Documents relating to two different men in the same officer's record file at the National Archives: What to do next?

[rolt968]

At my last visit to the National Archives before the COVID pandemic, I came across an officer's record file which contained documents about two officers with the same name (although one had a second forename which did not appear on all his documents). I may have raised this in the forum before(?).

When I finally got back to TNA again last October among other things I looked at the file again. There was plenty of evidence that there was information about two different men - two sets of documents about commissioning with different dates (one in 1915, the other in 1917) - different originating units and units into which they were commissioned. There were also documents which referred to their fathers who had different forenames.

Apart from their names the thing which the two men had most in common was that they came from the area of north western Angus (and eastern Perthshire). Perhaps to people in London their home addresses looked similar - but knowing the area, not to me.

I consulted one of the advisors at the helpdesk and he submitted information for me. I have seen a copy of the email he sent which includes both men's full names, their original units and serial numbers and the units into which they were commisioned. All of which I had obtained from the file.

When I got home I was able to do a little more research and found that the "second" man, the one with the second forename also had an officer's record at TNA. I also found out (no surprise to me) that the men were paternal second cousins.

I was surpised to receive an email a few days later which said that the file had been examined and there was "enough information to suggest that the files are related to the same individual".

I do not mean to be critical of the TNA staff in any way. Firstly, I am fairly sure that the mix up dates back to the days when the files were in the hands of the War Office. Secondly I am not sure what level of knowledge about WW1 documents remains at TNA following staff reductions.

I am not quite sure what if anything to do next. If it was not possible for someone to see that there were documents relating to two men, would it be possible for someone to sort them out? I am tempted to leave things alone. After reading the file twice I was able to work out which pages refered to which man, but perhaps I have some skill in reading WW1 soldiers' records (?).

What do colleagues advise?

One thing I will do next time I get to TNA is to check the "other" officer's record to see if it has any documents relating to my man.

RM

[TEW]

There's another similar topic.

I reported a mis-described WO95 diary but as the cover sheet gave the wrong unit they would only Key as seen and would not correct the listing.

You could try the Have you seen an error method and perhaps try to add some evidence that there are two distinct individuals. Otherwise the only option would be to tag the file with both full names.

TEW

[rolt968]

Thank you for that.

Obviously the files must remain as delivered (which I had forgotten last October).

The best solution seems to be to have the catalogue entries tagged in some way (both the entry for the record which I saw, but also the entry for the record of the "other" officer (indicating there are more documents elsewhere)). I am not sure if tagging the catalogue entry is possible.

I think I will wait until I have seen the other officer's record and then try to convince the powers that be at TNA. However I will do it from home which allows me to sibmit photographs of some of the pages.

RM