This is a photo of my Grandfather, Private 20003 Patrick Dillon, who served in the York & Lancaster Regiment. I suspect this photo was taken when he joined in 1915, it used to hang in the kitchen of my Grandmother’s house at 51, Fulmer Road in Sheffield. The photo has suffered with age, and from some pencil scribbling that I suspect was done by my father as a

Capture note War theatre codes His move between battalions

very young boy.

Like many others who have tried to research the service history of a family member who served in the First World War, I started too late and wished I had asked more questions when my own father was alive.  My Grandfather had worked as a Corporation Surveyor’s labourer in Sheffield, before joining the York and Lancaster Regiment in 1915. He was born in November, 1887.  Married at 24 in 1912, and died aged 65 in April 1953.  The picture below shows my grandfather, probably about a year before he died.  He looked considerably older than his 65 years.  I remember little of him, except his cough which my father always said was a result of his having been in two gas attacks. 

I am on the left, my brother in the middle, my mother at the back, and my grandmother on the right.

Unfortunately my Grandfather’s service record would seem to have been one of those that was damaged during the Second World War. Many of the records were destroyed by fire following a bombing raid on London.  One document we did have was a telegram to my Grandmother, from 1918, telling her that he was “missing”. This telegram showed that at that time he was in the 2nd Battalion of the York & Lancs. He had gone missing on the 21st March, 1918. This was the first day of the Kaiser’s Spring Offensive, 1918.  He had been taken prisoner and in April 2005 I was able to go on a tour with Richard Holmes where we made a detour to the area where Grandfather was captured.

In the Public Records Office at Kew, the records show my Grandfather as having the 1915 Star, and the Victory Medal, and as having entered the Egyptian theatre of the war on September 5th, 1915. This was the day before his son, my father, was born.  The record is a little confusing, which means that I only have a couple of “fixed points” in his service career. The record of his medals shows his “Theatre of war first served in” as “(3) Egypt”.  Unfortunately the alpha-numeric codes used in these records for the theatres of war have 3 as Russia, and Egypt as 4.  Gallipoli, where the 6th Battalion were in September was in the Balkan theatre, which is coded as 2.  The war diary for the 6th Battalion in Gallipoli showed that they received new drafts of men from England on the 9th and 28th of September.  Until I get any information to the contrary I am assuming that he was in the draft on the 9th of September.

The Regimental medal roll showed him as having moved between Battalions, from the 6th, to the 2nd, to the 10th and then back to the 2nd. We do not yet know why he moved between the different Battalions, but from my father I understand that he was gassed twice.  Recuperation could have been one cause. Also, the 10th was disbanded, with the men being split up between the other Battalions. I expect this was the reason for his final move to the 2nd Battalion.

Because of the difficulty with the records, but knowing that he moved between the battalions, I have tried to look into the battalion histories and find points where he might have logically been assumed to have moved.   I have assumed a move from the 6th to the 2nd battalion around October/November 1916.  At that time the 6th went to billets on the 5th Oct. in Agenville in France “where the battalion was to remain for several weeks.”  In October the 6th Division, of which the 2nd Battalion was a part, had suffered very heavy losses in action around Lesboeufs, Morval, Le Transloy at the back end of the Somme campaign. The Division “had suffered casualties amounting to 277 officers and 6,640 other ranks, and had well earned a rest.” The 2nd Battalion itself, which was reduced to 350 men prior to an assault on 8th October, suffered “ a total loss of over 66 per cent among officers, non-commissioned officers and men.”  Given their desperate need for fresh drafts of men, this seems a good point for my grandfather to have moved from 6th to 2nd Battalion.

I believe my grandfather may have moved from the 2nd to the 10th Battalion in February of 1917. At that time the 10th Battalion had moved from the 21st to the 37th Division, and in February 1917 the 6th Division (including our 2nd Battalion) relieved the 37th Division around Loos.  This is one of the few occasions I can find where the battalions were geographically so close that they were actually being relieved one by the other. The move then from the 10th back to the 2nd is more easily explained.  While the 2nd Battalion was at Fremicourt on the 7th February, 1918, “it was joined by eleven officers and two hundred and twenty-one non-commissioned officers and men from the recently disbanded 10th Battalion of the York and Lancaster Regiment.”

While he was in Egypt my Grandfather kept a small diary record, of which a few small pages remain.  Some of his references in this match up with the records in the Regimental history, especially the date of the 6th Battalion sailing from Egypt for the Somme in 1916, and the name of the ship they sailed on.  The Oriana.

The only other defined date that I have is his capture on the 21st March, 1918, while he was serving with the 2nd Battalion.  Between sailing from Egypt in 1916, and March 1918, I will have to be a little vague as to his whereabouts.