All about War Diaries 1914-1918

I've published thousands of blog posts over the years and I've written hundreds of thousands of words, mostly on military topics. My most popular blog is Army Service Numbers 1881-1918 which I see is ten years old this year. I also own the website, British Army Ancestors, which I launched last year and which takes up the majority of what little spare time I have.

War diaries 1914-1918 - Room for one more blog

But there's always room for another blog and I think that war diaries of the First World War are a neglected area of interest. Too many people, when researching their British Army Ancestors, dismiss the war diaries, believing that their ancestor will not be mentioned in them. And whilst it's true that other ranks are certainly, as a whole, mentioned less frequently than officers, very many war diaries contain great information on the ordinary soldier. Such mentions can be vital if that man's service record also happens to be one of the millions that was destroyed in bombing during the Second World War.

War Diaries 1914-1918 - Purpose

And so the aim of this modest blog is quite simply to document those war diaries which contain details of other ranks. And along the way, I hope also to be able to pick out and highlight other points of interest. I shall promote this on Facebook and also, to a lesser degree, on Twitter. I will create an index on this blog that will hopefully lead people and search engines to the relevant pages where their ancestor might be mentioned.

War Diaries 1914-1918 - Online resources

The war diaries themselves, for so many years inaccessible unless you were prepared to trek across London to Kew, are now easily available via Ancestry, The National Archives website and The Naval & Military Archive. Of the three sources, The Naval & Military Archive (run by Naval & Military Press) offers the most cost-effective access to multiple volumes, and the search functionality is also refreshingly easy to use. Furthermore, once you're on the Naval & Military Archive site you will also have access to millions of soldiers' records. A day's membership costs just £10 whilst for £25 you'll have access for a whole month.

This will be a journey of discovery for me too and it's one that will not be accomplished overnight. I will endeavour to publish posts weekly and I will regularly update the index. I welcome comments.

The illustration at the top of this post comes from the war diary of the 6th Yorkshire Regiment and there are various versions of these elaborate covers as the months unfold. No prizes for guessing how the talented diarist whiled away some of his time in the trenches.

Paul Nixon
31st July 2018