220th L.A.A. Training Regiment R.A.

I am trying to establish which units Len was in during the war so that I can ultimately get to the right war diaries and understand what he did during the war. I'm OK up to 28/4/42 when hes trf to 452 Bty 86 LAA Regt and shipped to Egypt on 8/7/42. I'm not sure of the 12/5/42 entry - perhaps allocated to 457 Bty?
I don't understand what the phrase "Struck of Strength Middle East Taken on Strength North Africa" actually means on 7/7/44 and whether 110 refers to Bty he is in. Likewise I don't know what the last 2 posting entries mean when he was in Italy and finally sent back home.
Can you help?
Regards
Mark

 

I am trying to establish which units Len was in during the war so that I can ultimately get to the right war diaries and understand what he did during the war. I'm OK up to 28/4/42 when hes trf to 452 Bty 86 LAA Regt and shipped to Egypt on 8/7/42. I'm not sure of the 12/5/42 entry - perhaps allocated to 457 Bty?
I don't understand what the phrase "Struck of Strength Middle East Taken on Strength North Africa" actually means on 7/7/44 and whether 110 refers to Bty he is in. Likewise I don't know what the last 2 posting entries mean when he was in Italy and finally sent back home.
Can you help?
Regards
Mark

Hi Mark
It seems to me that you have some forms missing. It looks like the MOD haven't sent them all. There have been a few members on here who've had the same problem of late.
The forms B103 are missing-these are the ones which have more detailed information on them. If you look at my albums you can see which forms are missing. Perhaps a phone call and be polite but firm and ask them to pull the file again to see if any forms are missing

I read some of the text as
X(I) ME Middle East 12.5.44

SOS ME TOS NA 7.7.44 452 battery 86 LAA
ie struck off strength (of Middle East Force) and taken on strength of North Africa (force)- I think this just was re-named, maybe one of the vets can help.

X List I NA (North Africa) 4.7.44
(X lists confuse me-again the vets can help)

Disembarked UK PA GTC (M) 12.8.45

I think the 110 you are referring to is just an admin code in the left hand column.

I'll ask Tom Canning to try and help

Lesley

 

Mark -
One of the problems I find with the forum is that people take the literal values of many service records - diaries etc as being gospel - and as the man says ' It ain't necessarily so ' as we have exhausted clerks writing up daily records - then we have lazy clerk short cutting everything and ending up with great confusion - then the experts jump in with their interpretations....so lets start with just ONE official interpretation of one
order
-i.e sosmetosna - officially this should read that he was STRUCK OFF STRENGTH
MIDDLE EAST FORCE (MEF) ....TAKEN ON STRENGTH BRITISH NORTH AFRICA FORCE
(BNAF) now all that means is that he was moved from say Egypt to Algeria/Tunisia - which were the two Theatres of the war in those areas of Continental Africa -

Now IF he then moved to Italy he would have been struck off strength BNAF and Taken on strength at Central Mediterrean Force (CMF)......so lets stick with the official facts to cut down all confusion- as to keep repeating this is very boring - and time wasting

Cheers

 

As you suggested, I asked the MOD to repull the file and check for missing form B103's. This they did but confirmed that there weren't any. Apparently, for those discharged on medical grounds it was common for these forms to be sent to some other location where they were subsequently lost/destroyed. So bottom line is this is all I've got to go on.
Re "discharge on medical grounds" It seems strange to be discharged from the Army on medical grounds on 17/2/1946 ie after the war had finished. Was their a financial benefit to doing this? I don't recall my grandfather being disabled. His record notes that he suffered from "Diabetes Mellitus - NA 20%" and I remember him being v. hard of hearing in his right ear. Is this grounds for a medical discharge?

Cheers

Mark