Looking at my father in law's attestation, it looks like he may have been somewhat economical with the truth when giving his age. We have is birthdate as 19 Nov 22. On hIs E.501 dated 25 May 39, he gives his d.o.b. as 19 Nov 19 thus aging himself by 2 years, making him 19y 6m, So what was the minimum age to join the TA at that time? I appreciate the TA was recruiting heavily at that time.
17 years was the minimum age for “man’s service”. Boys could enlist at 14 years of age. Young soldiers weren’t usually sent overseas until they were 19. My father added a year to his actual age of 17 when he joined TA in 1935 but as he had reached 19 by the time he joined Regular Army in 1937 he gave his true age. Young soldiers were posted to Young Soldier Battalions for Home Service until they reached 19 years of age in the early years of WW2. Steve
At first glance, it doesn't make much sense that he would age himself when he didn't need to, in order to get into the TA. I think that a lot of clerical errors were made by people filling in mountains of paperwork, especially during the early years of the war. When my dad signed up, I can well imagine someone asking him his age and then his birthday. That is the only way I can explain why the documentation shows his correct age, birth day and month, but then the year says 1922, not 1921. It really looks like the year was incorrectly calculated from his age, and the fact that he signed up during the same month as his 17th birthday. There was an age requirement for those posted abroad (...initially it was 20, but by 1942 it had been dropped to 18). Soldiers under this age were called "immatures". Although (like my dad) they would initially be in a regular regiment, if/when their regiment was due to be posted overseas, they would simply then be transferred to another. This happened to my dad ...twice, which is how this west country boy ended up in an Essex regiment.
