RootsChat.Com
General => Armed Forces => World War Two => Topic started by: Poppy17 on Tuesday 07 November 23 18:26 GMT (UK)
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I requested my father's record from mod Glasgow. Was redirected to national archives and have been waiting 12 months and cannot get any information. My father was only in the army for the duration of the war so there cannot be many documents. Have raised two complaints but still no answer. Any help/advice would be appreciated.
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At what stage are you with TNA?
Is your father's name in the catalogue yet? - if not it may well be awaiting cataloguing among a mountain of others.
Have you ordered his documents (or rather a copy?) - there may well be a big queue for this as well.
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I applied to MOD Scotland in July 2022. Had cheque and death certificate returned saying I had to apply to TNA which I did October/November 2022. They also told me to quote their reference when apply to the TNA Initially I had monthly updates telling me there were a lot of requests. I forwarded the death certificate before they asked for it. I hardly get any updates now only ones saying it can take 6-12 months which I have passed. I have been on chat quoting the relevant reference number I have been given and all they say is they will pass the chat stream to the complaints team (twice). I didn't wish to make a complaint just get my father's military records. I know very little just that he served in Egypt but could have served elsewhere. He went in as a private and became a corporal so would like to know how this came about. There seems to be a brick wall at the TNA
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Thanks for the details. From what you say it looks as if you are in a queue.
When all was with the MOD they prioritised welfare cases and other research was understandably sidelined. From what I've gathered, records from the MOD will need cataloguing and maybe conservation before they can be accessed.
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Thanks. I just wish they would be upfront and say we're snowed under at the moment but we will get to your request.
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My mother's first husband was only in the army for the war (came home on a stretcher and died in a London hospital) but his service record had several pages; Poppy17 you might be surprised when you do get your father's record.
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Think he was probably like most who served, never mentioned it at all.
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Just to put things in perspective, in the most recent transfer TNA received 4,837,951 individual sets of records from around a dozen Army Record offices, all of which used slight variations on how they indexed and filed the information. All of these files were moved in large containers, only some of which have so far been opened and fully processed. As mentioned in an earlier comment the TNA staff have go through every set of documents to re-index it, digitize the contents and do conservation as required on the originals, and then transfer the information to the TNA Discovery portal. Any requests for documents by members of the public have to be fitted in around this work. I believe the team working on all this is less than a dozen in number, although that may just be the processing and indexing staff.
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Perhaps if the TNA were more up front, the public would be more likely to understand why such delays occur. The TNA say it can take up to 12 months and my wait has been longer. Perhaps if they briefly explained what they are doing (without a full explanation) and say it could take much longer I and others would be more understanding. You sound very knowledgeable of the full procedure.
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Poppy
You may find this TNA video useful: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpCgYrp19Bc
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Very complex and probably won't be available in my lifetime. Thanks for your help