Hello I’ve my grandads album with photos from France, he was a sapper from Lancaster and I have a military photo of a unit titled as this thread with all the soldiers names. Would love to share this and learn more about this unit? Here is one of the photos E35877DC-DFAE-49F9-ABA2-CD60C47D031B by Nicola Hayward posted Nov 10, 2020 at 9:56 PM
Welcome aboard. Others may come along and help. Always apply for his Service Record, even if the turnaround is reported as a year plus now. See: Get a copy of military service records Upload the records here once you've obtained them and then the forum can get to work on them. Please do not pay for any site on the internet who promise you his service records they will not have them, and you would have wasted your money. An example of what you get: Pte S Attley 14685855 4th Wilts Service Records | WW2Talk Adding what you have already found can help, saves others from duplication. A Date of Birth and a Service Number help, though the experts here can surmount that gap. I have noted the 'Other Ranks' rarely feature in Google searches unless they have been awarded gallantry medals or written their memoirs. Searching Google will sometimes bring you back here. You must be agile and keep going. War diaries can contain almost anything. At the very least, they give the daily movements and most important actions of every unit. They may also contain information on casualties, message logs, rolls of officers (but not O.R.'s), maps, orders, and much else. They are available at the PRO to everyone. Drew5233 and some others are willing to scan them for the benefit of those who cannot get to the National Archives at Kew. It depends of course how much you want to know, just one battle or campaign for an example. Please come back and tell us what you found. Scanning threads it is clear some discover the site years after your posts and add their information or request help. Good luck.
The unit could be the same as this War Diary: WO 171/1434 5 Railway and Maintenance Group 1944 June- Dec. See Post 250 & 251 on Sword Beach. It would be worth visiting the Royal Engineers Journal online and thankfully New Zealand has every issue. Then search for railway etc. I would expect there is material there on the Royal Engineers role in railways, although may be not that unit. There is an IWM video of the units work at Caen in 1944: THE 5TH RAILWAY CONSTRUCTION AND MAINTENANCE GROUP RE REPLACE A DEMOLISHED BRIDGE OVER THE ORNE AT CAEN (PART 6) [Allocated Title] Change your search to: "Railway Construction and Maintenance Group 5" or "5 Railway Construction and Maintenance Group" and this website has some: 5 Railway Construction & Maintenance Group RE
Nicola I am also searching for details of my cousins husband who was with the Railways side of the RE in NW Europe, so there are some links to documents that you may need to read through and try to find details for yourself. As I am finding it is exceedingly difficult to pin down anything involving these sort of units especially in light of the Covid pandemic et al However there are documents out there that may help if you can put in the hours and then 'join the dots' if there are any that is, and one such document is below, but this only really deals with your question from after May 1945. I assume the town mentioned would be the site of the HQ Railway 5 Railway Construction and Maintenance Group 12 May 45 – 1 Canadian Army Troops – 2 Army 17 May 45 17 May 45 – Tostedt south-west Hamburg-Harburg If I find anymore I will post it TD
