Someone from Birmingham in the Oxforshire Light Infanty?

[ardchronie]

Hello all

I'm trying to follow up on my step great grandad, Lancelot Maddison Hazle, and have two pictures of him in uniform in the First World War. In the first he has been identified as being in the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry.

I'm wondering why he was in this regiment particularly as, as far as I know, he was born in London, possibly lived in Cheltenham for a while but from around 1900 had settled in Birmingham and stayed there.

I've had a look on Ancestry on the service and pension records but no luck  .  I did find his medal card which reveals he later was in the Machine Gun Corps and that he had a Silver War Badge, so it looks like a trip to Kew for me.

But just wondered if there was anything unusual in him joining the regiment he did

Thanks

Tessa

[pipkim]

Hi Tessa,

Sorry, I can't help you with your quest, but I came across the same thing with my mothers uncle.

Ben Thomas was born in Marylebone 1897. His father was from Headington, Oxford and his mother born in London. It is believed they may have moved to Oxford for a short time after 1901, before moving to Birmingham, where they settled.

Ben Thomas joined the Oxford and Bucks Light Infantry as well. Sadly he died at the Somme, 16th August 1916, aged 19 years.

I was confused at first, why didn't he join a London based regiment or a Birmingham based one. Perhaps he may have developed strong links with Oxford during his stay or because that was where his father was raised, I'll never know.

Best wishes
Pipkim

[oldtimer]

Hi!

I read somewhere that although lads would often enrol in a local regiment, they were often moved during the course of the war into a different regiment, usually when their new regiment had suffered high casualties, and needed to be replenished.

[neil1821]

Also, simply don't get too sidetracked by geographical questions about which regiment someone may or may not have joined. I wouldn't read anything into it, we just don't know the reasons.

A man could just as easily have joined the Sussex Regt or the Gordon Highlanders. 
I've seen Londoners in the Seaforth Highlanders, I've seen a Norfolk man in the South Wales Borderers and a Somerset man in the Durham Light Infantry. And they are all in relative peacetime (1890s).

[ardchronie]

Thanks for your thoughts and advice, everyone.

I wondered how joining the army worked, and it seems it's quite common for people to join up almost wherever the fancy takes them!  The reasons can be many and varied, and like you have said, we will probably never know.  I guess we can only look so far back into someone else's life!

Thanks again all

Tessa