Army numbers

cartav wrote:

brum wrote:

Bloody hell Yorkie, how do you remember all that stuff ?

We look after t'brass, tha knows up 'ere ! Dunno why it sticks in the mind
Brum......... It always niggled that we had to pay National Insurance when the Army had their own medical set up. I do remember one mate had a good way to extend his income..... he'd go round each of the rooms in the billet scrounging a 10pfg coin for the trolley fare to Osnabruck. At 12 DM to the pound 10 pfg was nowt.. we threw coins at him to get rid of him and he scooped up enough for a night out. Don't know why I remember that either !

Irrespective of its value, my favourite German coin was the 5 mark stuck.
Strange that they also, running in parallel, had 5 mark "schein".
Sorry if I have the spelling wrong, (selbstmord is a possibility).

In my early, (50s), days, in Nienburg NAAFI, the girls behind the counter called a 10 pfennig piece a "groschen". They called us "Meckis", something to do with our haircuts and a popular German hedgehog cartoon character.
The girls were from Ost Preussen, but that's another can of worms.

brum wrote:

2351 meself.


Dolmetscher

In the days of BD, I remember that flash.

Brum. I think that was 12th Infantry Brigade Group flash. By the way, you can see that although I am 6 years older than you, I have a much later number. The reason is, I was a late enlistment (26) as I was working in the pits.

[quote="brum}

In my early, (50s), days, in Nienburg NAAFI, the girls behind the counter called a 10 pfennig piece a "groschen". They called us "Meckis", something to do with our haircuts and a popular German hedgehog cartoon character.
The girls were from Ost Preussen, but that's another can of worms.[/quote]



Do tell............

From the pits to the Pay Corps -- now that must be what is really meant by being 'upwardly mobile'!!! lol

abueloeddie wrote:

237.... double shovel, knife fork & spoon!:-)

Signed up July '59 for a man's life ( still looking for it!)

Odd event... last week I got a CC PIN sent for a new card.... it was my last 4 ( no you can't borrow it for the afternoon!)

My "first four", 2351.
I was quite surprised, just before my demob, when I had a bloke posted in with a "first four" of 2451.
Could there really have been a million men through the army from 1957 to 1980 ?

Considering that some of your years were in the days of National Service, I would think
'yes' It's only an average of about 43000 per year a big turnover now but not then.

Marching guys into MQs before retirement two years ago I recall the numbers were 263something, ex rankers retained their ORs number which I believe was to do with the new pay system, covered elsewhere on here.

Cliffo wrote:

Considering that some of your years were in the days of National Service, I would think
'yes' It's only an average of about 43000 per year a big turnover now but not then.

In a note acquired some time ago from I don't know where, it's recorded that,during the days of NS, 6000 reluctant conscripts were snatched from their families twice a month. That figure is the total of entrants to all three services and, with probable breaks in the system for things like the Christmas period, that could top 130,000 a year.

What about TA numbers. Do they come from the same batches or are they different? I've not had any TA experience so have no clue.

Hussar100 wrote:

What about TA numbers. Do they come from the same batches or are they different? I've not had any TA experience so have no clue.

If you scroll back through this thread, which goes back a couple of years, you'll see that numbers were, indeed, in batches......... Don't know about TA, except that ex NS & Regs kept their old numbers and I suspect that anyone with no previous service was issued with something from a batch allocated to Reserve Army.

In NS, when the first thing you asked a newcomer was "How long have you got to do?" there was great glee to discover his number placed him well down in the pecking order and he was less fortunate than anyone else. Strange thing was that Regs, who joined at the same time, had bigger numbers which confused things and showed these must have been taken from a different batch. That seems to indicate that there could be numbers in a batch which were never allocated to anybody and subtracting an early number from a recent one doesn't necessarily tell how many men were taken on board in the intervening period.

cartav wrote:

Hussar100 wrote:

What about TA numbers. Do they come from the same batches or are they different? I've not had any TA experience so have no clue.

If you scroll back through this thread, which goes back a couple of years, you'll see that numbers were, indeed, in batches......... Don't know about TA, except that ex NS & Regs kept their old numbers and I suspect that anyone with no previous service was issued with something from a batch allocated to Reserve Army.

In NS, when the first thing you asked a newcomer was "How long have you got to do?" there was great glee to discover his number placed him well down in the pecking order and he was less fortunate than anyone else. Strange thing was that Regs, who joined at the same time, had bigger numbers which confused things and showed these must have been taken from a different batch. That seems to indicate that there could be numbers in a batch which were never allocated to anybody and subtracting an early number from a recent one doesn't necessarily tell how many men were taken on board in the intervening period.

Yes I can see what you mean. I know for a fact that in my time numbers were issued in area batches for regulars. It just crossed my mind that TA (and indeed Ulster Defence Regiment) numbers could either be from the same batches or have their own separate numbers.

In the National Service strange code of reckoning, it didn' matter if someone had an extra stripe or two, if he had a higher number he was a sprog and therefore somewhat inferior!!!

'Twas the same in my day chum.