Dear All

As promised a summary of the information supplied on the Archives of the
Royal Army medical Corps.

The primary source is probably

The Army Medical Services Museum

This based at Keogh Barracks in Mychett, Surrey. 

http://www.ams-museum.org.uk/museum/ 

They have an archivist a Capt Pete Starling but he may have recently
retired.

There is a RAMC printed roll of honour.

There are also a number of current units of the RAMC which might hold
information. For example the RAMC unit at Chavasse House in Liverpool
are setting up a small museum.

Some military hospitals published their own magazines / newsletters.

The Wellcome Library and Archives

There is a good proportion of the RAMC collection is at the Wellcome
Library and Archives

The Wellcome Library has an online archives catalogue and typing 'RAMC'
into the 'Reference' field will bring up the collection:

http://archives.wellcomelibrary.org/DServe/dserve.exe?&dsqIni=Dserve.ini
&dsqApp=Archive&dsqDb=Catalog&dsqCmd=Search.tcl

The National Archives

There is a wealth of information held at the National Archives  

Service records may be obtained from the National Archives, although
some First World War records (about 40% were destroyed in enemy action
in WW2) have not survived. The rescued material forming the 'Burnt
documents' (WO 363), plus a class of files reconstructed from material
in government pension files (WO 364) at the TNA.

These links will provide you with information on tracing service
records: 

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/RdLeaflet.asp?sLeafletID=18

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/catalogue/RdLeaflet.asp?sLeafletID=6

http://www.ramc-ww1.com/research.php

First World War pension and service records held at the National
Archives have been digitised and are available for download on Ancestry
http://www.ancestry.co.uk. Ancestry and Find My Past
www.findmypast.co.uk also contains military records. 

In addition the medals card index is also available on-line via
http://www.ancestry.co.uk. The medals index cards are a good first place
to start as many more cards have survived than service records and they
sometimes give you an indication of the battalion or battalions with
which people served.

Should you wish to find out some general and contextual information, it
may be worth locating a war diary for the Army Medical Corps. War
diaries are held at the National Archives and many of them have been
digitised via their Documents On-line service. See
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documentsonline/ for more
information.

It might also be possible to obtain discharge papers through the TNA.

Medical detachments were provided for units of infantry, artillery, etc,
under medical officers and orderlies, stretcher bearers. Their
activities are likely to be recorded as part of the war diary for that
specific battalion, field or signals company. In addition the RAMC
organised and ran field ambulances, casualty clearing stations,
ambulance trains and field hospitals. These organisations had their own
diaries - all in series WO 95 and all to be included (eventually) in
TNA's digitisation activities commemorating the centenary of the
outbreak of the war. You can find more information on the hierarchy of
medical services online here.

The best way of matching the person to a specific unit is to find their
service papers, since they will record their postings, transfers and
promotions. Not all survive, but those that do have been digitised by
Ancestry and can be seen online via their subscription service, or free
of charge in the reading room at TNA, Kew. You can also search the medal
index cards online, since they might supply information on units in
which a man served.

Many other policy, directional and operational papers relating to the
RAMC are also held here

Other Sources

The Long, Long Trail http://www.1914-1918.net/ is very useful for
tracking the campaigns that RAMC were involved in, giving both general
details but also specifics about where certain Field Ambulances or
General Hospitals were based.. 

There are also a number of published histories which are very useful. 

Given the current interest in the Commemorations for World War 1 a
number of local authority archives have extensive information on their
websites and a couple of examples are

Hampshire
http://www3.hants.gov.uk/archives/hals-collections/army-records.htm  

Tameside http://www.tameside.gov.uk/archives/familyhistory/military 

If some one was mentioned in dispatches then a good source would be the
London Gazette online or The Times.

Also there are the National Army Museum, the Imperial War Museum,
Commonwealth War graves Commission and local newspapers.

I hope this information is useful and one again many thanks to all the
people who took the time and trouble to respond to my request.

Regards

Nigel Hardman


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