Tracing military history

chughes

I've recently started tracing my family history and I see from my maternal grandfather's details that he was a soldier during the first world war. I'm presuming that he was in an Irish regiment in the British army. Is there anywhere in Ireland I can go to to look up his military details ?

Fratton Fred

You will need the national archives in Kew, London. There was a thread on this forum recently that had some very good advice. The National Archives records are all on line or if he died you can find memorials etc on www.cwgc.org

pinkypinky

You could look him up on Ancestry.co.uk.
They are uploading service records and already have the medal index cards up. It's a subscription service but you can get a free 2 week trial. If he's not there, it might be because a)records destroyed in the Blitz or b)just not uploaded yet.

It's 50/50. I had 2 great-grandfathers to find and I got one but not the other. 8 pages of service records and some really fascinating information the family didn't know.

Ponster

Lots of good advice available in this forum in recent threads but if you post all the information you currently have then I and other members can use our Ancestry accouns to see what we can find.

As Pinky said, its 50/50 at best....

dubtom

I wonder could I throw up the little info I have on my Great Grand father for someone to check out on that ancestry site. Someone here tried a site for me before but I don't think it was that one. A paid search by a guy in england turned up nothing,not sure if he used that site either.

Name,James Kavanagh
born approx 1886 (25 in 1911)
Married to Sarah
Address 7.2 Rutland Place,Dublin (could have moved to Little mary street by the time enlisted)
Dont know what regiment or numbers.
I know it's a long shot,and there are a lot of James Kavanaghs on ancestry,but would appreciate if someone had a look.

pinkypinky

If the guy you paid to search in England was searching in their National Archives, you won't find anything new on Ancestry. They're getting their source material from the Archives.

chughes

Folks, many thanks for the replies and apologies for the delay in getting back to you. The Commonwealth Graves website is a very good one but my grandfather survived the war so he wouldn't be mentioned on it. I don't have a lot of information on my grandfather but I have the following : his name was Anthony Cooney from Limerick city and was baptised in June 1886. He married Jane O'Connor in November 1913 in the Pro Cathedral in Dublin and they moved between various addresses in the north inner city of Dublin between 1913 and 1920 when they settled in Emmett Street, Dublin 1. When their son, also called Anthony, was born in 1916, Anthony senior's occupation was recorded as being a soldier. If any of you can come up with any details such as regiment etc, I would be very grateful.

pinkypinky

There's a few possibilities.

Royal Dublin Fusiliers
http://www.royaldublinfusiliers.com/ is run by Liam Dodd and he has a lot of lists of names so try asking there.

Royal Munster Fusiliers recruited in Munster and a lot of Limerick people would have been in them. They also have a website but are slow to respond and don't seem to have the same resources as the RDF site.

Have you looked at Ancestry yet? Service records give next of kin and children's names to match up. I've had a quick look and nothing leaps out as him. Do you know Anthony's middle name? It's possible he used it.

Do you have any other occupations for the father? EG; one of my ancestors was a baker and in WW1, he served in the Army Service Corps.