2nd Battalion, Royal Irish Regiment.

[FROGSMILE]

12 minutes ago, Captain Chip said:

Ok, it says in the War Diaries my unit went to Devonport and stayed there from July 29 to August 12th. I must ask were in Devonport would they have stayed? From the look of things, Devonport is mainly a Naval-type base.

 

Nowadays it’s all been encompassed by a single, unitary area of Plymouth, but at that time there were three separate areas, Devonport, Stonehouse and Plymouth. There was an army garrison in one and a naval base in the other.  The principal Army base was Raglan Barracks: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raglan_Barracks,_Devonport

As I’ve told you before there’s much information to be found by simply searching the forum, but you seem determined to be spoon fed, which surprises me for a putative author.  People in the forum are generally happy to help, but you’re missing out on so much untapped information that’s easily accessible here if you will but search for it.  See:

1. 

 

Edited 7 January by FROGSMILE

[Captain Chip]

Oh! Ok, thanks! And I also read something about placing reserves in case a battalion was destroyed. How was it decided who would placed there?

[FROGSMILE]

7 minutes ago, Captain Chip said:

Oh! Ok, thanks! And I also read something about placing reserves in case a battalion was destroyed. How was it decided who would placed there?

You can find information by searching within the forum “Battle Surplus”, “Battle Reserve” and “Left out of Battle” that all refer to the same policy.

For Devonport’s Army associations also see: 

 

Edited 7 January by FROGSMILE

[Des Moriarty]

On 05/01/2024 at 02:50, Captain Chip said:

Anyways, If anyone here can answer this question, What were the casualties of Company A at the Battle of Mons?

I have a roll of honour for the Royal Irish regiment 

https://www.ciroca.org.uk/first-world-war-links/infantry-regiments-1914-18/royal-irish-regiment-deaths-1914/

also a written history of the regiment 

https://www.askaboutireland.ie/aai-files/assets/ebooks/ebooks-2011/history-and-campaigns-of-the-royal-irish-regiment/GEOGHEGAN_CAMPAIGNS-HISTORY-OF-THE-ROYAL-IRISH-REGIMENT-VOLII_1900-1922.pdf

 

 

[Captain Chip]

Thanks mate. And good god. My characters are going to be going through hell practically! It'll be a miracle if any of them survive the war! 

[Des Moriarty]

16 minutes ago, Captain Chip said:

Thanks mate. And good god. My characters are going to be going through hell practically! It'll be a miracle if any of them survive the war! 

Royal Irish had a few rough moments, almost wiped out in Mons. Also one of the first to be gassed in Ypres, and didn’t have any gas masks. Also badly mauled in the Somme 

[Des Moriarty]

 The war had a high casualty rate, and the chances of an individual soldier surviving from start to finish were relatively slim. The Royal Irish Regiment, like many others, faced intense and brutal fighting throughout the war, leading to significant casualties.

However, there would likely have been individuals who did survive from the beginning to the end of the war. Some soldiers might have been rotated out of front-line service, wounded and sent home, or perhaps they were just fortunate. 

[Captain Chip]

Well, I can take some creative liberty but god. A company was in the think of it. From what it seems they would only number 20 or so men after each battle! 

 

[Des Moriarty]

This may help 

 

https://livesofthefirstworldwar.iwm.org.uk/community/3413

 

 

[Captain Chip]

That was the article that inspired me to undertake writing this book. But thanks.

[Des Moriarty]

2 minutes ago, Captain Chip said:

That was the article that inspired me to undertake writing this book. But thanks.

Thought it was in line with what you were describing, didn’t realise that you had been there before me 😀

[Captain Chip]

I have been asking questions, looking at sites, and more for almost...12 days now I think. It is just that the British don't keep records on just companies. They don't even list what company a man is with unless he is an officer it seems. In America, especially during the Civil War, we have rosters. Listing men and which company they are in. In my opinion, this is so much better. Anyways, thanks again.

[FROGSMILE]

1 hour ago, Captain Chip said:

I have been asking questions, looking at sites, and more for almost...12 days now I think. It is just that the British don't keep records on just companies. They don't even list what company a man is with unless he is an officer it seems. In America, especially during the Civil War, we have rosters. Listing men and which company they are in. In my opinion, this is so much better. Anyways, thanks again.

There were company rosters maintained within battalions, they simply haven’t survived.  The war lasted from 1914 to 1919, was fought on more than just the Western Front, involved around a million casualties, and then early in WW2 had the storage area of the records in the London Docks firebombed, with the resulting destruction of 5/6th of the records and with most of the remainder water and smoke damaged.  Making comparisons with the American Civil War records is like comparing chalk with cheese and quite ludicrous. 

Edited 7 January by FROGSMILE

[Michelle Young]

To quote L P Hartley.

“The past is a foreign country, they do things differently there.”

You also have to remember the class system that existed  at the time. Officers are far more likely to get a mention in any documents. 

[Captain Chip]

6 minutes ago, FROGSMILE said:

There were company rosters maintained within battalions, they simply haven’t survived.  The war lasted from 1914 to 1919, was fought on more than just the Western Front, involved around a million casualties, and then early in WW2 had the storage area of the records in the London Docks firebombed, with the resulting destruction of 5/6th of the records and with most of the remainder water and smoke damaged.  Making comparisons with the American Civil War is like comparing chalk with cheese and quite ludicrous. 

I'M SORRY! I am a Civil War Buff, that is the closest comparison I got! To be honest I am slightly going mad from this unit.

Edited 7 January by Captain Chip

[FROGSMILE]

Just now, Captain Chip said:

I'M SORRY! I am a Civil War Buff, that is the closest comparison I got!

You will get the readership you deserve if you think that 12-days research even begins to scratch the surface of what you need to know to write a convincing narrative.  Are you a university or college student?

[PRC]

1 hour ago, Captain Chip said:

I have been asking questions, looking at sites, and more for almost...12 days now I think. It is just that the British don't keep records on just companies. They don't even list what company a man is with unless he is an officer it seems. In America, especially during the Civil War, we have rosters. Listing men and which company they are in. In my opinion, this is so much better.

Yes the US Army rosters from the Great War have been a help in answering a number of queries over the years on the forum, as have the many illustrated books that were produced in the aftermath that significantly increase the chances of finding the holy grail that most seek, a photograph of a relative - but should you try to delve into the service records then I believe the fire at your own storage facility caused the loss of an even bigger percentage of records than the Germans managed with planes full of bombs!

We have to just be thankful for what has survived and learn how to extract every last ounce of useful information and draw on the experience of others in a respectful way. From your perspective I would have thought that could be turned into a postive. Like a Flashman novel your events only have to be plausible - for an individual soldier all he knows about is what is happening around him. He has no view of the bigger picture, and if most of the officers are dead, wounded, captured or missing, then probably nor will anyone else. The truish picture may only gradually emerge - sometimes only when the captured individuals are released post-war, by which time memories are no longer fresh and events can be jumbled, names mis-remembered, people put in places they could not have been, others who could have corroborated are dead or spread to the four coners of the globe, etc, etc..

Having evaded the firefight, your A Company survivors will not find a helpful note saying we retreated that way, and may have no idea if anyone else survived or if help is coming. They will be confused and making decisions on very little information - head towards the sound of the fighting in what had been their rear area or turn away from it.

I suggested in one of these threads the possibility of dismounted French Cavalrymen who were on the flank at Le Pilly joining with the Irish to evade capture. Is it plausible  - yes. Is there any any documentation to say it happened - almost certainly no, but on the other hand that also means no documentation to say it didn't. Would it be too cliched for one to know the area from peacetime - probably

And for a piece of creative fiction how many do you need to survive? - the historic record is unclear and there will be a rump of men who survived anyway because they were not cut-off - but they may well have exchanged gun-fire with the German troops who were doing the encircling. In their telling they may have "escaped" from the battle. I take it that unless you find a memoir from one individual around which you will base your story that the individuals will be composite characters anyway with fictionalised names. But 20 characters - even if you are George R.R. Martin or J.R.R. Tolkien - is almost certainly too many. And while a platoon or a rump of a company might have made it out together it would seem just as likely that small groups and individuals might gradually come together in what was probably an ever-deceasing number of "safe" places.

So in my opinion - for what little it's worth - may be time to draw back and work out truely what it is you are trying to do. Are you writing the definitive documentary based research piece and then fictionalising it, or a piece "based on the" or "inspired by" that leads to a good bit of storytelling. If you stay true to the spirit, remain plausible, and don't try to hang your plot on some McGuffin that could never have happened then the events themselves tell a tale worth telling.

Cheers,
Peter

[Captain Chip]

Peter. Your right. I have been overthinking this whole story. I just need to tell my story and leave it at that. I don't need exact figures. I just need to follow the story of the battalion through my character's point of view. I'll take this to another chat. But I did plan on just 12 Characters to start with. All friends from Kilkenny Ireland. All of them enlisted in 1905 at the age of 16 minus one who was 15. But you are right. It's historical fiction. It should stay at that.

[PRC]

32 minutes ago, Captain Chip said:

All of them enlisted in 1905 at the age of 16 minus one who was 15.

The minimum age of enlistment was 18 with a small group of exceptions for musicians normally taken at 14/15. Yes the British Army was always missing their recruiting targets, and the recruiting sergeants could turn a slightly blind eye when a big promising lad came along who stated they were "18" and pocket his reward, but a group trying to enlist together might be chancing his luck. His future retention as a recruiter would get judged on how many made it through training satisfactorily / didn't fess up their true age.

BTW the young musicians had to be approved by the Army Head Office, enlisted for 12 years in the colours as far as I'm aware and were often "sons of the regiment", (father served and died or was disabled), from workhouse orphanages or industrial schools (young offenders).

The standard short service enlistment in 1905 in an infantry battalion was 3 years in the colours and 9 years in the reserves. The recruit could ask to vary the split with more time spent in the colours, but they would have to push for it. Which begs the question would a group of recruits lieing about their age to enlist draw attention to themselves in that way. More likely after they had done their first year they would ask to extend their time in the colours and do less in the reserves. But by then the group could well have been broken up as a result of posting to different Companys or even Battalions.

Because of the adverse effect 3+9 had on garrisioning the Empire I believe about late 1906 the Army went over to 9+3 before reverting after a couple of years to 7+ 5. So from 1907 onwards your group will be in the colours all the way through to August 1914 and beyond.

I would suspect much of the employment in an area like Kilkenny would have been agricultural related. May not apply but my observation of peacetime recruiting to the Norfolk Regiment is that it tends to peak in October \ November and stays at an elevated level through to about March. My working theory is that these young lads of 18-19 had worked hard all summer as seasonal hires but still hadn't learned the discipline of saving for when no work was available. With the money spent and not much prospect of casual farm work until the spring, they were looking for a dry roof over their head, a clean bed of their own, warm housing, three square meals, decent clothing, and coins in their pockets all year round. If their families couldn't \ wouldn't support them and if they'd been through the lean months in previous winters then I suspect the Army would have looked like the best of a bad choice.

Cheers,
Peter

[Captain Chip]

Ok... so have them enlist in say... 1907? And the reason they joined the army was because they didn't want to do farming.

Edited 8 January by Captain Chip

[FROGSMILE]

7 hours ago, PRC said:

The minimum age of enlistment was 18 with a small group of exceptions for musicians normally taken at 14/15. Yes the British Army was always missing their recruiting targets, and the recruiting sergeants could turn a slightly blind eye when a big promising lad came along who stated they were "18" and pocket his reward, but a group trying to enlist together might be chancing his luck. His future retention as a recruiter would get judged on how many made it through training satisfactorily / didn't fess up their true age.

BTW the young musicians had to be approved by the Army Head Office, enlisted for 12 years in the colours as far as I'm aware and were often "sons of the regiment", (father served and died or was disabled), from workhouse orphanages or industrial schools (young offenders).

The standard short service enlistment in 1905 in an infantry battalion was 3 years in the colours and 9 years in the reserves. The recruit could ask to vary the split with more time spent in the colours, but they would have to push for it. Which begs the question would a group of recruits lieing about their age to enlist draw attention to themselves in that way. More likely after they had done their first year they would ask to extend their time in the colours and do less in the reserves. But by then the group could well have been broken up as a result of posting to different Companys or even Battalions.

Because of the adverse effect 3+9 had on garrisioning the Empire I believe about late 1906 the Army went over to 9+3 before reverting after a couple of years to 7+ 5. So from 1907 onwards your group will be in the colours all the way through to August 1914 and beyond.

I would suspect much of the employment in an area like Kilkenny would have been agricultural related. May not apply but my observation of peacetime recruiting to the Norfolk Regiment is that it tends to peak in October \ November and stays at an elevated level through to about March. My working theory is that these young lads of 18-19 had worked hard all summer as seasonal hires but still hadn't learned the discipline of saving for when no work was available. With the money spent and not much prospect of casual farm work until the spring, they were looking for a dry roof over their head, a clean bed of their own, warm housing, three square meals, decent clothing, and coins in their pockets all year round. If their families couldn't \ wouldn't support them and if they'd been through the lean months in previous winters then I suspect the Army would have looked like the best of a bad choice.

Cheers,
Peter

All good thoughts Peter.  As well as musicians (band boys) and drummers (two separate arrangements) Boys could enlist and be effectively apprenticed to the two infantry battalion workshops.  Tailors and Shoemakers.  Each under a sergeant on the battalion HQ staff (ergo staff sergeants) who were paid a stipend for each individual boy they brought up to a set trade standard.  Upon reaching the age of 18 Boy entrants had the option of joining a service company, as a majority apparently usually did, and also transitioned onto the adult pay rate.

The enclosed photos show the Enlisted Boys contingent of four different infantry battalions in the period straddling 1902-1922.  The Boys were accommodated in a separate barracks block under the supervision of an NCO (often from the band) until they reached adulthood.  The boys in the lowermost and very faded photo are those of the Connaught Rangers home service battalion just prewar.

Edited 8 January by FROGSMILE

[PRC]

9 hours ago, Captain Chip said:

Ok... so have them enlist in say... 1907? And the reason they joined the army was because they didn't want to do farming.

Can't comment on the situation in Ireland, but in a rural agricultural county like Norfolk an Ordinary Agricultural Labourer as they were known in the heirarchy had no job protection, being taken on at a hiring day in the spring and released in the autumn. Some might get a longer period by becoming a specialist such as Cowman \ Cowboy or Horseman. Others got to this stage by getting married and finding a farming job with a tied cottage - but that gave their farmer employer complete control over them. Attempts to unionise led to violence on both sides.

The temptation for those with a bit of get and go would be to save up the money to become a farmer - either a tenant farmer in this country or by emigrating to the White Dominions,  (Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, and to a lesser extent South Africa) and the U.S. where land grants were available at no\minimal cost. In England children from teens onwards were then engaged in the recognised profession of "Farmer's Son" and "Farmer's Daughter" - these farms were often too small to be able to afford waged labour. And the failure rate was high amongst tenant farmers - rents were reviewed on an annual basis, and as the landlord controlled a number of factors such as how the land was used, they could arbitraily choose to evict one of the less productive farmers so another one could expand and probably invest in machinery, starting a cycle of consolidation.

Of more relevance to your story, a bit of digging in local newspapers \ histories will probably turn up evidence of a poor crop \ animal disease outbreak in the period 1907-pre-war 1914.  The resultant shortage of casual work would probably be compounded by ordinary agricultural labourers being paid off, increasing the desperation off finding work as a growing pool of men sought a shrinking pool of jobs - making emigration or the army look like increasingly attractive options. As the cause would affect whole communities, it would be less surprising that a group of friends might come to the same decision as to which option to take - at 18, (or possibly via the Militia at 17 and a half)

3 hours ago, FROGSMILE said:

As well as musicians (band boys) and drummers (two separate arrangements) Boys could enlist and be effectively apprenticed to the two infantry battalion workshops.  Tailors and Shoemakers.  Each under a sergeant on the battalion HQ staff (ergo staff sergeants) who were paid a stipend for each individual boy they brought up to a set trade standard.  Upon reaching the age of 18 Boy entrants had the option of joining a service company, as a majority apparently usually did, and also transitioned onto the adult pay rate.

Thanks @FROGSMILE. Would it be fair to say that it is very unlikely that the regiment would take on twelve individuals at the same time in any of those categories?
The proposed scenario was twelve friends joining at the same time, and presumably then continuing to serve together up to Mons and beyond. So really it's question of @Captain Chip coming up with a plausible timeline for that to happen.

Cheers,
Peter

[Captain Chip]

On it. Be back soon with the results.

 

[FROGSMILE]

1 hour ago, PRC said:

Can't comment on the situation in Ireland, but in a rural agricultural county like Norfolk an Ordinary Agricultural Labourer as they were known in the heirarchy had no job protection, being taken on at a hiring day in the spring and released in the autumn. Some might get a longer period by becoming a specialist such as Cowman \ Cowboy or Horseman. Others got to this stage by getting married and finding a farming job with a tied cottage - but that gave their farmer employer complete control over them. Attempts to unionise led to violence on both sides.

The temptation for those with a bit of get and go would be to save up the money to become a farmer - either a tenant farmer in this country or by emigrating to the White Dominions,  (Australia, Canada, and New Zealand, and to a lesser extent South Africa) and the U.S. where land grants were available at no\minimal cost. In England children from teens onwards were then engaged in the recognised profession of "Farmer's Son" and "Farmer's Daughter" - these farms were often too small to be able to afford waged labour. And the failure rate was high amongst tenant farmers - rents were reviewed on an annual basis, and as the landlord controlled a number of factors such as how the land was used, they could arbitraily choose to evict one of the less productive farmers so another one could expand and probably invest in machinery, starting a cycle of consolidation.

Of more relevance to your story, a bit of digging in local newspapers \ histories will probably turn up evidence of a poor crop \ animal disease outbreak in the period 1907-pre-war 1914.  The resultant shortage of casual work would probably be compounded by ordinary agricultural labourers being paid off, increasing the desperation off finding work as a growing pool of men sought a shrinking pool of jobs - making emigration or the army look like increasingly attractive options. As the cause would affect whole communities, it would be less surprising that a group of friends might come to the same decision as to which option to take - at 18, (or possibly via the Militia at 17 and a half)

Thanks @FROGSMILE. Would it be fair to say that it is very unlikely that the regiment would take on twelve individuals at the same time in any of those categories?
The proposed scenario was twelve friends joining at the same time, and presumably then continuing to serve together up to Mons and beyond. So really it's question of @Captain Chip coming up with a plausible timeline for that to happen.

Cheers,
Peter

Yes it wouldn’t be accurate.  New Boys were enlisted at the same rate that those ahead of them in age reached their 18th birthdays.  From after the 2nd Boer War the age range became 14 to 17.  Before that it was 12 to 17.

Edited 8 January by FROGSMILE

[Captain Chip]

Ok got it. I only mention this factor in one segment of the book. But just you guys pointing out that this is highly unlikely for them to even join in 1905.