Genealogy Chat

Oh Nicky that's fabulous. I had decided by the look of Mr Keen that he was around the same age as Freddie (my great Gradnfather) if not a little older so aged 49 in 1944 would make him born around 1895 and only 5 years older than Fred. Thank you very much, i will follow up that link in the morning, my eyes are refusing to stay open at the monet, but i will definately attempt to build a skeleton tree and see if i can trace someone for him. :)

Thank you very much for your help and i'll attempt to trace him in detail tomorrow. :)
Thanks again,
Leanne.

I don't know much about the Army and the different ranks, but have just checked the CWGC website to see if there was a General F Keen listed and a Major Frank Keen who was in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps was killed in 1944 aged 49, so it is more than possible he would have also fought in the first world war. It gives the next of kin at the time, so if he was a possible contender, you might be able to use the births, marriages and deaths index to build a skeleton tree and trace any living descendants that way. I've done it before when doing something similar to what you are asking and it takes a bit of doing, but if luck is on your side you can be successful and it is very rewarding to be able to provide someone with a photo that they never knew existed. Good luck

Thanks for your reply Nicky,

I did have a brief look at the military records on ancestry in the hope there might be something on there and they joined the forces during the war but nothing jumped out at me.

I have done a goodle search on each but nothing of note comes up. Thank you very much for your reply though. all suggestions are very welcome as i really have no clue where to go from here. Obviously the search is in no way essential to my tree i just thought it would be rather nice to find out a bit about them and maybe reunite a copy of the picture with a relative. :)

Thanks again.
Leanne. :)

Sorry, just re-read your post again and see that the photo was taken after the first world war, so the CWGC may not be that helpful after all. You could just try 'googling' the names and see what you come up with. Nicky

Hi, As a starter you could always try looking on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Website - list of those who died during the first and second world war. www.cwgc.org

just to add that I am not entirely sure which letter Gnl Sayer has as a first initial, i know that Mr.Keen is definately an F because it is my great grandads writing and it matches the look of the f in his name too.

Mr Sayer i dont think is an F because it is quite different to the other f's on the back of the postcard.

Thanks for reading. :)

Hi everyone,

Wondered if anyone had any ideas on how to trace someone with JUST a name. I have a photo of my great grandfather taken in between 1918 and 1924 when he was in Belgaum in the army. on the back of the photo he has written the names of the three other men in the photo. i thought it would be quite nice to see if i could either find any descendants on the other men or just a little more info on them in general.

All that is written on the back of the photograph is:

Sergt Black,D.
Bde Fagan, F.J.

(left to right)
Gnl Sayer, Y???
Gnl Keen,F.

The police force Belgaum

F.J Fagan was my grandfather he was born 1900 and served between 1918 and 1924, so i haven't got any first world war records for him. Also i thought the men's names were relatively common so i dont know how easy it would be to find them.

Any ideas or tips would be fabulous. Thanks for reading. :)
Lee.