Transcribe naval record

[Paul Johnson of Hartlepool UK]

Hi all,

Are any of you able to help me transcribe this naval record and what the parts mean.

Any help will be gratefully appreciated.

Jono

[jds1949]

Several pointers which might help:

Your man entered the Navy as a "Boy 2nd Class" - which was the lowest, most junior rating - on 7th December 1897. At that time he was on HMS Caledonia.

He then became "Boy 1st Class" - same posting

On 27th August 1900 - 18th birthday - he signed up for 12 years - he was rated "Ordinary Seaman"

He then progressed to "Able Seaman" on 31st July 1902

His last recorded posting terminated on 6th October 1902 - there is then an entry in the Remarks section dated 14th October 1902 - Ican't read the two words - but the first seems to be "Traced" and the second seems to be "Pens" - which might be an abbreviation for pension - but there doesn't appear to be any stated reason as to why his Navy career ended prematurely.

If you google the names of the ships [preceded by HMS] in the left hand column you will almost certainly find info and pictures of most of them. HMS Caledonia was a training ship.

Hope that helps,

jds1949

[crimea1854]

Jono

If I can add a little more. The 'TM' indicates he qualified as a Trained Man, a level of proficiency in seamanship that had to be reassessed periodically, and earned additional pay.

I think he was invalided out of the service, hence the 'Invld' note against his last ship on the extreme right.

Traced Pen does mean that he qualified for a pension.

I note that he served on Terrible during the Boer War, and from the medal roll can confirm that he was awarded a no clasp Queens South Africa Medal, this was sent to Aurora, which was on the China Station during the Boxer Rebellion, for which he received a no clasp China 1900 medal. Both of these would have been officially named.

Martin