Hi Thanks to all for sharng their experiences of people having kids all over the world due to army. I watched BBC1 who do you thnk you are(uk) last night - Rory Bremner- it explained how up to 1854 the army allowed wives and families to travel with them. On the day the army was due to set sail there would be a lottery and those picked would travel. The wives would work in the army camps, washing cooking etc. I always thought it was only officers etc who took wives with them and never imagined wives of privates would be there, having a pretty tough time by the sounds of it. Carol- off to check out the Indiaman site and to learn more of Spike Milligan and John Sullivan the boxer.

Afternoon all. Yes the army did allowed some other ranks wives to travel with the unit when they went overseas. A fact that might interest some of you is that when a soldier died, especially when they were overseas; the widow would marry another soldier so that she would still have a sort of home and family around her, That fact causes problems to family historians as it is quite difficult tracing the new family and their records Oh one other point is that an other rank had to get permission of his Commanding officer before he could get married. This practice was still in force in 1957 when I got married. Regards Peter Collins