Uniform and medal help

[Silent Whale]

Hi

Some help here please. These are all brothers with their mother - so have different units. I have (scrawled on back of photo), from left back row; Royal Horse Artillery, Royal Flying Corp, Royal Horse Artillery. Front row; Royal Engineers, Mum(!), PO Rifles. I'm wondering if these are correct and if there is any other detail I've missed?

Also I'm really interested in the gentleman front row left and if anybody could tell me what the armband means?

I've hit a brick wall in tracing any more military info about this relative as well - Albert Alexander Percival b. 1896 d. 1966. I can't seem to find his military record - most probably because he went on to join the RAF. So would have to apply to the MOD for his record?

What I'm most interested in is how he won the Military Medal. I spent ages trawlling through the London Gazette - reading tales of daring-do and eventually got a record from NA which gave me:
Rank - Pioneer (he seemed to be in demand as he was attached to loads of different regiments - including the Canadians at one stage). Corps - RE attached 18th Bde RFA. Regimental Number - 259155. Date of Gazette - 17-7-18. France. Registered paper - 68/121/548. Schedule Number 171428.

So armed with the Gazette date I actually managed to find the entry. Imagine my disappoint to find that tales of daring-do where only published for officers. Grrrr! All my poor Albert got was: 259155 Pnr. A. A. Percival, R.E.

There seems a reasonable amount of MM's given out - were they a real honour to receive?

Any help greatly appreciated.

Neil

[DeeBoneham]

Second world war records are not yet released so you will have to apply for it.  Are you the closest living relative because it needs to be that person? If you are then if you look at some of the other threads you will find the link to the MOD site...  You could see if the Pioneer Corp have a museum and they may have details of his MM.  They are still by the way a great honour and not that common. I think it depends on how many were being noted in LG at the time how much information they entered.

Reference the gentleman on the front row I wonder if he was in some sort of signals unit. Might be worth researching the crossed flags on his arm.  Not sure about the armband.

Good luck with your research and let us know how you got on...

Dee

[forester]

The man bottom left, as Dee says, is a signaller. The brassard is blue and white.

Phil

[mmm45]

Some old war veterans there including bottom right who has a wound stripe.

You may if you can tie down his RE unit see if hes in the War Diary also another good place would be local papers of the time they usually had write ups if local lads won an MM...Its a gallantry award so yes he did something brave and was reported for doing it by an officer.
On average the award was gazetted about 3 months after the event...he may have won it during the Spring offensive in 1918 when the Germans launched there surprise attacks.

RAF records for WW1 are at Kew but not online

Great phot and lucky men all to have survived all that active service.

Ady

[DeeBoneham]

What a good idea of looking at local newspapers Ady.  Might be worth talking to County Archives too...

Just a thought is it possible to zoom in on him only as my Sgt would probably be able to tell you about  the ribbons as he is a medals buff (thats for any of them)

Dee

[Silent Whale]

Hi all - thanks for the thoughts.

Dee - I have checked the Pioneer Corps website and they do offer a service to find details - I'll drop them a line and see if I can tempt them with a photo of one of their 'heros'. Would be not a problem proving next of kin - if not me; then I am in touch with others who would be.

Phil - you say the brassard is blue and white - if you know that does that mean you know what it is?

Ady - thanks for that - had no idea that was a 'wound strip' - to be honest I'd not noticed that at all! And yes, I did waiver before posting as I do realise that many people's relatives on this forum weren't so lucky as this 'band of brothers'.

I've tried local papers but not much available online and I believe the repository is in Colindale, NW London. I can possibly send somebody along there but would really like to narrow the search down a bit first - he lived in Paddington and have no idea what local paper would have been.

I have a family cutting, from a newspaper (paper title cut off!), of his obituary which states: "During the first world war he was a signaller with the Royal Field Artillery on the Western Front and was awarded the Military Medal for bravery during the last retreat in 1918".

And back to Dee again - tried zooming in but the scan I have is not good enough. I've got another picture of the one bottom left but no badges:



And on the back:



Thanks all.

Neil

[forester]

Hello Neil,

I used to have a link to a good website on the Royal Engineers Divisional Signal Companies, but when I checked last night, it was no longer working.

If you have a few hours spare, you could trawl through the war diaries for 4th Canadian Divisional Signal Company and see if there are any RE companies mentioned:


http://www.rootschat.com/links/08ht/

The war diary for 18th Army Brigade RFA is buried amongst the CEF war diaries as well and includes the period that it was attached to 4th Canadian Division:


http://www.rootschat.com/links/08hu/



Phil

[Silent Whale]

Nobody spotted my deliberate mistake here - and off I went emailing the Pioneer Corps when I should have been asking the Royal Engineers. Whoops! Anyway a nice man replied pointing me in the right direction so will await communication from the RE Museum in Chatham. They have a very good website: http://www.remuseum.org.uk/index.htm which does seem geared towards research but I got very confused and decided to ask them instead (even though they say it is best to come).

Phil - thanks for the links - did find some refs to soldiers getting Military Medals but not my chap. Some interesting reading there all in all. Ta. May go back again to re-check.

[Silent Whale]

Small update for anybody who is still interested..

Heard back from Royal Engineers museum and you have to go there to look at records.

Phil - rechecked the war diaries and definitely nothing there unfortunately. The other link for 18th Army is the wrong year and I can't seem to go from there to the right year!?