Looking for sources on 2/47th Regiment of Foot

Now that this thread has been resurrected, one of Samuel Hayes medal roll entries for the Peninsular War lists his Battalion and Company as 1st Battalion (which can't be correct since the 1st Bn was in the East Indies throughout the Peninsular War period) and Yates. I'm thinking this must have been his Company Commander while serving with the 2nd Bn, 47th Foot in Spain because his Company Commanders during his later service with the 1st Bn were Hutchison and Sadlier.

Is there any way to confirm that Yates was his Company Commander in Spain?

Hi Paul,

Many, MANY thanks for the above link. I was tracking that my Great x3 Grandfather transferred to the 1st Bn, 47th Foot but the Regimental muster rolls are rather patchy during the 1814-1815 timeframe.

The Tilbury Fort muster roll includes my forebear (Samuel Hayes) on p.22 of the record. I'll now need to dig through any related records to see if I can find more entries for him.

One thing that's puzzling me is that he's recorded as joining the 1st Coy, 1st Bn, 47th Foot on 28 May 1815 but the muster roll entry with that detail dates from October 1815. Apparently he joined from the Regimental Depot at Bombay. Perhaps somewhere on Ancestry there's the Bombay equivalent of the Tilbury Fort muster roll?

Kind regards, Mark

Mark after the disbanding of the battalion on the 24th Oct 1814. Many of the men were transferred to the 1st Batt in India. My Ancestor served with the 2/47 from Feb 1812-1814. He was discharged on the 24th Oct 14. I believe due to being wounded at San Sebastian. 109 days in regimental hospital. He re-enlisted into the 40th foot.

Many of the recruits were recruited by depots such as Hull depot. My ancestor was recruited in Tyrone. He then was moved to Liverpool & then to Hull Depot. From Hull to Hilsea, then Portugal. Hull Depot Musters have all different regiments inside. Tilbury Depot has the men of the 2/47 in 1814 being transferred to India.

Hi Mark.

Samuel Hayes was at Tarifa.

You can contact through my website

http://2-84thfoot.uk/index.php/contact-2/

Jim

Ian,

There is no Dennis Hellim on the Musters, but there is a Dennis Hulme, he was from Unsworth, Lancashire and enlisted 5th April 1809. He sailed on the Ephira in February 1811 from Cadiz to Algeciras as part of Graham's force at Barrosa. Following which he also served at Tarifa as part of Skerret's defence. He was then involved in the defence of Puente Largo, Aranjuez 30th October 1812, here he was reported as missing/killed WO25/1822 and died 16th December 1812. Hulme had 12/- credit which was ordered 21st October 1815.

Musters are notorious for phonetic/mispelling of names so this could possibly be your relative; time scales are right 1809 to 1815 and there are only three Dennis's shown on the Musters.

If you feel it could be him pm and I will send images

Jim

Hi,

I have the WO12 Muster Rolls for 2/47th covering period in Cadiz/Barrosa/Tarifa and WO23 & WO25 Pension records. Unfortunately the WO25 Descriptives are missing from the N.A. I will check my sources for your respective family members.

Contemporary reading for 2/47th are

The Veteran or 40 Years Service; John Harley Paymaster 47th Foot – Gareth Glover (Ken Trotman Books)

Seven Years in the Peninsula; Memoirs of Private Adam Reed – Gareth Glover (Ken Trotman Books)

Jim

Ok...back from Kew. According to the 2/47th muster rolls, Samuel joined the Battalion on 20 Feb 1809 with a note that, prior to that date, he had been paid by the depot. The rolls also show a number of recruits receiving rations aboard ship from 20 Feb until 7 Mar 1809.

Based on this info, I presume Samuel was taken on the rolls of 2/47th as soon as he joined the ship that would take him to Jersey. It also appears that some form of depot was in use in the UK to train new recruits for a few months before they joined 2/47th.

The 2/47th moved from Jersey to Gibraltar in October 1809. Again, the muster rolls show 911 men aboard ship from 13 Oct thru 14 Nov, with a follow-on note of the same number of men receiving rations at Gibraltar from 14 Nov onwards.

So...next question...is there any way to determine which ships carried my relative to Jersey and then to Gibraltar in 1809?

I'm also on the hunt for the depot location in the UK. Other muster roll sheets mention recruits coming from Hilsea but there was also, apparently, a depot in Bury. I clearly need to do some more digging to discover where he was trained from 4/5 Dec 1808 thru 20 Feb 1809.

Thanks Rob. This is exactly the kind of help I need to ensure I'm making the correct assumptions about the Army during the Napoleonic era.

So it seems Samuel may have sailed for Jersey either at the end of 1808 or early in 1809 to join the 2nd Bn. Hopefully, the muster roll will confirm this when I access it next week (assuming I can get to London and that Kew remains open).

The system was that recruits would never go to the 1st battalion. They'd go to the 2nd, be trained, and then go the 1st battalion months or even years later. It would be more expensive to maintain a separate training depot on the mainland. The was an Army Depot on the Isle of Wight but as far as I know it was more of a clearing house for drafts going back and forth, supply depot etc. As far as I know it had no training role.

Hmmm...interesting. That seems a rather expensive way to do it because any recruits destined for the 1st Bn would have to sail back to the mainland before they could embark for India (assuming the 2nd Bn retained responsibility for training recruits for the entire Regiment.

I'd say it was more likely that he was sent direct to Jersey. All they probably had on the mainland were recruiting teams, feeding the men across in batches.

Thanks Rob. That was my understanding from my limited reading on the subject. I just wasn't sure if Samuel would have been sent direct to Jersey to be trained or if he'd be trained on the UK mainland first. My guess is the latter, and that a small training cadre prepared new recruits to go to either of the battalions. Unfortunately, I can't locate any muster records for that training team...unless it was folded into the 2nd Battalion records which I hope to view on 2 Oct at Kew.

The theory was that 2nd battalions remained at home (which Jersey counts as) and the 1st battalion was deployed abroad. The 2nd battalion would recruit and train the men, and when the 1st battalion needed replacements they would be sent off. Whilst at home the 2nd battalions would also perform general defence and policing duties.

However, with the severe shortage of manpower that system broke down and many 2nd battalions were also sent on activity duty. When that happened they would quite often leave behind a small cadre of officers and NCOs to handle recruitment and training.

Hi Mark,

I wrote a blog post on researching soldiers from the Napoleonic period which may help point you towards other records:

The names of vessels are sometime recorded on the regimental returns, if they happened to be at sea on the right date. You can sometimes find embarkation reports if you know the rough date of sailing but I've found the records to be a bit patchy.