by Geoff Badham
I wonder how many of you have suddenly found a “second wind” when a new source of information comes to your attention, or simply becomes available. My problem was that I had hit a serious snag tracking the birth detail of my Great Great Great Grandfather, George Badham – known to be living in specific locations in or around Dymock, Gloucestershire in 1841 and 1851 (according to the censuses for those years), but running into a brick wall when it came to establishing his birth details and parentage (note the plea for any help!). In the records where he shows up, he states he was born c. 1800 in Dymock, but the Parish Records (and those for the surrounding areas) are not showing him. Anyway, the thought that I might never actually find this information and that I would come to a complete halt after so many years of otherwise productive tracking was, frankly, getting me down. I wonder how many of you have been there as well?!
My temporary salvation came recently when I spotted, on one of my frequent “revisits” to the main genealogical information sites (in this case, the National Archive, nee Public Record Office), that they had digitised and put on-line most of the “Medal Index Cards” (MIC, also known as “Medal Rolls”) for service personnel serving in the 1st World War. I won’t repeat here the detail of what the MICs are and what they contain as the website explains all that, but briefly they are the best (and largely only) record of the medals service personnel received, but also provide extra connected information such as Regiment, date of entry into the “theatre” of operations, etc. As most of the actual WW1 service records have been destroyed (largely thanks to a stray incendiary bomb in the WW2 blitz), this is also one of the few remaining, centrally held sources of service information.
Our War Graves Visit
My interest was aroused because I first got interested in tracing my family tree some years back when my wife wanted to know more about the war grave of one of her relations and we had heard about the Commonwealth War Graves Commission web site, which had been recently launched. I too had at least one relative killed or wounded in the Great War, so we jointly searched the CWGC records and found them. We followed that by a long weekend over in the Picardy, Flanders and Pas de Calais areas of France on on a “grave hunt”. I know this sounds morbid and a few friends and relations gave us strange looks at the time, but I recommend it. Anyone who has seen the sad but magnificent sight of the cemeteries with their seemingly endless rows of immaculately maintained graves will have been moved by the images, but homing-in on a particular individual, especially when they are a loved-one and part of your personal ancestry is a strangely satisfying but also very poignant exercise (honestly!).
To cut a long story short (or at least shorter!), this trip inspired both of us to trace our respective family trees, and a few months after our return the 1901 census was made available. The rest, as they say, is history: I spent the next few years obsessively chasing that elusive long-lost benefactor while desperately hoping records of abject poverty or a baseborn child would not ruin my romantic images of my ancestors! Nevertheless, I realised the other week that I had possibly left the original WW1 story unfinished when I saw the Medal Index Card information: I knew the regiments and the dates of death of most of the relations concerned, but not much else. I also knew nothing about the medals themselves – I suspect like most of you that are reading this, I knew about Victoria Crosses, “DSO”s and the like, but very little about Campaign Medals, etc - basically, the “standard” row of medals all those proud folk wear at the cenotaph every November 11th, or more recently over at Calais and the D-Day landing beaches for those poor folk who were unlucky enough to be involved in both World Wars.
Medal Index Cards (Discovered!)
A quick search revealed that my Great Uncle (Charlie Badham) who was killed in 1916 (having survived for 2 years, poor devil) produced an MIC that showed he received a “14 Star”, a British War Medal (BWM), and a Victory Medal. Another search for his brother (known as “Bert”, but christened Hubert) who survived the war, but died a few years later (so say because of injuries he never recovered from) showed he also received a “14 Star”, a BWM and a Victory Medal, but an additional “S.W.B.”. My Grandfather (Joseph Badham). eldest of the brothers, who we believed served later than his younger brothers and fortunately survived (or I wouldn’t be here!), also received a British War Medal (BWM) and a Victory Medal.
Charlie and Bert were in the 1st Battalion, Hertfordshire Regiment and Grandpa (“Joe”) was in the Hertfordshire Yeomanry, a mounted regiment that served most of the war in Egypt, Gallipoli and (topically) Mesopotamia, now Iraq (I hadn’t realised but the Herts Yeomanry were one of the two represented Regiments that fatefully entered Baghdad). I have found out that the clues to what they received are in the dates they were on active duty and the Regiments with which they served. Unfortunately, the family today do not have any of the medals they received.
Campaign & Other Medals (Explained!)
As I have already said, the National Archive site explains the “standard” medals awarded, but I needed to apply what I knew about these three chaps before I started to comprehend properly what had happened, and why they got what they got.
Essentially, any serviceman who was over in France (or Flanders) early in the conflict (i.e. between 5th August 1914 and 22nd November 1914) might have received a 1914 Star. This meant they were members of the first tranche of the British Expeditionary Forces. This medal was sometimes referred to as the “Mons Star"; recognising the location of the first battle lines taken up by the BEF soon after they had disembarked in France, the initial skirmishes along the lines of the canal there, and the first fateful retreat a few weeks later. An additional clasp (or “bar”) that went across the ribbon was awarded to anyone who came under fire during the dates received, with the inscription “5th AUG. - 22nd NOV. 1914”. Approximately 378,000 medals plus 145,000 bars were awarded to members of the British Expeditionary Force.
BEF personnel who served between the same start date and the end of 1915 (and didn’t receive a 14 Star) received a “1914-15 Star” (2,366,000 were issued). As both the 1914 and 1914-15 Stars were awarded to volunteer forces, and conscription was finally introduced in 1916, nobody received a Star after that date – it seems you had to volunteer if you wanted to risk getting killed with full honours!
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| The 1914 Star (with addition clasp) | The 1914-15 Star |
The BWM was issued to commemorate the end of the war and went to all personnel who had entered a theatre of war, including areas outside Western Europe up until 1918. This included many civilians; e.g. Merchant Navy seamen involved in the supply chain as well as other civilians under contract. The qualifying period was later extended through to 1920 to cover mines clearance, etc after hostilities ended. 6,500,000 medals in Silver were issued, as well as 110,000 of the much rarer Bronze (mainly to Chinese, Indian and Maltese personnel in labour battalions).
The Victory Medal was issued to all ranks of the fighting forces, to civilians under contract and others employed with military hospitals who actually served on the “establishment of a unit in a theatre of war”. It was never issued alone, but to those that already had the 1914 or 1914-15 Stars, and most of those who had the British War Medal. In addition, anybody “Mentioned in Dispatches” was authorised to wear a single oak leaf in bronze sewn onto the ribbon. Some 5,725,000 were issued in all.
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| British War Medal | The Victory Medal | The Territorial Force Medal |
A common entry on the MICs is the “Territorial Force War Medal”. This was granted to all members of the Territorial Force embodied before 30th September 1914, who had completed four years service by that date, and who had served outside the United Kingdom between 4th August 1914 and 11th November 1918. Those who had already qualified for the 1914 or 1914-15 Stars, however, were excluded. This medal is by far the scarcest of the First World War medals, with as few as 34,000 being issued.
You can see that considerable numbers were issued, and it is sad but perhaps inevitable that more are now often in grandchildren’s’ attics, in pawn shops or advertised on “eBay” than are with their rightful owners or direct ancestors.
In addition, a lapel badge that is often seen is the “Silver War Badge”, often wrongly referred to as the “Silver Wound Badge” as it was awarded to all those that were invalided out of the war through injury. This was the “S.W.B.” on Bert’s record card and offers proof to the anecdote that he died of his wounds. It was issued by George V – hence the King’s initials – and the badges were highly prized possessions, as it was a way of saying “I have been there, sent back with the King's permission and I am not afraid to fight!” – in defiance of the relatively small number of young men who refused to sign-up, that in many cases were branded cowards. The number of these that were issued is seemingly unknown.
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| The Silver War Badge |
Adding It All Up
However, with all this as a backdrop, all was not how it seemed when it came to the three Badham brothers. It showed my complete ignorance of the whole thing. It highlighted that I had given no thought to the fact that Charlie and Bert were volunteers, illustrated by their respective medals; but the problem was that so, I believed, was my Grandfather – except his medal tally didn’t seem to match. The key of course lies in the regiments, or more accurately the battalions they were members of (e.g. some Regular Army regiments also had territorial battalions that made up the regiments), and how and when the individual battalions were brigaded into the fighting divisions and brigades for the various theatres of the war.
All three brothers were in regiments that were part of the “Territorial Force” that had no battalions that formed part of the full-time, “Regular Army”. Formed in 1908 from all the volunteer forces at the time, the Territorial Force was the forerunner of the Territorial Army (“TA”) of today and were nicknamed at the time the “Saturday Night Soldiers”. However, even when combined with the Regular Army, the available manpower was soon seen as insufficient (mainly after considerable thumping of desks by Kitchener), and while the BEF were desperately helping the French hold back the massed German invaders, the word quickly went out for volunteers. Many thousands immediately responded to make up the “New Army”; so called because rather than extend the existing Territorial Force units, new Battalions were created aligned with the main (largely County-based) Regular Army Regiments. Many of these new Battalions became known as “Pal’s Battalions”, due to the fantastic comradeship coming from all being volunteers and many friends and close relations joining in groups. In a number of cases, they consisted of the entire male youth of small towns and villages, factories, mining and farming communities, not to mention most of the young male staff from large country houses; stories of which have caught the imagination of many playrights and screenwriters.
Meanwhile, the undermanned BEF were initially described as a “contemptible little army” by Kaiser Willhelm. The aging survivors naturally nominated themselves as “The Old Contemptibles”!
Back to the Territorials, the Hertfordshire Regiment was sometimes referred to as the “Hertfordshire Guards”, from their prestigious attachment to the 4th Guards Brigade which was otherwise made up of highly professional, regular army units of Guards Brigades (including the Grenadier, Coldstream and Irish). Unfortunately, this honour backfired on Charlie and Bert as, despite their recognised skill and bravery, they not only ended up in the BEF right from the start, frequently fighting outnumbered against formidable odds – eventually being forced into retreat at Mons after only a few weeks – but served in one of the Divisions (the 2nd) that fought in most of the major battles on the Western Front for the entire period of the War.
Grandpa Joe’s Hertfordshire Yeomanry was a mounted Regiment – according to my father, he would tell stories about looking after the horses, not that I ever saw him near one! The Herts Yeomanry joined with others to form the “Yeomanry Mounted Brigade” over in Egypt, initially to defend the essential Suez Canal supply route (mainly oil) from possible attacks by the Turks who had allied with the Central Powers (Germany and Austria-Hungary) soon after outbreak of hostilities. Because they were mounted (i.e. a Cavalry troop), the basic grade soldiers normally called Privates were known as “Troopers”, and where normally there would have been separate “Companies” in an army infantry Regiment, the equivalent were known as “Squadrons”.
Regrettably, the only mementoes I have of Joe, Bert and Charlie from that time are two studio ‘postcard’ family portraits (shown here – one with parents Lewis William, my Great Grandfather and his wife Elizabeth, nee Lewis, the other with Joe and his younger brothers), along with two framed enlarged photos of Charlie, which were kept and treasured by my Grandparents in memory of the sadness of his loss. The two family shots I find particularly poignant – my Grandfather (Joe) is stood (or sat) in “civi” clothes in both, flanked in both by Bert (left) and Charlie (right). Charlie and Bert, looking slightly sad, are looking directly to camera, while Joe seems to be either have his mind elsewhere or is being deliberately aloof (or both!).
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Back row: Hubert, Joe and Charlie Front: Parents Elizabeth & Lewis |
Grandpa Joe flanked by younger brothers Hubert and Charlie |
My initial conclusion was that these photo were taken just before the war, with Joe aged about 21, Charlie 20 and Bert 19. Charlie was 22 years old when he “Died of Wounds” after fighting on the Somme in 1916. Through a search of the GRO, I discovered that Bert died in 1930, apparently never recovering from wounds he received (although admittedly that seems quite a long time!) And as I said before, my Grandfather survived. The picture gives the impression that the two younger sons are going off to war and the family wanted a “final memory” (presumably a fairly common event), with maybe the eldest son reluctantly staying behind to help look after the family business interests (etc), and showing his displeasure (if not his disinterest!).
The above scenario may well be the case, but having now looked at the war records (and figuring that Joe always looked a bit older than 21 in the photos!), it is possible that in fact Charlie and Bert had returned from their initial duties (that got them their 1914 Stars), and Joe was also about to be dispatched to serve on the Western Front as one of the dwindling number of fully-fit men having served in Egypt fighting the Turks of the “Ottoman Empire” (who were in league with the Germans and threatening the essential supply route through the Suez canal). This would put the photo as c. Dec 1915 when some of the Herts Yeamanry were redeployed – little did Joe know that he was to be gassed at some point and probably very nearly to join the fate of his two younger brothers.
I will probably never know the truth about the photo. Regrettably, my Grandparents had both passed away before I was inspired to ask about any details and my father could not help. But I am sure that all of you who have similar photos, pause for a few seconds every time you flick through your albums and wonder what was going through the minds of the people in them, and how a few saw a happy ending, but many (if not most) saw at least one tragic loss. In our case, two of the three sons were taken away, which considerably “narrowed” my Badham lineage at one stroke.
As I have already said, Grandpa Joe served in Egypt and (eventually) France, but was gassed and had a terrible cough for the rest of his life (as I recall) – he blamed it on the gassing, which I’m sure didn’t help, but smoking “roll-ups”, Capstan Full Strength and un-tipped Players Weights probably didn’t help either! Even at the tender age I was when I knew him, I had spotted that as a possible flaw in his argument! He did not get a 14 or 15 Star because he joined the Western Europe theatre after the “qualifying” date. Therefore, he would have stood with a lesser display of medals than others would, but I am sure he would have stood there just as proud. Having said that, he might well have stood just as distant and aloof as in the picture! It’s also a shock to work out that he would now be 112 years old (Charlie and Bert 111 and 110 respectively), which explains the dwindling numbers of “old soldiers” proudly marching past the Cenotaph at this year’s Armistice Parade. Apparently (at the time of writing) 26 service men are still around today, which is a miracle in itself.
As an interesting aside, while investigating all this using a range of fantastically useful web-sites, I suddenly realised I’d kept seeing the phrase “Pip, Squeak and Wilfred”! It transpires that the typically awarded three medals (a Star, a BWM and a Victory Medal) were given the names “Pip, Squeak and Wilfred”, after a comic strip of the same name that appeared in the Daily Mirror soon after the end of the War, which consisted of adventures concerning a bizarre combination of a dog, a penguin and a rabbit! To me, it is one of those pieces of information that makes little sense to us these days (literally, a case of “you had to be there”), but seems to brilliantly reflect the humour and maybe the general attitude towards the War and other aspects of the times.
Most medal images are courtesy of Sarah Jane Framing and Medals.
An excellent site, the “Long, Long Trail” at:
contains an immense amount of detail about the Great War, its fighting forces and battles, and tons of other background material. This can be supplemented by resources such as can be found at the British Library:
http://www.bl.uk/world-war-one
plus, of course, any sites that are dedicated to individual regiments and their history.