Filed under Photographs and Personal Papers: A Method Guide
Where should you start looking?
A cap badge can suggest a regiment or corps, but badges were worn by attached personnel and misremembered in captions. Use a badge as a lead, then confirm the unit from the service record.
The record you need is usually the one for the dates you have, not the one with the most dramatic story attached to it. A record that names the right person in the wrong unit, or the right unit on the wrong dates, is a lead, not a match.
Working through it in order
Let dates set the sequence. When the order is unclear, sort by date and work forward, because records explain the entries that follow them, not the ones that precede them. Treat the steps below as a loop, not a ladder: a finding at a later step often sends you back to re-check an earlier one, and that is normal. The sequence below is a default, not a law. If a step produces a surprise, follow the surprise, and return to the sequence afterwards.
- Describe the item itself first: what it shows, what it says, and what marks it carries.
- Date the item from its own clues, uniform, badge, format or handwriting, before attaching it to a person.
- Use the dated item to frame a record search, unit, place or date, rather than as a substitute for one.
- Note the item reference and where it is held, so the next researcher can find it.
Making sense of what you find
When two sheets give different dates for the same event, note both, check which sheet was written first, and let the earlier sheet carry the timeline, with a note of the disagreement. If a word is illegible, look at the same word elsewhere in the file. Clerks repeat words, and a clear instance elsewhere can unlock an unclear one. What a record omits can be as informative as what it includes, but only if you know what that kind of record usually includes. Learn the form before you judge the gap.
Where this kind of research usually stalls
A person recorded under a middle name, a nickname, or a stepfather surname will not be found by a search on the name you know. Collect name variants first. Do not confuse a record that is hard to find with a record that does not exist. Difficulty is a property of the search, not of the record.
- An undated photograph with no caption.
- A badge shared by several units.
- A diary with few or no dates.
- A letter naming a place but no unit.
What should you check next?
Check the next record in the chain, not the next story about the same person. The chain matters: personal record, unit record, corroborating record, in that order, and then back to the personal record to test what the chain produced.
A timeline should end each session with a named next step, not with a vague intention to look further. Name the record, the reference, and the question. The record set will not hurry for you, and you should not hurry for it. Slow, referenced work is the only kind that survives checking.
Primary sources for this guide
This guide keeps its claims general and points to the official holders, so the holder itself is the place to check the current position. It is general educational information only, not personal professional advice, and it offers no record lookup service and no determination of any individual's service.