Ancestry changed?

Posts : 8 Join date : 2022-11-26

Happy Christmas to you all.

Quick question - does anyone know if Ancestry has changed their access to access to military records at all? I am trying to research some lads but can't seem to access any attestation papers etc.

Many thanks

AG.

Posts : 615 Join date : 2013-05-07 Location : Brecon

Dear AG,

No every individual record has survived. Those who only served on a short service engagement (the normal in 1870s/1880s) their docs were not retained. It was only those subject to an army pension. So it was not until about 1890s when all documents were retained in series WO97. Other options are:

1. Examine regimental/depot pay/muster rolls before 1881 - to track down individual movement of recruits.
2. 'Find My Past' site often has scanned army docs such as medical records and muster rolls - you may lucky here.

Posts : 8 Join date : 2022-11-26

Hi Kenny,

Thank you for your reply - I didn't know that short service records were not kept - there's me pulling my hair out why I couldn't find them!

Many thanks and Happy New Year,

AG.

Subject: Re: Ancestry changed? Wed Dec 28, 2022 11:35 am

If you know a particular soldier did complete his service and was awarded a pension, access will be limited depending on what level of account you have.

I cannot access WO 97 images, only a basic transcript with a Worldwide account package. There is a "All Access" package which is the next higher level but I'm not sure if that will allow you access to pension records which seem to be held by Fold3 subsidiary.

Findmypast allows you to access full images of pension records, not sure what package you need.

Bill

Posts : 8 Join date : 2022-11-26

Thanks Bill, appreciate it.

Posts : 615 Join date : 2013-05-07 Location : Brecon

Albert,
You can always try - as I call it - a wild card search.

Original Army documents for the Victorian period are held in boxes in the National Archives (TNA) at Kew. I suppose there are about 200-300 papers in each box - regulars WO 97 series, WO 96 series for militia. At this time many regulars enlisted in militia (age 17) before deciding to turn regular (age 18).

The friends of TNA some years ago created an named index of the contents of each box to assist researchers. Some of these indexes have added to the TNA search catalogue particularly those post 1880 to 1913. So if you go to the TNA site - go to discovery - the catalogue search - enter name you looking for - modify by WO 97 or WO 96 and date range. You can add regiment with the name - you don’t need full title of the regiment - Welsh would sufficient for Welsh Reiment or Royal Welsh Fusiliers. A positive search match would indicate a set of docs exist. But a scan version may not be available from TNA.

Posts : 8 Join date : 2022-11-26

Thanks Kenny, I'll certainly take a trip there in the New Year. Thanks for the steers and happy New Year :-)

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