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WW1 Service and or Pension Records for Thomas William Lowe

WW1 Service and or Pension Records for Thomas William Lowe

Posted: 25 Jun 2015 11:23AM GMT
Classification: Query
Surnames: Lowe
I have found a UK WW1 Service Medal and Award Roll for the above person. I have this named person in my tree if this gentleman is the same for the record. The Thomas William Lowe in my tree was born in the 8th Sept 1896 in Butterknowle, Co. Durham, UK. I am trying to find the above records to prove the Sevice Medal Record belongs to my gentleman. Ancestry does not have any Service or Pension Records available for him. The Service Medal Record gives his Regiment as Durham Light Infantry 2nd Bn, Regiment number is 114484 etc, therefore I am looking to see if this gentleman is indeed the one in my tree. I would be grateful for any help in resolving this to finding any of these records which would give more information on them, ie. family or next of kin. Any help in this would be grateful.

Re: WW1 Service and or Pension Records for Thomas William Lowe

Posted: 26 Jun 2015 3:48AM GMT
Classification: Query
Edited: 26 Jun 2015 3:57AM GMT
Tell it all...or don't tell it at all.

The medal records do not give his regimental number as 114484.

They give 2 regimental numbers for him...114484...and...4437242.

Actually they don't, because, although the two terms tend to be used interchangeably, strictly speaking, prior to August 1920, army numbers were really regimental numbers, and after that date, they were service numbers.

Although, even today, many soldiers, whether serving in regiments or in corps, still use the term, regimental number, when referring to their service number.

That is because, prior to that date, army numbers were issued to a man by the regiment or corps in which he served, and since many regiments and corps were using the same number blocks, there could be many men serving at the same time, but in different regiments or corps, who had the same regimental number.

If the man changed regiments or corps, he would be issued with a new regimental number, and in the WW1 era, some men could have up to 6 different numbers during the course of their service.

From August 1920, that system was changed, and each serving soldier, or future new recruit, was issued with a 7 digit service number, and each regiment or corps was allocated a separate and unique block of numbers from which they issued the new service numbers.

Once a man was issued with a 7 digit service number, he retained that number for the whole period of his service, even if he changed regiments or corps, and that number was never reissued to anyone else.

In other words, from August 1920 right up to the present time, no two British soldiers have ever had the same service number, because a service number was and still is, unique to an individual.

4437242 was issued from a block of numbers which was allocated to the Durham Light Infantry.

His WW1 medals were issued in respect of his WW1 era number, which was 114484.

His WW1 medal record roll is dated 10th March 1923 and it states that he was currently still serving and had the service number of 4437242.

The service record for any soldier who served after January 1921 is now held by the UK Ministry of Defence ( MOD ) and if the soldier had also served during WW1 his WW1service record will be included in that.

You can apply for a copy of his service record from the MOD for £30 and normally you would have to supply proof of death, but you don't need to do that in his case, because he was born more than 116 years ago.
https://www.gov.uk/requests-for-personal-data-and-service-re...
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