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Ordering WW2 Records

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meekhcs
Posts: 468
Joined: 02 Jun 2020, 18:19
Location: Lincolnshire, but Hampshire born and bred!

Ordering WW2 Records

Post by meekhcs »

Following on from the post by phsvm last August does anyone know if the situation has improved regarding records from WW2 please? Has anyone had success ordering since then?
Thanks
Sally
paulr1949
Posts: 147
Joined: 02 Jun 2020, 18:25
Location: North West Kent

Re: Ordering WW2 Records

Post by paulr1949 »

No, unfortunately. My wife is about to try and obtain her late father’s records (I had this forlorn hope that they would have got somewhere with digitisation by now)
Paul
meekhcs
Posts: 468
Joined: 02 Jun 2020, 18:19
Location: Lincolnshire, but Hampshire born and bred!

Re: Ordering WW2 Records

Post by meekhcs »

Me too Paul!!
You would have thought this was the ideal opportunity??
Anybody know if progress is being made on this front?
Sally
Sally
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AdrianBruce
Posts: 358
Joined: 14 Jun 2020, 18:57
Location: South Cheshire

Re: Ordering WW2 Records

Post by AdrianBruce »

Digitisation of the post-WW1(ish) records? Goodness me that's far too difficult.... I think they're still trying to work out how to do it without breaking all the rules that they think they're subject to. Plus TNA insist on making decisions about what their contractors will do rather than actually just shutting up and going out to tender.

(This was, so far as I could see, what happened with the Home Guard stuff - TNA decided that, given the number of Private Pikes whose records couldn't be allowed out in public, no contractor would find it viable to bid for the rest. So far as I can see they didn't actually ask those contractors, they just made the decision on their behalf. That's why you have contractors - they have the knowledge to make those decisions, not you!)
Adrian Bruce
meekhcs
Posts: 468
Joined: 02 Jun 2020, 18:19
Location: Lincolnshire, but Hampshire born and bred!

Re: Ordering WW2 Records

Post by meekhcs »

Sorry Adrian

We were talking about being able to order the records, and certainly pay for them, online, and not have to still send cheques! - not the digitisation of the actual records.

We were promised this in 2019.

Sally
Sally
Thunder
Posts: 436
Joined: 14 Jun 2020, 01:43

Re: Ordering WW2 Records

Post by Thunder »

I understand that most of the MOD staff have been working from home for most of last year, wherever possible, so not much will get done.

TNA have on numerous occasions (at the now-defunct User Forum) said that the transfer of the post-First World War and Second World War service files whether by digitisation or any other method is up to MOD not TNA, it is a bit of a cop-out in my view. Regarding Adrian's comments about contractors it was the case that it was not apparent at the beginning that Home Guard records had so many young men amongst the records (obviously hadn't taken notice of 'Dad's Army') and had to apply a 100-year closure across the records, interesting that it is a 100-year closure plus one day and not 100 years and one year, it's also always annoying to have such inconsistencies.
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AdrianBruce
Posts: 358
Joined: 14 Jun 2020, 18:57
Location: South Cheshire

Re: Ordering WW2 Records

Post by AdrianBruce »

meekhcs wrote: 18 Jan 2021, 17:05... We were talking about being able to order the records, and certainly pay for them, online, and not have to still send cheques! - not the digitisation of the actual records. ...
Ah - sorry Sally - Paul mentioned digitisation, so I thought that full blown digitisation was the topic.

Re Thunder's comments
... obviously hadn't taken notice of 'Dad's Army' ...
Precisely!! (If anyone misses my reference to Private Pike, he was the youngster in the Walmington on Sea Home Guard, not yet called up. Indeed, Ian Lavender, who played him, is now one of a very few Dad's Army actors still living).
Adrian Bruce
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