I am researching a Royal Naval rating in 1939/1940, he was Eric Hurt service number D/SSX/26752. However, his death certificate, issued in France, notes his Royal Naval Matricule as simply 102.107 The does not look right as a service number? Were naval service numbers ever only 6 numbers? Did naval personnel ever have two service numbers? Philip
Hi Philip, The full stop in the middle would not be correct for a naval official number. I agree, a Royal Navy Official Number would not be written like that. - naval service numbers changed through the years along with added prefixes Prior to 1943, men from differing branches could possess the same number albeit with different branch prefix letter(s). Regards Hugh
Thanks Hugh. Have you ever seen a service number with the two sets of three separated by a full stop? Philip
Never, Phillip. He could have had two different numbers if he had changed branch for any reason. Also you may see numbers for example with a prefix J.123456, sometimes with a full stop, sometimes not, same for any other prefix like M.X.123456. You will also see P/JX123456 and other variations of Home Port (Welfare Authority), D/SSX etc. The CWGC have his death as 1942 for some reason. Regards Hugh
CWGC - Yes, they do. And its wrong! He died in 1940. Regards the number, he was at HMS Drake but 'Lent' out to a secret operation (Operation XD) at the time of his death. Maybe they gave him a temporary number whilst he was on loan to the Op?
I agree with Hugh that 102.107 is not a RN Official No. ADM 104 (Register of Deaths of RN Ratings) for Eric Hurst shows his records are held at Drake IV, date of death - 20/6/1940, place of death - France and cause of death - Missing, Death on War Service presumed. With this cause of death I cannot understand why a Death Certificate would be issued in France. Philip - who issued the certificate you are quoting? Better still would be to post a copy here. Tim
Hello Tim and thanks for responding. From what I know now, Merchant Navy id's were often 6 figures or more with no letters. But no 'full stop'. I have spent some time today trying to find a man to fit the number, with or without the full stop, but so far no luck. Its a red herring amongst other red herrings in an error-strewn, incomplete history of a young naval rating. We have worked out the true history now after invoking the Freedom of Information Act at one stage. The most important piece of the puzzle was contained in an undigitized file that we were told would not be of interest to us! He was never missing. Just badly mislaid! That matricule is 123.107 by the way. Yes another example of how error strewn this can be (my bad this time)! The death certificate was issued in France. We have a partial transcript and are hoping for a full copy soon. We now have help on the ground in France and will soon have our own boots there too.
Hi Phillip, that information quoted is really not correct. MN numbers changed through the years too. They only had numerical numbers up to 1925 when the system changed. Not sure how that could be relevant to your search though? Regards Hugh
It was ID he was purportedly carrying at the time of his death, even though he was still classed as 'missing presume killed' years later. He died on three separate occasions in 1940, 1941 and 1942, which is an astonishing feat. The Navy refused to pay his widow a pension even in 1942 as they still said he was just 'missing' despite them having him 'discharged dead'. And this is only part of the story! But we are getting there slowly...
