British Military Records, 1815

My great great grandfather, William HAMILL, born in County Armagh, Ulster in 1792-1793, was Scots-Irish and served in the British infantry at the time of the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. (The family tradition is that he actually fought in that battle.) His rifle is still in the family today. Is there a mailing list that specializes in military records? Or is there anyone on this list who can advise me on how to find his military records?

Don Phillipson...

You should take this firearm to an appropriate museum to
identify its type. If it really is a rifle, it would narrow your
quest for a regiment down to those equipped with rifles
in 1815. Most carried Brown Bess unrifled muskets.

CWatters...

Possibly this one can help
- it has links to the RA this side of the pond

I have done British military research before, for records during the Crimean war and for some later records, but in those cases I knew the individual's unit, which made finding his records easy. In this case, I have no idea of William HAMILL's unit. Can anything be deduced from the type of rifle he carried? Can anything be deduced from the fact that he was Scots-Irish living in County Armagh, Ulster, Ireland at the time he joined up? How should I get started on this search?

Chris Watts...

If you have already researched somebody in the British Army then you should
know better than to use the term **military** in this context. It applies
to the whole armed services (Army, Royal Navy, Royal Marines) - and their
records, and the procedures for researching them, is quite different. I
really do hate the use of Americanism out of the context of US research. If
you are researching in Britain learn to use English. Ugh!!!

Chris Watts...

Then you have a tough time ahead. Unless he was discharged to pension the
key source is miuster books and pay lists - which are arranged by
battallion.

Chris Watts...

No.

Chris Watts...

No. About half the army was from Ireland at that date. And Ireland was
part of the UK.

========

Thanks a lot,

Walt in Florida.

Hugh Watkins...

the rifle mayhave marks which indetify the unit or at least manufacturer

at least a broad arrow

Hugh W

Philip Maddocks...

There are several bits of the Waterloo Medal Roll on the web but none seems
to be complete; try searching the web.
The nationalarchives site has only one specific record on a William HAMILL
in that time period as being in the 49th Foot. The 49th did not take part

Chris Watts...

The catalogue entry at
shows he served between 1846 and 1849 and was discharged at the age of 22.

in Waterloo but this might not even be your William HAMILL. Yours may be in
a box with a load of other people starting HA-.

Chris Watts...

I think Phil must be refering to the entries in TNA's catalogue for WO 97
and WO 121 for the period up to 1854. These cover all those for whom
discharge papers to pension survive - so there won't be anything else in the
box to which he refers (human error besides). But there may be information
elsewhere,
primarily in the muster books and pay lists - please see TNA's research
guide for more sensible guidance.

Location often gives a clue to the regiment he joined but not always. I

Chris Watts...

RUBBISH. Up until WW1 this statement is totally untrue and grossly
misleading :-( Location will NOT provide that clue.
If I had a penny for every time I have had to correct this then I would be
very rich indeed :-)

have heard of a somerset man joining a Lancashire regiment and there are
also all the cavalry regiments and other corps that are not geographically
based.

Chris Watts...

The fact that a regiment has a geographic name tells you absolutely nothing
about where it recruited

Philip Maddocks