How Do I Follow an Army Transfer?

What should you look for first?

Follow transfers through dated posting entries, one move at a time, and note when the service number changes. A transfer between regiments or corps is a new unit trail, not a continuation of the old one.

If the first search returns a crowd of same-name results, narrow by dates before you narrow by anything else: dates cut a crowd faster than spellings do. The catalogue entry is a record in its own right. Read it fully before you open the record it describes, because it tells you what you are about to see. A record set arranged by unit will not yield to a surname search, and a record set arranged by date will not yield to a unit search. Learn the arrangement first.

Reading what the record actually says

When a record and a published history disagree, the record written at the time wins, and the history becomes a question, not an answer. A name entered in a different hand, or in different ink, may have been added later, for a later purpose. Ask when an entry was made, not only what it says.

What looks like a sudden posting, promotion or move often has its explanation in a correction, a marginal note, or an entry on the next sheet. Do not carry a final rank, a final trade, or a final unit backwards through a career. Every entry belongs to its own date, and the career is the sequence, not the endpoint.

Dead ends to expect here

The most common reason a search fails is a date filter that is too tight. Widen the range by a year on each side before you conclude anything is missing. A transcription error can hide the right entry completely, because you search for the correct spelling and the index holds the wrong one. Try variants deliberately. A missing sheet, a closed record, or a file held by another holder are three different problems, and each has a different next step. Do not treat them as one problem called missing.

Working through it in order

Order matters more than speed here. The same records, opened in a different order, produce a different timeline, and only one of those orders can be checked. Work from the most reliable record you have towards the least, not from the most interesting towards the most convenient. When working with family papers, note who holds the original and where it is kept. A paper you cannot relocate is a paper you cannot verify.

1. Fix the service dates first, so you know which holder is likely to hold the file.
2. Note the regiment or corps and the service number together, exactly as written.
3. List postings and transfers in date order, and treat each transfer as a new thread to check.
4. Test every later record, medal, casualty or war diary entry, against the personal file before adding it to the timeline.

The next record in the chain

Do not open a new area of research to escape a dead end in this one. Note the dead end, choose the next check inside this area, and only then widen the search. Work the chain one link at a time. A timeline built link by link can be checked; a timeline built by jumping to the most interesting record cannot.

The related guides at the foot of this page link back to the pillar for this section and to the neighbouring guides, so you can move through the cluster without losing the person you started with. Stop at the record that answers the question, and note the reference before moving on.