David Love wrote: > I am doing some research for a friend in England. It is proving a tad > difficult to unravel fact from fiction with husband's grandfather. > > His name was James Elias MARTIN and he was born in 1891, in Kent. Family > recollections recall he served with "The Buffs" in WW1 and took part in some > of the major battles. It is said that in the 1920s he was posted to Ireland. > While there he married and that resulted in two/three children. His wife > died and in 1926 he married Lucy Maud PAGETT, in Kent. He continued in the > Army and at one stage was a Sergeant Major. > > Where can I find information about: > > (a) his military service? > > (b) his marriage in Ireland? > > I have been into familysearch and looked at the Births and Marriages for > MARTIN but James Elias I cannot find. > > Any assistance is most welcome. > > David > Births Jun 1891 Martin James Elias Gravesend 2a 538 This is possibly him in 1901 - Northfleet is in the Gravesend RD 37 Taunton Road, Swanscombe Kent James Martin 40 Cement labourer b Gravesend Mildred Martin 37 b Gravesend Richard Martin 19 General Labourer b Gravesend Charles Martin 15 b Gravesend Ellen Martin 13 b Gravesend Fred A Martin 6 b Northfleet Mildred Martin 8 b Northfleet Hetty Martin 1 b Northfleet James Martin 10 b Northfleet The family is still in Swanscombe in 1911 but without James - perhaps he had already joined the army by then There are no WW1 medal record cards for James Elias Martin or James E Martin for the East Kent regiment but two possibilities for James Martin Name: James Martin Regiment or Corps: Royal Sussex Regiment, East Kent Regiment, Hampshire Regiment Regimental Number: 4502, 12877, 04947 Name: James Martin Regiment or Corps: Middlesex Regiment, East Kent Regiment Regimental Number: 61540, G/14529 other possibilities J E Martin East Kent Regiment, East Kent Regiment 2078, 200426 J E Martin 1st East Kent Regiment L/8860 (sergeant) J E Martin Kent Cyclist Battalion, East Kent Regiment, East Kent Regiment 7327, G/15642, 265343 J Martin East Kent Regiment 200426 (cpl) You could try The Buffs museum http://www.armymuseums.org.uk/amot-search/default.asp?Category=Amot&Service=Museum-Display&reference=0000000020 There is an ancestor research service http://www.armymuseums.org.uk/ancestor.htm Information on requesting military records http://www.veterans-uk.info/service_records/service_records.html -- Anne Chambers South Australia anne dot chambers at bigpond dot com

[] >Births Jun 1891 >Martin James Elias Gravesend 2a 538 [] (Deliberately deleted poster details as this isn't specific to that poster.) I presume from the "2a 538" that this is from a BMD index. I'm sure most of us here know this, but it will mislead newcomers to the hobby: these indexes are divided into quarter years, so the above really means "April, May, or June 1891" (plus see last paragraph below). Unfortunately, I have seen such referred to as both "Apr 1891" and "Jun 1891", so there isn't any consistency. Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest any of Apr-Jun 1891 1891, Apr-Jun Q2 1891 1891Q2 (with my personal preference being for the last one). It'll be a long haul, not least because both Ancestry and FreeBMD use this form in _some_ of their output (I'm not sure whether FMP do). [Ancestry have even mangled it further: they've _tried_ to fix it, but then let it pass through another interpreter stage that turned "1" into "Jan", so I've sometimes seen "QJan-Jan-Feb-Mar" (or something very like that) in Ancestry output.] What does the house think (about the suggestion we try to stop using just one month to indicate a quarter)? (And yes, I do know that there's further ambiguity in that a BMD may be registered in the following quarter. I feel my preferred option of 1891Q2 makes that possibility very slightly more obvious, though I'm not sure why I feel that.) -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf There's nothing wrong with looking at cake. - Sarah Millican, Radio Times 10-16 December 2011

On 18/08/2013 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to > refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest any of > > Apr-Jun 1891 > 1891, Apr-Jun > Q2 1891 > 1891Q2 I tend to use <year> Mar/4, Jun/4, Sep/4 and Dec/4 -- Graeme Wall This account not read, substitute trains for rail. Railway Miscellany at <http://www.greywall.demon.co.uk/rail>

On 18/08/13 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > What does the house think (about the suggestion we try to stop using > just one month to indicate a quarter)? I think it's a very good suggestion. Personally, I use '1891-Q2' in my database (the format being similar to '1891-06-21', which is the internal date format), and convert it to 'Q2 1891' when displaying it in a report. And while we're on the subject of ambiguous dates, let me mention another one that causes needless confusion. I often see a decade referred to as, say, the 1920s. That causes problems for the first decade of each century. Does the 1900s refer to a decade or a century? The Ancestry interface suffers from that ambiguity when filtering censuses. Personally, I use 19xx or 190x. Richard

On Sun, 18 Aug 2013 17:05:21 +0100, "J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG@soft255.demon.co.uk> wrote: >[] >>Births Jun 1891 >>Martin James Elias Gravesend 2a 538 >[] >(Deliberately deleted poster details as this isn't specific to that >poster.) > >I presume from the "2a 538" that this is from a BMD index. > >I'm sure most of us here know this, but it will mislead newcomers to the >hobby: these indexes are divided into quarter years, so the above really >means "April, May, or June 1891" (plus see last paragraph below). > >Unfortunately, I have seen such referred to as both "Apr 1891" and "Jun >1891", so there isn't any consistency. > >Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to >refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest any >of > >Apr-Jun 1891 >1891, Apr-Jun >Q2 1891 >1891Q2 > >(with my personal preference being for the last one). > >It'll be a long haul, not least because both Ancestry and FreeBMD use >this form in _some_ of their output (I'm not sure whether FMP do). > >[Ancestry have even mangled it further: they've _tried_ to fix it, but >then let it pass through another interpreter stage that turned "1" into >"Jan", so I've sometimes seen "QJan-Jan-Feb-Mar" (or something very like >that) in Ancestry output.] > > >What does the house think (about the suggestion we try to stop using >just one month to indicate a quarter)? > It has been standard to refer to MAR, JUN, SEP, DEC quarters since 1837. >(And yes, I do know that there's further ambiguity in that a BMD may be >registered in the following quarter. I feel my preferred option of >1891Q2 makes that possibility very slightly more obvious, though I'm not >sure why I feel that.)

On 18/08/2013 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > [] >> Births Jun 1891 >> Martin James Elias Gravesend 2a 538 > [] > (Deliberately deleted poster details as this isn't specific to that > poster.) > > I presume from the "2a 538" that this is from a BMD index. > > I'm sure most of us here know this, but it will mislead newcomers to the > hobby: these indexes are divided into quarter years, so the above really > means "April, May, or June 1891" (plus see last paragraph below). > > Unfortunately, I have seen such referred to as both "Apr 1891" and "Jun > 1891", so there isn't any consistency. > > Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to > refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest any of > > Apr-Jun 1891 > 1891, Apr-Jun > Q2 1891 > 1891Q2 No, we can't. The above reference is direct from the General Register Office index of Births, which holds its Births, Marriage and Deaths indexes to the registers in quarters, March, June, September and December. And this is something any newbie genealogist just has to learn and understand. Just as they have to learn that this particular birth did not necessarily take place in Gravesend, but took place within the Gravesend registration district, which included many different towns and parishes. Any newbie should go to the Genuki web site to learn about sources for British and Irish genealogy.. Here, for example, are the registration districts for Kent: http://www.ukbmd.org.uk/genuki/reg/ken.html 2a is the volume and 538 is the page.

In message <kurmqk$pab$1@speranza.aioe.org>, Renia <renia@otenet.gr> writes: >On 18/08/2013 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: [] >> Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to >> refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest any of >> >> Apr-Jun 1891 >> 1891, Apr-Jun >> Q2 1891 >> 1891Q2 > >No, we can't. The above reference is direct from the General Register Why not? Just because a bad (I think more posters have agreed with me than disagreed) way of identifying the quarters, I see no reason to continue to do so. >Office index of Births, which holds its Births, Marriage and Deaths >indexes to the registers in quarters, March, June, September and >December. > >And this is something any newbie genealogist just has to learn and >understand. > >Just as they have to learn that this particular birth did not >necessarily take place in Gravesend, but took place within the >Gravesend registration district, which included many different towns >and parishes. Agreed: any new genealogist has to learn both of those points, since there are so many such references around. (They also have to learn about registration delay.) But I see no reason to continue to use a misleading method in any _new_ reference I/we make. > >Any newbie should go to the Genuki web site to learn about sources for >British and Irish genealogy.. > >Here, for example, are the registration districts for Kent: > >http://www.ukbmd.org.uk/genuki/reg/ken.html > >2a is the volume and 538 is the page. > (I knew that - I only mentioned those as evidence that the reference I was quoting _was_ from the indexes.) -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf A man is not contemptible because he thinks science explains everything, and a man is not contempptible because he doesn't. - Howard Jacobson, in Radio Times 2010/1/23-29.

On 20/08/2013 00:20, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > In message <kurmqk$pab$1@speranza.aioe.org>, Renia <renia@otenet.gr> > writes: >> On 18/08/2013 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > [] >>> Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to >>> refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest >>> any of >>> >>> Apr-Jun 1891 >>> 1891, Apr-Jun >>> Q2 1891 >>> 1891Q2 >> >> No, we can't. The above reference is direct from the General Register > > Why not? Just because a bad (I think more posters have agreed with me > than disagreed) way of identifying the quarters, I see no reason to > continue to do so. It's not our terminology. It's the terminology of the GRO. You'd better contact them and tell them to change their methods to suit you.

"Renia" <renia@otenet.gr> wrote in message news:kuufnv$nd5$1@speranza.aioe.org... > On 20/08/2013 00:20, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: >> In message <kurmqk$pab$1@speranza.aioe.org>, Renia <renia@otenet.gr> >> writes: >>> On 18/08/2013 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: >> [] >>>> Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to >>>> refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest >>>> any of >>>> >>>> Apr-Jun 1891 >>>> 1891, Apr-Jun >>>> Q2 1891 >>>> 1891Q2 >>> >>> No, we can't. The above reference is direct from the General Register >> >> Why not? Just because a bad (I think more posters have agreed with me >> than disagreed) way of identifying the quarters, I see no reason to >> continue to do so. > > It's not our terminology. It's the terminology of the GRO. You'd better > contact them and tell them to change their methods to suit you. I just use about or Abt Mar 1878 or what ever, the about means it is not exact if a year is only known I still use abt 1870 or whatever, In New Zealand and Australia you only get the year from the online BMD indexes, so a quarter is a lot closer, often it is enough, as I certainly can't afford every cert to get the full date.

J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > In message<kurmqk$pab$1@speranza.aioe.org>, Renia<renia@otenet.gr> > writes: >> On 18/08/2013 17:05, J. P. Gilliver (John) wrote: > [] >>> Can we as a hobby/profession start to abandon using only a month to >>> refer to a quarter, when further precision isn't known? I'd suggest any of >>> >>> Apr-Jun 1891 >>> 1891, Apr-Jun >>> Q2 1891 >>> 1891Q2 >> >> No, we can't. The above reference is direct from the General Register > > Why not? Just because a bad (I think more posters have agreed with me > than disagreed) way of identifying the quarters, I see no reason to > continue to do so. > >> Office index of Births, which holds its Births, Marriage and Deaths >> indexes to the registers in quarters, March, June, September and >> December. >> >> And this is something any newbie genealogist just has to learn and >> understand. >> >> Just as they have to learn that this particular birth did not >> necessarily take place in Gravesend, but took place within the >> Gravesend registration district, which included many different towns >> and parishes. > > Agreed: any new genealogist has to learn both of those points, since > there are so many such references around. (They also have to learn about > registration delay.) But I see no reason to continue to use a misleading > method in any _new_ reference I/we make. >> >> Any newbie should go to the Genuki web site to learn about sources for >> British and Irish genealogy.. >> >> Here, for example, are the registration districts for Kent: >> >> http://www.ukbmd.org.uk/genuki/reg/ken.html >> >> 2a is the volume and 538 is the page. >> > (I knew that - I only mentioned those as evidence that the reference I > was quoting _was_ from the indexes.) Aren't there enough things the newbie (and the oldie) need to remember about boundary changes and calendar changes and how Regnal dates and the Quaker dating system(s) differ from the Gregorian/Julian and why Uncle James' baptism is down as Jacobus ... without tossing in an unnecessary difference? Even if /this/ change seems like a good idea at the time. Cheryl

On 18/08/2013 06:45, Anne Chambers wrote: > There are no WW1 medal record cards for James Elias Martin or James E > Martin for the East Kent regiment but two possibilities for James Martin > Name: James Martin > Regiment or Corps: Royal Sussex Regiment, East Kent Regiment, > Hampshire Regiment > Regimental Number: 4502, 12877, 04947 The 2nd Battalion of the Hampshire regiment was in Ireland from 1919 to 1923 according to.. http://1rhamps.com/hampshireR/hamps2ndBn.html > > Name: James Martin > Regiment or Corps: Middlesex Regiment, East Kent Regiment > Regimental Number: 61540, G/14529 Ist Buffs were in Ireland in 1926.. http://www.kentfallen.com/PDF%20reports/BUFFS%20DATES.pdf