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Remembrance
- The Yorkshire Regiment, First World War Research Help
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If you want to look into the military service record of a soldier who served in the First World War, there are three books which are invaluable in giving you the background information to make a start.
First
World War Army Service Records, by William Spencer.
Tracing
Your Army Ancestors, by Simon Fowler.
Tracing
Your Family History - Army, published by the Imperial War Museum.
If you know that the soldier lost his life while on active service, there are two prime computer based resources from which to start your search;-
The Commonwealth
War Graves Commission website.
and
Soldiers Died in the Great War.
This latter resource is available as a CD-ROM from the Naval and Military Press, or is available on subscription-based genealogy websites (such as Ancestry.co.uk). It may be possible to access this resource in Public Libraries or in Military Museums.
Other vital military records available on Ancestry.co.uk
and other genealogy websites, include;-
1 The Medal Rolls Index - a card for each individual soldier where
service medals have been claimed / awarded.
2 Service Records - only about 30% of these survive, as a consequence
of enemy action in the Second World War.
3 Pension Records, - if the soldier was discharged to pension.
Again, only a limited number of these records have survived.
4 Silver War Badge Records, - if the soldier was discharged during
the war due to wounds / illness, these badges were issued so that the soldier
could show publicly that he had "done his bit".
Once you have started your research, you may want to establish
further details. The links below are for additional resources to help you
further your research.
Also included in the links below is "A Family Memorial", which
illustrates the medals and commemorative scroll in the possession of the
family of a soldier who lost his life in the First World War. These medals
and the scroll are often the starting point for a relative or descendant
deciding to research the military history of a soldier.
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