1st Parachute Battalion?

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

Hi, I'm trying to research about the unit my Grandad served in, during the Second World War. I have a useful book, called 'By Air To Battle' a reprint of the original made in 1945, which gives a lot of information about the parachute and airlanding brigades of Britain during WW2. Unfortunately I haven't got very far into reading this, but I think, thanks to some small bits of information I have read from a few of the chapters, that he may have served in the 1st Parachute Battalion, of the 1st Para Division (British). I have also tried searching the net, and have come up with some good websites, such as this one: http://www.arnhemarchive.org/batt_1st_batt.htm, but am still finding it very hard to research. I have a limited knowledge of where he served, but can find very little information on it. I think he served at Monte Cassino, and Sicily, and went to Palestine after the war, and I know that for some reason, I think it was injury, he did not go into Arnheim. I was wondering, seeing as how some of you seem to be very good researchers and historians, if you could maybe help me norrow my ideas down a bit more. Thanks in advance for any reply :)

[enigma]

1st Airborne left Italy for England in Nov '43, how come it seems he didnt leave with them? :confused:

Anyhoo, question of my own, did he fight in Africa with the division do you know?

Cant find anything on the net, and i dont think my own collection covers anything on this unit, ill ask on another forum to see if they have any info on the unit.

Meanwhile this site, may provide some help for you :)
linky (http://www.army.mod.uk/para/)

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

1st Airborne left Italy for England in Nov '43, how come it seems he didnt leave with them? :confused:

I didn't mean to imply that he didn't leave with them, its just nothing much happened between Italy and Arnhem, and I know that for some reason he didn't go to Arnhem.


Anyhoo, question of my own, did he fight in Africa with the division do you know?
I think he probably did, but will need mum to confirm it later, when she gets home.

Thanks for the link, and I shall check it out in a minute. :)

[enigma]

Just realised, if you wanna know exactly what he did, what units he servered in etc seek his permission or the next of kin and iirc you can request his Service Record from the MOD
link (http://www.mod.uk/defenceinternet/home)
I tried to do the same thing for my granddad to find out who he served with ... however my nan ... his daughter would not give me permission to request it.


Looking through the MOD site ... cant find a thing on requesting the info though :(



Edit: It seems that 2nd Para Brigade from the 1st Div, was detached and stayed in Italy as a seperate unit, while the rest of the division left for England ... training and Market Garden.
I do believe there was a plan to drop the 1st Div in an joint land effort in one of the attempts to take Caen but the LZ was overrun (by British forces).

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

Yea, I think maybe I shall try to find the service records, if mum or my my uncle will give me permission.

When I say that he didn't go to Arnhem, I mean he was supposed to, but I think he had an injury, which prevented him from going ;)

I had a look at the MOD site, and it contains some interesting information about the units history, but I also couldn't find anything about enquiring for information, so yea, I think I'll just try for the service records, thanks for the link to that website :)

[enigma]

This site may be of use to you?

linky (http://theairbornesoldier.com/index1.html)


possibly this one too (doubt it though, looks like it mostly centred around arnhem (http://home.planet.nl/~peter.vrolijk/frontpage.html)

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

Thanks for the links, but couldn't find a lot of information, other than Arnhem, thanks anyway :)

[enigma]

I opened a topic asking for info, oob, possilby even a register of the unit:

here (http://www.battlefront.com/discuss/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=9;t=020105)

tis where i got the links from ... although it seems it moved on now to beer ... sigh lol

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

Thanks for starting the topic :) Btw, what is OOB?

[enigma]

Order of Battle, The topic title I started is a partial OOB.

The forums are great, the CMAK and CMBB forums which i check out every now and again have some decent topics on the war and is where i got the Photos in my other thread from.

The General Forum is bloody excellent for all sorts of info ... although watch out for the sarcasim ... and we posting in every bloody topic with questions lol.

There is a 6 page topic in the General forum on British Arty which is rather intresting ... well in my opinion :p

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

Ok. I'll check it all out, I have registered on the forums, because, well you said there is a lot of general WW2 discussion, the other day, in another thread, didn't you? Its a shame I dont have any of the Combat Mission games, cos they really seem quite good, I remember I used to have TONS of fun on the Combat Mission: Barbarossa to Berlin demo. Come to think of it, I saw it in Gamestation pre-owned for like £1-5, I have forgotten if it was 99p or £4.99 :D

[Tough Ombre 359th]

You need to precisely confirm what division he was actually in. The best way to find this out is to try to find his discharge papers. I'm not really sure how they keep records in your country but, in the United States you can request a military record. I went through a long process getting my Grandfather's military records. Good Luck

[[BEF]-R!G4M0RT!Z]

You need to precisely confirm what division he was actually in. The best way to find this out is to try to find his discharge papers. I'm not really sure how they keep records in your country but, in the United States you can request a military record. I went through a long process getting my Grandfather's military records. Good Luck

Yea, I think I shall enquire about his service records from the MOD. Thankyou :)