have you checked the Gamble names against the family?
MaxD
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I don't know the names of the Gamble family at present. However, I need to confirm one thing with you: if Walter served in the Army but didn't go overseas he would not have any medals - is that right? Also if you are saying that there's a significant chance of him being missed in the KLR database then we could be back to the family's own understanding that he was actually in this regiment and the photo was of him. Getting a bit confused here, but I'm trying! Lastly, in your experience, is it actually going to be worth writing to the NRO at Kew?
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No overseas service - no medals.
Not on the database means not on the database but not necessarily that he wasn't in the KLR.
No. The National Archives have farmed out all they have on WW 1 soldiers to Ancestry and/or Findmypast so if he isn't on those he isn't at Kew.
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/help-with-your-research/research-guides/british-army-soldiers-after-1913/
MaxD
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OK, I have a question and a request. My question is where the KLR online database came from, given that primary records were manly destroyed. What I'm thinking is if this was substantially based on medal records then it would automatically exclude those who didn't go overseas - of which there would be more than a few who were called up late in the war.
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FindMyPast has a database called Liverpool Pals. It has details of some 7000 men who were the original 1914 members of 17, 18, 19 and 20 Battalions. KLR had some 50 battalions, many of which served only in UK. The one man on the FindMyPast database is the one killed in 1918. I have no way of knowing whether this is the database you keep referring to.
Ancestry has no "KLR Database".
With this post I shall leave you to continue with others although they may have noticed that the words please and thank you are conspicuous by their absence from your posts. Rootschat is not a search engine powered by artificial intelligence but is populated by people who are happy to give up their time to help and expect nothing in return but the common courtesies. Good luck.
MaxD
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Many libraries and Record Offices offer free access to Ancestry and/or FindMyPast.
Might be worth your while seeking out what is available local to you?
Can't offer more specific advice as you haven't entered a location on your profile? :-\
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I'm certainly very grateful for all the advice given, and apologise that this wasn't expressed.
I had no idea what to expect when I joined the group. Although the problem has not been solved, I now see "how the land lies" and have a more sober assessment as to whether the answer is actually out there.
Walter's relatives don't know that much about him, although they are keen to discover whatever they can, and I've simply been trying to follow the avenues suggested to me on FB in the hope of breakthroughs similar to what I've seen elsewhere. One of the FB connections knew of a KLR expert in N America, and he helped me with my father-in-law William Anderson's record - I've no idea how - but at least we had the service number in that case.
Their younger brother Harold joined the 4th (Lancs) Howitzer Brigade of the RFA in 1911 but was invalided out in 1916 owing to a ventral hernia arising from removal of his appendix. So one way or another all three brothers were in the army and survived.
This has been quite a journey of discovery since we did not know until a couple of years ago that William Anderson had any brothers. My wife was born to him when he was 67, as all of his previous family had died - one son murdered by the Japanese in Singapore, the other dying of TB the following year, and his first wife in 1951. Having found and got in touch with descendants of both his brothers, we are still in the process of putting what we know together and trying to fill in the gaps. Harold's granddaughter and Walter's granddaughter-in-law have both studied family history and the former has a big tree on Ancestry.
Thanks again for looking at my problem. Was Walter a sergeant in the KLR? Possibly! :)