Pretty sure this isn't the right place to post but ?

SailorSam

Morglin wrote: »

I gave all my grandads medals, from the first and second war to my grandsons, as it seemed the obvious place..


Lin

I had my Grandads WW1 medals 'cos i'm the eldest.
One of my nieces in Australia was doing a family tree and asked could she have one, but i didn't want to split them up. I did think though they were better with a younger member of the family so long as she wasn't going to lose or sell them so i gave them all to her. But i made photocopies so i had pictures in my copy of the family tree.

Person_one

thorsoak wrote: »

One set of medals, one great-grandson, six great-granddaughters. Great-grandson is also the eldest (and incidentally son of only grand-daughter). My oldest son has youngest great-granddaughter. Girls will get great-grandmothers' jewellery divvied up between them. Penis envy doesn't come into it - the three grandsons are happy with it.

Then there's no need to mention him being the only boy. Go with him being the eldest as the reason. Still a bit arbitrary but at least its not sexist and arbitrary!

gingin_2

zaxdog wrote: »

Just a small niggle but my two grandfathers were in the navy and I would have been pretty upset at being passed over being left their medals due to my lack of a penis.

It happened to me and it still upsets me, the boys inherited all military items, including the diaries he wrote ( I would have liked those more than anything). Being the only female, I inherited nothing. My Grandfather never chose who would receive them, the next generation down did. Although it's not a competition, I was closest to him - just a little something of his would have been lovely.

I've never made a fuss, only mentioned it once at the time but it still stings a little.

I understand you've discussed it with family Thorsoak, so this isn't intended to be a dig at you.

Oakie

http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/records/looking-for-subject/secondworldwar.htm
Hope this helps

thorsoak

As a feminist, I feel pretty offended that people would even think that primogeniture would be the reason why DGS is getting the medals.

However, as I didn't state that he had expressed an interest in the medals and in his great-grandfathers' records, there is really little point in allowing my feathers to be ruffled - though it is interesting to see that other peoples' feathers were ruffled by that thought!

Thank you for the suggestions, I can see that I - or DGS will have a lot of research to do.

PasturesNew

You can do a lot of reading/researching online, but ultimately you will want to get your hands on his actual service records. There is a smallish charge for these, there are forms on the official sites to get those, but I'd suggest you research what you can online first, as you'll discover lots of other information, photos, maybe even memories etc .... and the actual service records will then be the backbone of a scrapbook you put together with all the other information in it.

Once you have his service records and get the full list of where he was etc, you might find yourself researching more about one particular month/year or event ... or even following up another line of enquiry as you discover that his brother, or neighbour, were also alongside him and killed/or not and there might be a memorial with their name on, which might be close (and worth a visit) .... it's addictive and you can never tell where your journey will end.

mountainofdebt

thorsoak wrote: »

As a feminist, I feel pretty offended that people would even think that primogeniture would be the reason why DGS is getting the medals.

However, as I didn't state that he had expressed an interest in the medals and in his great-grandfathers' records, there is really little point in allowing my feathers to be ruffled - though it is interesting to see that other peoples' feathers were ruffled by that thought!

Thank you for the suggestions, I can see that I - or DGS will have a lot of research to do.

Just a thought but could this be a 'joint project' for you and DGS to do ?

My mum is currently researching a family member of WW1 that was awarded some medal (she did tell me and apparently it's the almost-a-vc-but-not-quite) and what she plans on doing is getting a picture of said relative with a replica of this medal and putting it in one of these deep frames .

Could you not do the same and if its a significant medal then perhaps a copy of the citation could be included as well, rather than just handing over the medals in a box?

TonyMMM

Apply for a copy of his service record, which will probably still be held by the MoD.

Details here ...

Once you know which units/ships he served with you can look for their records/logs at The National Archives at Kew.

The National Archives have useful guides on researching the Navy ...Here

thorsoak

mountainofdebt wrote: »

Just a thought but could this be a 'joint project' for you and DGS to do ?

My mum is currently researching a family member of WW1 that was awarded some medal (she did tell me and apparently it's the almost-a-vc-but-not-quite) and what she plans on doing is getting a picture of said relative with a replica of this medal and putting it in one of these deep frames .

Could you not do the same and if its a significant medal then perhaps a copy of the citation could be included as well, rather than just handing over the medals in a box?

That's a lovely idea although it might prove to be difficult as he lives in the states - I'll have to do the preliminary stuff first and give him the websites, then I'll have to do the legwork to get the actual records, I think. This next year is going to be a pretty tough one for him as well, as it is his last year in High School before going on to Uni, but instead of taking the equivalent of A levels, he has to attain A grades in each and every one of his subjects (all of them - not just the 4 as over here) to get into the uni of his choice - so I don't know how much time he's going to have.

Person_one

thorsoak wrote: »

As a feminist, I feel pretty offended that people would even think that primogeniture would be the reason why DGS is getting the medals.

However, as I didn't state that he had expressed an interest in the medals and in his great-grandfathers' records, there is really little point in allowing my feathers to be ruffled - though it is interesting to see that other peoples' feathers were ruffled by that thought!

People thought it because you said it in your OP!