Understanding Military Records

[woofas]

I have the Army Military History Sheet of my grandfather which lists his service (summarised) as follows:
Home From 23/3/1893 To 15/4/98
China From 16/4/98 To 28/7/1903
Home From 29/7/1903 To 22/3/1914
Do I take this to mean that he left the Uk on 15/4/1898 (arrival in China unknown) & similarly arrived back in UK on 29/7/1903 (departure from China Unknown)?

Additionally is there any way to establish which ships he was on for these journeys?

[Lin Fisher]

That is exactly how I would read it but I'm no expert.

Is there anything in his records to tell you what his regiment etc is? You could then try google.

One of my great uncles was in the Boar war but I found out the ships name at Kew. Then google and found the exact day the ship let and arrived in England.

Sorry forgot to say welcome to the site.

[woofas]

Hi Lin & thanks for your welcome

He was in the RASC so that does not really help as they were stationed almost on an individual basis.

[Sylvia C]

Later pages in my grandfather's records for WW1 showed the names of ships that he travelled on from Bombay to Basra, and then from Basra to the UK.

Missing is any information on when and how he left the UK, arrived in Bombay, or how long he spent in Bombay. He was in the MGC

Don't forget that only about 30% of the WW1 records have survived, and most of them are damaged and incomplete. I'm not sure whether all records pre-then are complete, or have been digitised.

But trying to find records online for the RASC could be very helpful. At least, the RASC was not disbanded and most records apparently destroyed after WW1 as happened to the MGC!

[grumpy]

Welcome to the forum Woofas.

Prior to May 1916 the ASC (Didn't have the Royal appellation until towards the end of the GW or shortly afterwards, can't remember the actual date) only sent individuals, generally

of Captain or Lieutenant rank to India where they were integrated with the Supply and Transport section of the Indian Army. Their usual posting was for a period of 5 years.

I would recommend that you have a look at the FIBIS (Families in British India Society) website - Google FIBIS and the appropriate site will come up. They may be able to help you

with your mans transport arrangement.

The dates you have given will be the date the person was posted and may not refer to the actual date of sailing to/from UK.

I have two definitive books on the RASC (one of my g/fathers was in the ASC during the GW) but they don't carry a lot of information about Indian activities of the ASC pre war.

[grumpy]

Woofas, another web site that could possibly be of help is the Victorian Wars Forum (free to join). Haven't been there for a while and should mend my ways.

[merleyone]

When your grandfather served in China, the Boxer Rebellion raged from 1899 to 1901 which was largely aimed at Europeans, Christian missionaries and, initially at least, the Chinese authorities. It was only defeated eventually by an eight nation military alliance. China was very weak in those days and, needless to say, the victors took full advantage of their victory meting out summary justice and extracting punitive compensation terms from China for their citizens living there as well as favourable benefits for their own governments.
Clearly exciting times though for serving soldiers, as long as the very real dangers were not too protracted for them.

merleyone