72cd regiment of foot

bigjack71 · Post by **bigjack71** » Wed Mar 21, 2007 9:00 pm

HI,
I'm looking for my ggg grandfather who served with the Dumbarton Fencibles and joined the72cd in Newry in Northern Ireland
incirca 1803. he served in Capetown from 1805-1820.discharged in Cape Town as Colour Sergeant

Post by **SarahND** » Wed Mar 21, 2007 9:19 pm

Hello there,
A warm welcome to Talking Scot! Do you know anything about him besides his military career? Birth place and date, etc? You could search for him on the National Archives site to see if they hold any military records in his name that would give more information. At the top of this page click on "Sources"-- there will be a link to the National Archives.
All the best,
Sarah

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Thu Mar 22, 2007 8:36 am

What was his name?

David

bigjack71 · Post by **bigjack71** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:22 pm

Hi there
His name was Thomas Hunt Born1780 (approx).I have his discharge paper which gives his record of service from 1800-1820 I think the72cd foot were in garrison in The Cape of Good Hope and he had a family there.
The army gives his place of birth as Lanark, as the subsequent family lived in and around Govan I'm fairly confident he's from there.

Thanks for your interest,

Jack

Post by **emanday** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:40 pm

Hi Jack,

Have you any clues about his parents names? If you know about his children, might he have followed the Scottish naming pattern? Even middle names in subsequent generations can be quite helpful.

I've solved a couple of my mysteries just from a middle name.

DavidWW · Post by **DavidWW** » Fri Mar 23, 2007 1:54 pm

bigjack71 wrote:Hi there
His name was Thomas Hunt Born1780 (approx).I have his discharge paper which gives his record of service from 1800-1820 I think the72cd foot were in garrison in The Cape of Good Hope and he had a family there.
The army gives his place of birth as Lanark, as the subsequent family lived in and around Govan I'm fairly confident he's from there.

Thanks for your interest,

Jack

I'm not sure if it's useful in this context but Army records exist as follows, Birth and Baptism, 1761-1924, Marriage records for 1786-1924 but, sadly, I seem to recall that the records haven't survived for all regiments.

http://www.findmypast.com/resources/ove ... talreg.jsp may have some of these indexed, otherwise it's a trip to GRO in London, or maybe Kew, - I'm unsure just where the records are kept.

Have a look at http://www.regiments.org/deploy/uk/reg-inf/072-1.htm and you'll se that the 72nd were not only in SA for a good part of the period 1800 to 1820 but also Ireland, Mauritius, and India!

On discharge a soldier had two options, to be disharged at the place where he was enlisted, with travel paid as required to get back there; or discharge at the current location of the regiment. Looks like Thomas HUNT opted for discharge in SA before the regiment returned to England in 1821. His record of service should be clear on this.

David