Northamptonshire Police Archives

[uptodat]

Hi Robert, you are most welcome.

Charles is one of only 5, out the 92 County Constabulary men who served  in WW1, whose Military Unit has not yet been confirmed. My visit to Northamptonshire Records Office was originally intended just to identify those units, although a still growing list of other things to look for has been added.

Looking for an Army service record, a colleague suggested two possibles:

Gunner Charles Henry Davey of the RGA (150605) who served 10/12/1915 to 14/12/1918 and was then awarded a SWB. (More than 30 NCC men served in RGA, but these dates don't fit with Charles' police service dates.)

Private Charles Henry Davey, supposedly of the Royal West Surreys (203292) who was apparently pensioned off 21/2/1919 (Record is on Fold3 which I do not have). The index re Fold3 on Ancestry states that his Military Service Region was "North Midlands" and his address was "Welmant Northampton". (Welmant must be a transcription error I think).

Have you been able to eliminate one or both of these?

Thanks for setting out all that information. I am also intrigued now and you can be sure I will be keeping an eye out for any references  to Charles.

I wonder if the recommendation by C.C. Norfolk indicates that Charles applied there first, but rather than waiting for a vacancy, opted to try Northants where perhaps vacant posts existed? Or maybe Northants Constabulary was the next best thing to the French Foreign Legion after a failed romance in Norfolk!

You have probably traced Berry Wood / Berrywood / St Crispins Hospital to it's closure in 1995. I went in search of records from its Northampton War Hospital time. There is an archives / museum department at Northampton general Hospital and I got some information from there about NWH, when researching a nurse's autograph book containing details of about 50 soldier patients.
Alas they had no idea where patient records went after the frequent health trust / authority / area reorganisations and assumed the MOD would hold any records of soldiers treated.

I stand corrected that Charles lived in Lt Houghton, not Brafield, as I thought 1939 Register showed. The former is closer to Northampton but I didn't think either was ever in the Brixworth Reg. District.

I hope something will turn up to solve the mysteries.

Thanks & all the best,

Dave

[PalmTree1]

FYI Little Houghton came under Brixworth Registration District from 1936 to 1974 so looks good.

Paul

[uptodat]

Thanks Paul.

[uptodat]

Robert,

Please ignore my last reply. It was Jane King, a volunteer researcher for IWM working on the War Memorial Register, who suggested the two possibles for Charles. He was the second. Welmant = Kelmarsh.

My thanks to her for finding on BNA: page 4 of the Buckingham Advertiser and Free Press on 1/6/1918:

"Pte C.H. Davey, Queen's R.W. Surreys, formerly a police-constable at Kelmarsh and Deanshanger. Wounded in the chest and arms and in hospital at Whitstable"

Deanshanger is on the Bucks border in the south of the county. Kelmarsh is in the north on the Leics border. So after his start at Constabulary HQ at Angel Street, Northampton, it seems Charles was transferred from top to bottom ends of the county, or vice versa.

Regards,

Dave

[uptodat]

Further to my last, Jane King went the extra mile & followed a hunch: The fact that his reference for the Northants Police post had apparently been supplied by the Norfolk Chief Constable A.E. Fuller suggests that Charles had previously been a copper in Norfolk. Having checked the Norfolk Police website, this appears to have probably been the case, as apparently a Charles Henry Davey was indeed a Constable on that Force: his reference in their records (Recruitment Register?) is Book 5, Page number 161. If you go to https://www.norfolk.police.uk/about-us/our-organisation/our-history it gives the contact details re how to obtain data from that record. Again, as Davey is not an uncommon surname, one would need to check it all out, but that would certainly explain why the reference for NCC's chap was provided by Norfolk's Chief. Whether he transferred directly, or there was an hiatus in between is unknown, but will hopefully become clear from the Norfolk record.

Perhaps provision of police accommodation was better in Northants, or maybe there had been a family rift?

[robbo43]

Dave
Thanks for all that, brilliant. I was about to make several suggestions but now they are mostly not necessary. I had eliminated the RGA Gunner partly because of the dates but also because he came from Newport, Monmouthshire. Most of the WW1 records on Fold 3 are also on the normal subscription area of Find my Past. I had just checked for the Royal West Surrey record but could not find it on FindMyPast, I suspect they have mistranscribed his name.

I was going to suggest electoral registers as a possible source. He would probably be on the 1918/19 absentee voters register which would give his unit and subsequently he and Beatrice should appear on the ordinary registers, unless it was regarded that his mental capacity was too damaged for him to be fit to vote in which case only Beatrice would appear. Unfortunately Northants electoral registers are not on line and may not have been indexed so it would be a slog to find him.

I have some information on the divisions he served in. Kettering (1908), HQ (1908), Wellingborough (1908), Towcester (1909), Kettering (1912)(Kelmarsh?), Northampton (1920). At the time he was taken ill in 1923 he was stationed at Boughton.

I'm inclined to think that as he wasn't taken ill until 1923 and presumably though fit for service until then that he was suffering from Encephalitis lethatgica rather than PTSD. For anyone interested there are a couple of linkshttps://www.encephalitis.info/encephalitis-lethargica
and news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/3930727.stm


Again, thanks Dave for all the effort you have put in. I will try the Norfolk Police link and post back here anything I find.

Robert

[robbo43]

I stand corrected that Charles lived in Lt Houghton, not Brafield, as I thought 1939 Register showed.

I think that one is my fault. In the 1939 Register his address is given as 168 Bedford Road, Bradfield but at the time of his death in 1957 his address is given as The Cottage, Bedford Road, Little Houghton.

Perhaps provision of police accommodation was better in Northants, or maybe there had been a family rift?

Family rift? Amongst the Daveys? Mostly they seem to have got along. However in a letter to another of her sons Charles's grandmother comments about his father disapprovingly and suggests he was a spendthrift. In another "discussion" between one of Charles's cousins and either his aunt or his mother, (or possibly both), the final retort was "I hope the church roof falls in on your head". Isn't family history fun?

I've contacted the Norfolk Police history group, their response tine is around four weeks, so will just have to wait.