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Hello Ian,
I was a little confused by the last paragraph of your original post, Collin's family are clearly shown, his parents, Thomas and Eliza, his sister, Anna and his brother Thomas, at number 358 St James Hill, Old Kent Road, Middlesex.
His fathers name has been crossed through, he might well have moved on.
Kind regards Frank

Frank
Be not confused! I was looking at his "unmarried with no children"status. Yes, his Mother,sister and Brother were indeed living on the Old Kent Road.
Brett and Mike
Thanks for your posts regarding medal groups including an Egypt medal. They are very nice indeed and you just don't see them nowadays. Well, I don't. I have a couple more examples of the Egypt medal in combination with the QSA and other medals and when they are researched, I will post them. I really like Brett's Navy group!
Best regards to all
IL.

IL
I will e-mail Chief ERA James Howell's story to you later today.
Regards
Brett

IL - great group. As far as I know, only 20 of this combination to the Essex Regiment (by which I mean men who earned both campaign medals with the Essex Regiment) - article in prep for consideration for the OMRS Journal. Only 7 with this precise combination of clasps, all officers and men who served with 2nd Bn in ABW.

I have seen Collins' discharge papers but your notes show you must have had access to his service papers as well. I can't for the life of me find them on findmypast. Grateful for a pointer.
Kind regards

Ian

Exyeoman
As noted, Pte. Collins' trio is still one of my favourite groups. For me, it pretty much summarises the Late Victorian Army. As a matter of interest, a fair file of info came with the Collins trio.
Thanks for your comments.
Regards
IL.

Exyeoman
Just now, I dug out my folder regarding Pte. James Collins of the Essex Regiment and had a look at the accompanying paperwork. A photocopy of his service papers is present and the bundle shows a reference WO97/4559. You might care to pursue that? Perhaps you could summarise your projected OMRS article on this site after publication?
Personally, I do not subscribe to commercial sites such as FMP, etc. Being of the "well-before-computers" generation, I find the best approach for IL is to do what basically can be done and then gratefully hand over the deep/deeper research work to someone who knows what they are doing. And it is not all that expensive. I thoroughly recommend Kevin Asplin for research purposes.
Regards
IL.