Historic Records Men of 1914

Arrived overseas: 11 September 1914. Connection: Victory Medal. I paid the grand sum of £20 for George Thorpe's Victory Medal when it came up for sale on eBay in February 2022. George had enlisted with the RFA in February 1906 and although he arrived overseas in France on the 11th September 1914, he was back in England and getting married to Maud Eccersley in Wakefield at the end of the following year. A Wakefield man, George returned to France and was certainly a casualty in 1918. A surviving pension ledger entry gives his year of birth as 1887 and his date of discharge from the army as the 2nd February 1919. Neurasthenia, or 'shell-shock' is listed as the disability which caused his discharge, and he certainly received a pension as a result of this up to 1923. The 1921 census of England and Wales shows George living with Maud at her parents' home at 11 Harvey Street, Belle Vue, Wakefield, with George's occupation recorded as a coal miner at West Sherlaton colliery...

Arrived Overseas: 14 October 1914. Connection: Victory Medal. Years ago I swore I'd never buy a single medal that had been disunited from its group. But I was young[er] and foolish then, and have since bought hundreds of single medals, and even re-united a couple. For those starting out on their medal collecting hobby, and even for grizzled old hoarders like me, the Victory Medal from the 1914-1918 War can offer hours of researching pleasure for a very modest investment and, besides which, like all British designed medals - and perhaps some from other countries too - it's an object of aesthetic beauty. This particular Victory Medal, which cost me £28 in March 2022, was once owned and earned by 54571 Gunner Edward Brown of the Royal Field Artillery. He'd joined the regiment on the 20th January 1909 under his real name of Milward, deserted in 1910, and then almost immediately re-joined under the alias of Brown. He served overseas with IV Bde RFA in the 7th (Meerut) Division f...

Arrived overseas: 23 August 1914. Connection: Victory Medal. Frederick Vincent Keen was technically still a boy - he was 17 years and 10 months old - when he attested with the Royal Field Artillery at Oxford on the 8th March 1909. He signed up for six years' service with the colours and six years on the reserve and so was still in uniform when Britain went to war in August 1914. He served in France from the 31st December 1914 and remained there until 1915. A detailed service history does not survive for this man but we know that he was in Salonika between 1915 and 1917 and then in Egypt from 1917 until 1919. He was discharged on the 7th March 1921, 12 years to the day since he had attested, and having been issued with a new army number, 1003005, in the interim. Notes in a Royal Artillery enlistment register record that his rank on discharge was that of corporal and that his character was rated as very good. There is also a note that prior to service as a career soldier, he had serv...

For some while now I have been building a collection of British Army soldiers who arrived overseas in 1914. The 'collection', which is incomplete, is comprised of single medals, medal groups, postcards, photos, autograph album entries, letters, and interviews with surviving veterans. In short, anything tangible, that connects a man to an arrival date overseas in 1914.  Great Britain went to war with Germany on the 4th August 1914 and within days, men of the British Expeditionary Force were arriving overseas, even though the first shot fired by the British Army would not occur until the 22nd August. Ascertaining when a man arrived overseas is easy enough, as the date appears on medal index cards. At the time of writing this post - 8th April 2025 - I have a connection for the majority of dates in 1914. The earliest date I have is the 6th August 1914 when Frederick Thomas Gris disembarked with the 6th Dragoon Guards -  I have his medals and those of his father too - whilst the la...