No other draft recorded in that year numbered 100, and no other diary entry referring to replacements mentioned the source regiment. It seems to indicate that the combination of them being described as 'boys' and all from the same regiment was unusual - which further implies that they must have been among the first of the under 19-year-olds to reach the front. Figure 24: Extract from the Norfolk Regt. Casualty Book showing my Dad's transfer to hospital in Leicester. This story began in 2002 with a man and a mystery. The man was my father who served in WW1 and, as part of unravelling my family history, it was important to me to find out about that pivotal period in his life. The mystery arose as soon as I started to gather together the facts and the dimly recalled shreds of memories from my brother and sisters.

Overall, the two-month 25 mile advance from Morlancourt to Epehy had cost the battalion 37 officers and 634 other ranks, about two thirds of its official peacetime strength. The 'Liverpool boys' had lost another six killed and at least 13 wounded. [xxi] So, this study of the coherent group of 100 Kings Liverpool to 7th Bn Norfolk Regiment transferees had yielded 9 service records - and they tell a consistent story. Whilst my father was recovering from gas poisoning his battalion was heavily involved in the advance that would lead eventually to victory.Music for the ceremony in the Palace Gardens was provided by His Majesty’s Band of the Royal Marines, the Band of the Grenadier Guards, and the Band of the Royal Air Force Regiment, playing in harmony in tribute to a splendid joint force occasion. The note was clearly an afterthought, inserted after the diary entry for the day had been written. So, the 'Liverpool boys' must have arrived at Hénencourt, about three miles west of Albert, in the late evening of 10th April at about the time that the depleted 7th Bn. resumed their march from the front to billets in Toutencourt. xxv] Later, tests showed that a search for anything other than simply Initial, Surname & Number fails to deliver a result.

I think, though I can't prove it, that the incident he described to me that evening is the one recorded in the battalion diary for April 28th 1918 four days after he stepped into the front line for the first time. If I'm correct, it's likely that my Dad was in "C" Company. The diary entry (Figure 16) reads:In September 1952 1st King's, after acclimatising in Hong Kong and Battle Training in Japan, deployed to Korea under command 29th Infantry Brigade Group. The Companies deployed into defensive positions at the beginning of October. The war was in stalemate and much like the Great War, with the men in deep trenches under constant harassing fire. The average age was 19 and many of the men had been brought up during the Blitz so they did not consider the conditions too bad, and the food was better than at home. Offensive activity was limited to patrolling, until May 1953.

a b "The Kings Regiment". regiments.org. Archived from the original on 17 December 2007 . Retrieved 4 February 2017. {{ cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown ( link) v] Later in the investigation, when I had uncovered a number of service records, I found that every one of them fitted into the inferred name/number sequence exactly, which proved my deduction to be correct. Figure 1: My father, Tom “Robbie” Robinson. Photo taken in New Brighton. The added blow-up shows his Kings Liverpool Regiment cap badgeIt was known by a succession of colonels' names until 1751 when it was designated the 8th (The King's) Regiment of Foot. At this time it was formally awarded the White Horse of Hanover as a regimental device. In 1874 the Regiment adopted a badge comprising a figure 8, above which the prancing horse of Hanover, all within a belt circlet inscribed KING'S REGIMENT, surmounted by a crown.

In the immediate post-war period, the army was significantly reduced: nearly all infantry regiments had their first and second battalions amalgamated and the Supplementary Reserve disbanded. A defence review by Duncan Sandys in 1957 decided that the King's would be amalgamated with the Manchester Regiment, to form the King's Regiment (Manchester and Liverpool). They united as the 1st Battalion on 1 September 1958.That solved the mystery of the mismatch of regiments between his photograph and his documentation - but much more than that - by the same logic I could deduce all the other missing numbers - John Thompson's would have been 96010, George Thornborrow's 96011 etc. [v] At the end of November 1917, they passed out from basic training and set off once again, this time to Fermoy, 20 miles north of Cork in Ireland, where they became 'D' Company, 51st (Graduated) Battalion Kings Liverpool Regt. [x] Three months of more advanced training in Ireland followed, then in March 1918 they were shipped to Great Yarmouth. They'd been there only a matter of days when alarms rang in every military establishment in the country.