Army Lists

(There is an example of an Army List further down the page)

One of the first places to look for details of officers serving in the British Army are the various Army Lists that have been published in some form or another since Nathan Brooks produced the first one in 1684. After Brooks produced his list, many years elapsed before the Government published the first official list of officers. Since then, there have been many types of Army List - some were published by the Government; others were produced privately. Some came out every year, whilst others appeared each month or every 3 months.

The amount of information recorded in each one depends on many factors, but the minimum that you may expect to find about an officer is the following:

• Surname
• Initials
• Regiment
• Rank and date of promotion to that rank
• Decorations (eg VC, DSO, MC)

At the other end of the scale, you may be lucky enough to find the following as well:

• Forenames
• Date of Birth
• Date of Death
• All his ranks, with the dates of promotion to each one
• The date he retired or went onto Half Pay
• His battalion, in a regiment which had more than one battalion
• Where he was stationed at the time of printing
• The appointments he held (eg Adjutant, or an instructor at a School)
• The number of years he had served for, both on half pay and full pay
• Details of his war service - where he fought, the medals or decorations he was awarded, the date he was "Mentioned in Despatches"
• Academic Degrees and Professional qualifications (eg BSc or MICE)
• Army qualifications (eg Passed Staff College, or Rotary Wing (Helicopter) Pilot)
• Type of Commission
• Whether the commission had been purchased or not
  

Do not expect to find all the above information for the officer you are looking for - it would be highly unusual for everything to be given!

Army Lists are not only useful in determining an officer's regiment or basic service details. Here are some other useful bits of information that you may find in an Army List:

• The location of a regiment at the time of printing
• A list of places to which the regiment has been posted (see below)
• Battle Honours of each regiment, along with its marches, address of the Regimental Headquarters, the name of its Colonel and/or Colonel-in-Chief
• Details of recent amalgamations
• Addresses of Army Establishments, Commands and Headquarters and the names of those holding important appointments at these places
• Rates of pay for officers

Just as the amount of information given about a particular officer varies from List to List, so does the more general information above. Locations are a case in point. They were first introduced in Hart's Lists in 1840, and the idea was followed up in the Official Lists. During the Great War the locations of units were omitted from the Official Lists, but they were then re-introduced after the war had ended, only to be omitted again for the Second World War.

Please note that family details and addresses are not listed

Official Army Lists

The first "proper" Army List was an official list, published in 1754. To begin with, it only gave the minimum of information, and these early lists did not even contain all the Army's officers! Over the years, the scope was broadened:

1755 The Irish Establishment was added
1756 Royal Artillery and Royal Marines were added
1757 Royal Engineers were added

Nowadays, the official list is just called The Army List, and is available from booksellers in two forms:
Part I is the most commonly found volume, and it lists all active (as opposed to retired) officers in both the Regular Army and the Territorial Army. It is produced every year, and lists the officer's:

• Surname
• Initials
• Number
• Regiment
• Rank and date of promotion to that rank
• Decorations
• Academic Degrees and Professional qualifications
• Army qualifications
• Type of Commission

Part II contains an alphabetical listing of all retired officers, and a new edition is produced every three years with supplements issued for the intervening years. The information held in this volume is:

• Surname
• Initials
• Decorations
• Academic Degrees and Professional qualifications
• Date of Birth
• Date of first Commission
• Last held Rank and date of that rank
• Regiment on retirement
• Date of retirement
  

There is also a Part III to the Army List which is only for internal use, and not available to the public.

Hart's Army Lists (Click for a sample of the 1906 Hart's Army List)

The most useful and commonly found unofficial Army List was produced by Lieutenant H G Hart of the 49th Regiment of Foot in 1840, and annually thereafter until 1915. These are usually referred to as Hart's Annual Army Lists, although the proper title changed over the years.

To begin with, there were two main advantages of Hart's Lists over the Official Army Lists:

• Hart included details of an officer's war service and medals - this feature not being included in the Official lists until 1881
• He also gave the date of all the officers' promotions, rather than just give his current rank.

Lieutenant Hart continued to serve in the Army whilst he was compiling his lists, and died a Lieutenant General in 1878. His son, A Fitzroy Hart, took over the production of the List, and it continued in production until the start of The Great War.

Hart also produced a series of Quarterly Army Lists from 1839 to 1914, to accompany the Annual Lists, but these quarterly lists are much rarer.