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General => The Common Room => Topic started by: Marianthompson47 on Friday 12 December 25 20:57 GMT (UK)
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I wrote to the MOD earlier this year requesting military records for my father.
They wrote in October to say that they had found said records and asked me to pay around £28 adding the records would be sent to me within 20 days.
I made the payment straight away and waited.
Then I received another email saying they were looking for records!?
I responded quoting the information they have sent me, but no response.
Today, I have received another long email where they are quoting Public Interest Test where I understand they have to ensure my father would be happy for this information to be released to the public!
My father had been dead for over 60 years!? How can they communicate with him?
Why did they not ensure they complied with rules BEFORE taking my money!?
I am not sure where to turn as you cannot even call them and they do not respond to my emails.
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This seems to be where you can complain to, hopefully they can help.....
https://www.gov.uk/get-copy-military-records-of-service/complaints
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Deleted, replied to wrong post ::)
Jane :-)
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Aren’t they in process of transferring all the records from the MOD to the NA?
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Marian,
Is the MOD citing section 41 of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act 2000 in their response to you?
I ask this because I have recently had a similar knock-back - in connection with my request to obtain my late mother's ATS record.
Willyam
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I've been trying to get my father's WW2 records for the last two years and am making no progress whatsoever.
I applied for my Dad's service record (1940-46) in December 2023. I had regular updates,which were basically apologies for the delay, until about a year ago. I tried to chase it, with no result.
Earlier this month I had a lengthy and rather odd e mail out of the blue , which said his record was embargoed until 2033, but they didn't have proof of death (where had that gone? I submitted it originally) and basically invited me to [re]submit his death certificate and try again.
I did this and now I have an e mail which confirms they have found his record, but also says this:
"This record is currently closed under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and will need to be sensitivity reviewed before we can determine whether it is possible to open it to the public.
This department is currently handling an exceptionally high volume of cases. This has led to some delays in the service, meaning that it may take us longer than usual to respond to your request. We apologise for this and thank you for your patience.
Please note that in order to process requests as quickly as possible, we will be unable to answer requests for updates on specific cases. We are also unable to prioritise specific requests, or to take special personal circumstances into consideration."
That's pretty much the same response as I initially received in December 2023, when they said it would take about six months to process my request.
As far as I am aware, my Dad had an undistinguished war. Conscripted into the RAMC in 1940, he rose to the dizzy heights of WO2 and was then demobilised in 1946.
I will keep trying, but this is the most lengthy and obtuse process I have ever come across.
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Marian,
Is the MOD citing section 41 of the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act 2000 in their response to you?
I ask this because I have recently had a similar knock-back - in connection with my request to obtain my late mother's ATS record.
Willyam
They say that the public Interest Test is currently ongoing. They hadn't mentioned it before.
Adding some if the information in the record I'd covered by section 38, a qualified exemption under the FOI?!
The FOI gives me the right to know whether they hold the info I want.
It goes on and on about section 48 and dection 41.
It says it contains medical information that had been deemed to have been given on confidence at that time!!
They say if an authority holds a large amount of medical information on a person, that person would not expect the info to be released to the public after they passed away. Everyone had a right to privacy!!!
It goes on and on....
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Send a letter or email to your MP detailing the request and the response.
As long as you are a direct descendant than they cannot refuse.
Anything sensitive ie Secret etc, can be redacted.
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Apparently, they state that not even next ofKin or family can view anything.
So I wonder why they asked me to pay (which I did).
This has been going on since last ysar. 😔😓
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Hello
They would perhaps have been better off saying they cannot find your record for the time being and offering a refund?
Was he Army?
Records Transferred
I am aware that Army records have been shipped for some time now and will take several years to move them.
I suspect a reference to your file was found in one of many Ledgers and the files were already packed?
We had this with an Army Private about two years ago, who left the Army in 1936, we proved death had occurred and gave his details, but it was refused under the FoI Act.
Fortunately no money was requested when the enquiry was made.
Twenty years ago, under the Release of information we had to show:-
1) the Death of the Service Person had occurred.
2) that his Wife had also died (with a photocopy Death Certificate), but because she had remarried ...
3) that her 2nd husband had also died too (with a photocopy Death Certificate)
An Index Card (photocopy from microfilm) was released, corresponded to a file and to find it would exceed £600 under FoI Act and was refused.
Those particular files were offered to the Public Record Office, but the PRO/TNA only wanted a limited sample.
Mark
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Thank you Mark. I just find the way the MOD deal with the public very light.
In fact, I wish I hadn't bothered at all as all it has done is give me headaches and sadness.
When they told me they had found several records and to pay immediately I was hoping to receive said record within 20 days, as per their statement.
Equally, when you answer their email of query anything, they simply do not respond
I think they have taken on too big a case.
😔😓
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I wrote to the MOD earlier this year requesting military records for my father.
They wrote in October to say that they had found said records and asked me to pay around £28 adding the records would be sent to me within 20 days.
I made the payment straight away and waited.
Then I received another email saying they were looking for records!?
I responded quoting the information they have sent me, but no response.
Today, I have received another long email where they are quoting Public Interest Test where I understand they have to ensure my father would be happy for this information to be released to the public!
My father had been dead for over 60 years!? How can they communicate with him?
Why did they not ensure they complied with rules BEFORE taking my money!?
I am not sure where to turn as you cannot even call them and they do not respond to my emails.
If you have paid the around £28 to the MOD and they have not honored their service in 20 days they quoted you.
I would have a word with your local MP for advice, show the MP a copy of your email of the MOD around £28 request payment ! and other communication emails the MOD have sent you as well. Seeing its Gov MOD, he or she MP maybe able make enquires on you behalf.
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Thank you!!
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I don't suppose you have the envelope and Certificate of Service of several pages that your Father was given or sent when he left the Service?
The RAF 'Certificate of Service' (Form 1996 RAFVR) was a Printed Sheet (folded) giving 4 Foolscap sides and folded into the envelope pictured (Identification painted out)
Certificate Of Service sent during WW 2
Full Name
Official No [Service Number]
Place of Birth and County
Date of Birth
Place and Date of Marriage and Maiden Name of Wife
Religion
Term of Engagement
Wife and Two Next of Kin, with their Title, initials, surnames with their full addresses and their relationship, e.g. Wife, Father, Brother
Date of Joining, Joining Office and Town
Birth Mark
Height
Chest sizes
Hair Colour
Eye colour
Date Placed on Reserve.
All the following are also dated From and To dates
Civil Navigation School, School Unit Number and Airfield Location Name
Where Trained as a Reservist
Under Training as
When moved from Reserve to Permanent
Remusterings and Promotions
Posting with Date to Operational School, Unit Number and Place
Date of Qualification and Proficiency and reference to an Award, a Badge (the material badge was a sewn on their Uniform)
Conduct
Units attached to, with From and When Dates and the Places named
Squadron Number (This was the only one, where the place was not given, but Dad told me this place and his Wife took a temporary house there) and we have several letters sent from there.
Date of Death or Discharge from the Air Force.
We applied for the RAF Service Record, but it contained nothing about their day to day Service.
But some old boys (at the Squadron Association) who applied for their personal Service Record whilst still alive, said they got very numerous photocopy sheets from their full file.
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If the Service personnel were attached to a fighting or Operational Unit most of those kind of Unit Records survive in the Archives, but it can be an expensive hunt to piece a decent history together.
RAF Operational Records are quite good from Command to Group to RAF Station or Unit. Then separate Squadron records are online.
Mark
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Thank you Mark.
My parents separated when I was 12. My mother and my siblings.remaining in Brussels, and father returning to England. I wrote to him on many occasions but then life took its toll and writing stopped.
I know very little if anything at all about his life, other than he was a piano teacher.
It's only now, in my 70ies that I found the interest in his past, because he was out of my life for many years.
Two years ago, after much research, I managed to find out where he was buried, far away from his home. And we visited twice.
I have nothing of his but a Bible, given to him in Ayr, Scotland in 1956.
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Hello
It is a great pity for family history, if the family split up and Mother did not say much about their Father's family.
"The UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) is conducting a massive project to transfer about 10 million British Armed Forces service records to The National Archives (TNA), a process expected to finish by 2027, making historical personnel files from WWII and post-war eras (up to 1963) available for public access after closure periods, with some records already online via Ancestry. This vast digitization and transfer effort aims to preserve and open up military history, though access to closed records still involves specific application processes through TNA or Gov.uk"
When the Record Office at Hayes, closed, the files went to a new storage facility with a database.
There was a press release when this new Archives opened and a local chap was a Navy Adjutant and he was reunited with one of the books that he put in a sealed drum during WW 2 before he and the drum went overboard into the Sea, so the drum must have recovered and he survived too.
Mark
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If you found his burial place.
Burial Record
Have you seen the burial record to see what is said (if it adds anything) as some give abode or circumstance / address of the death?
Some Scottish Death Certificates
Mid 20th Century onward, Death Certificates in Scotland are usually very good, my Grandmother's recorded 1st & 2nd husband names and her parents and her Father's occupation and Mother's Maiden name (which we knew was correct) back to c.1900 period.
Try Scotland's People, the official site.
They are usually like our GRO Copy Certificates, usually of a good enough quality to decipher the details.
Newspapers Online
Sometimes Death / Funeral Notices in newspapers may mention other family.
Undertakers
Undertakers, a Canadian Funeral Home helped me trace the family of a person they had buried (after getting information from the Cemetery Office) and offered to send a copy of my letter to the family and the family kindly photocopied official information they had and my relative who flew with him as Crew on flights was named in her Father's Log Book.
Undertakers Instructed by Authorities
Regarding an incident 60 years ago written enquiries were made to all three undertakers in the nearest town in England who may have collected one of the deceased wanting to know the collection place.
I could get nowhere with the Coroner and the Police Archives Store, nor Ambulance Books.
A reply came from one Undertaker, who said we only keep one Book now, because that names who we collect, the place collected from (which was a village name) and who paid for the coffin.
Regarding the date and one of the names you gave us in your letter, was named on the attached page (photocopy enclosed).
Mark
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Thank you Mark.
I discovered the General Registry Office three years ago..
I sent off for my father's death certificate.
It shows he had had an operation in Coventry and was sent to Lanherne, a recovery hospital in Dawlish, Devon. Hundreds of miles away.
Then I had to find out if his sister had claimed his body of whether there was a funeral in Devon.
I rang all the cemeteries and eventually found him.
He was actually cremated.
I owe it to him in order to carry out one last respect I owe him.
The death certificate quotes a lung problem.
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Thank you Mark.
I discovered the General Registry Office three years ago..
I sent off for my father's death certificate.
It shows he had had an operation in Coventry and was sent to Lanherne, a recovery hospital in Dawlish, Devon. Hundreds of miles away.
Then I had to find out if his sister had claimed his body of whether there was a funeral in Devon.
I rang all the cemeteries and eventually found him.
He was actually cremated.
I owe it to him in order to carry out one last respect I owe him.
The death certificate quotes a lung problem.
That sounds like the Coventry Hospital Saturday Fund convalescent home, which was still going in the 80s when I was working for the Fund's solicitors.
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My late OH was in H.M.Forces for twelve years. After his death I discovered he had a quite large leather bound book in which he was supposed to enter all his postings to various countries and also to enter his promotions.
All the pages were blank. He had been too busy working and enjoying life with his pals.
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Yes, it was a convalescent home.
I feel so guilty I didn't try and look for him when I was younger.
😔😓
And now, having to deal with the MOD who have a scrap of his past ....
ItThank you Mark.
I discovered the General Registry Office three years ago..
I sent off for my father's death certificate.
It shows he had had an operation in Coventry and was sent to Lanherne, a recovery hospital in Dawlish, Devon. Hundreds of miles away.
Then I had to find out if his sister had claimed his body of whether there was a funeral in Devon.
I rang all the cemeteries and eventually found him.
He was actually cremated.
I owe it to him in order to carry out one last respect I owe him.
The death certificate quotes a lung problem.
That sounds like the Coventry Hospital Saturday Fund convalescent home, which was still going in the 80s when I was working for the Fund's solicitors.
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Thank you Mark.
My parents separated when I was 12. My mother and my siblings.remaining in Brussels, and father returning to England. I wrote to him on many occasions but then life took its toll and writing stopped.
I know very little if anything at all about his life, other than he was a piano teacher.
It's only now, in my 70ies that I found the interest in his past, because he was out of my life for many years.
Two years ago, after much research, I managed to find out where he was buried, far away from his home. And we visited twice.
I have nothing of his but a Bible, given to him in Ayr, Scotland in 1956.
Hello
If the Service record is currently not available for some reason or other and you want to go back on your Father's line.
If your parents married, have you applied and been able to obtain a Copy of their Marriage Certificate or a Copy of the Marriage Entry from the Register?
Depending on the country where they married, his Father may be given, or more?
If they married in Brussels (from A.I.) so may be the current information gathered ...
"A Brussels marriage certificate provides rich family history, listing the bride's & groom's full names, ages, occupations, residences, and birthplaces, plus names, occupations, and residences of their parents, details on any previous spouses, and witnesses' names and occupations, acting as a key genealogical source to trace family lines back further. You can access these records through the State Archives of Belgium or by requesting them from the municipal administration where the marriage occurred, keeping in mind privacy rules for newer records (75 years)."
Mark
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Thank you Mark
Yes, my parents were married in Anderlechf (Brussels) and I have asked for a copy of their marriage certificate which lists all details you mentioned.
I also have acquired about 500 sheets of information regarding my family from the "Archives de l'Etat" as my mother, grandmother and great aunt were German.
Lots of personal letters too from My German grandfather writing from prison in Belgium. He was incarcerated because he was German.
He was extradiated from Germany because he refused to divorce my grandmother who was Jewish and my grandfather worked for the German government.
It's very complicated.
But to come back to my father, I have just received yet another email from the MOD informing me that they acknowledge my request for an internal review!? With a reference number and warn me it could take months! I don't know what on earth they are talking about!?
They are NOT addressing the fact that they told me they have found records and acknowledged receipt of my payment...
I give up...
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Being WW2 time in your fathers history ! there were lots of records covered by the 100 years rule, Its a bit like the 1939 register where people who had been called up or regulars in the forces had their names censored - crossed out with black markers.
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Indeed, we asked the MOD for my father in law's war records.
Of the three pages of information that were sent to us, only one line was visible.
All the rest was crossed out in thick black ink.... I don't know why they even bothered.
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My German grandfather writing from prison in Belgium. He was incarcerated because he was German.
He was extradiated from Germany because he refused to divorce my grandmother who was Jewish and my grandfather worked for the German government.
It's very complicated.
Indeed, we asked the MOD for my father in law's war records.
Of the three pages of information that were sent to us, only one line was visible.
All the rest was crossed out in thick black ink.... I don't know why they even bothered.
Hello
They photocopied the record, redacted the copy and sent a photocopy of that.
It sounds as though the British wanted your man, who had been on the inside of the other side!
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Sometimes a requester can ask their Member of Parliament to write to the Minister of the Department and get more released (already mentioned on here).
Mark
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Hello
1) They have proven to you the record exists.
They are conducting a Review (keep the letters and copies safe).
The Review
2) The Review is usually by the Department (the MoD) and wait for the Outcome of their Review.
If you change address or contact information, keep them in the loop.
But you probably won't hear much more until their Review Decision.
Information Commissioner
3) After the Review and if still disatisfied they may advise you of your right to Appeal to the Information Tribunal (it used to be free 20 years ago).
The Freedom of Information Act seems to have different Section numbers to appeal under.
If you employ or get advice only from a Solicitor (in FoI Act Law) obviously you will have to meet, your own costs there for that advice, fees etc., that you get.
Make sure you keep all the original copies you have been sent.
It might be that it won't go to a Tribunal Hearing, that the ICO might get the Department to release it.
https://ico.org.uk/
Sections of the FoI Act
There are different Sections of the Freedom of Information Act under which to Appeal and it might well be worth getting some advice before filling out the Appeal Form.
Added:
Had a look this evening and our FoI Act Appeal Section number got changed to Section 57 and we got no more new information.
Added:
I just wonder if they wriggle out of some on a technicality. Regarding another file, it was the cost to find the file, (not shelved & no database for those files).
Mark
Further thought added:
I wrote to my M.P., during the MoD Review stage and he wrote to the Minister and managed to get photocopies of the main parts.
I think the M.P. put more pressure on them to be fairer to me. (Already suggested on this thread).
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Some Scottish Death Certificates
Mid 20th Century onward, Death Certificates in Scotland are usually very good, my Grandmother's recorded 1st & 2nd husband names and her parents and her Father's occupation and Mother's Maiden name (which we knew was correct) back to c.1900 period.
All Scottish death certificates from 1855 onwards record the full names of both parents of the deceased, including the mother's maiden surname, and (except between 1856 and 1860) full names of any spouses, all assuming that the informant knew all this of course.
Try Scotland's People, the official site.
www.scotlandspeople.gov.uk
They are usually like our GRO Copy Certificates, usually of a good enough quality to decipher the details.
But if you can't decipher a certificate, use the 'Report Issue' button at top right to request a re-scan. These are normally sent by e-mail in two or three days.