Lives of the First World War

'Third Battalion growing fast. One hundred men were enlisted at Swallowfield camp yesterday'. Remembering the 3rd Battalion (2nd Jamaica War Contingent - 22 officers, 1100 men) of the British West Indies Regiment who sailed from Jamaica on 7 January 1916 (having earlier collected men from The Bahamas) arriving in Plymouth on 20 or 26 January 1916. Between October 1915 and March 1916, Seaford was used as a training camp for the men from the West Indies in preparation for fighting in Europe. Withnoe camp, Whitsand Bay, Plymouth was also an arrival camp. The new arrivals were inadequately clothed for the harsh realities of the British cold in winter and the huts badly insulated. As a result the camps became rife with diseases and men lost their lives totally unnecessarily. The 3rd battalion transferred to Alexandria, Egypt on 24 February, arriving 8 March 1916. For those who died extra information has been collected from the Soldiers' Effects records, but for lots of these men there are only medal records because they managed to survive; (the medal rolls are however split by island and show their original battalion). So they sailed from home, served in the war and then sailed home again, with the regiment not invited to the Peace (Victory) Parade held in London July 1919 // incomplete.

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~jamwgw/contin.htm

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