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Archiver > GENMTD > 2000-05 > 0958105246


From: "Neil C. Thomsen" <>
Subject: Re: Guards Searching
Date: Thu, 11 May 2000 21:20:46 -0700


Linda & Barry Richardson wrote:

> Can anyone help or if there are any relevant sights to my question?
>
> My mother told me her Uncle (don't know his christian name) but his
> surname is either SEARLES or HEATHFIELD. Was a guard at Buckingham
> Palace, Her story goes that when she was very young she went up to
> him and tried to make him laugh, move etc. but to no avail until he
> next came to visit did she experiance the etc.
>
> Is there a list of these guards or the names of there groups?

You need to understand that practically every regiment in the
British Army(and some from other armies in the Commonwealth) has
stood guard at Buckingham Palace at one time or another. There are
more than a few Guards Regiments -- Coldstream Guards, Scots Guards,
Irish Guards, Welsh Guards, and Grenadier Guards which are now a
part of the Guards Division of the British Army -- but it isn't only
Guards regiments that mount sentry duty at Buckingham Palace. The
Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry have mounted guard there
on one occasion recently. When I was visiting in 1996 I believe it
was the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers on duty. Extrapolate that to
understand that hundreds of thousands of young soldiers have marched
up and down the parade square at Buck House and you will soon figure
out that there isn't an Internet site listing every soldier who put
on a bearskin.

Surely your mother must know her uncle's first and last name?
That's the first starting point for you. I'm not sure what you're
hoping to find on the Internet. When you do find his name, you
might be able to request his military service records from the
Public Record Office in the UK. From there you can learn more about
his military career, and perhaps he did things that were much more
interesting than ignore little tourists trying to make him laugh.

Neil
- ---------------------------------------
Neil C. Thomsen
Cambridge, ON

/netcom.ca

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