TOPIC:

I've recently been researching my Family tree and traced a John William Lowers who lived in South Africa from atleast 1895 when he had his first child. He served in the WPMR as the RQMS, It seems plausible he may have been brought into the WPMR as RQMS due to his previous experience in the the Colonial/Imperial forces which he declares on his attestation papers. However I have been unable to find any record of him within military regard prior to or following his time with the WPMR.

Does anyone have any further information on the WPMR as I have found very little on them? (I have already read all the posts on this forum with small mentions of them)
Also would anyone have any idea what regiment he would have been likely to go to following his time in the WPMR or who he may have served beforehand?

Thanks in advance for any information.
( Attestation paper is linked here: drive.google.com/open?id=1J5Rqo3lafMihlnxap7N8yh_yCfqyWPEh )
Medal Rolls he is listed on for the Boer War are here aswell:
drive.google.com/open?id=1lH0bXQ2I1GMn_cIrlW4DmSHIMnqrcpRQ
drive.google.com/open?id=1BlUnAF2ntcpZk5gIWYnxuzQ5HCB50QqL

Welcome Jake,

The URL you have provided gives an error.

I've just updated it hopefully it should work now, the image was to large to upload directly to the post.

Thank you, Jake.

He is listed on the WPMR QSA roll WO100/278p183 for the QSA with clasp Cape Colony. He is also on the supplementary roll WO100/278p255 for the clasp South Africa 1901.

There are no notes to suggest he served elsewhere and a search for Lowers using the Ancestry index does show these two WPMR entries and 2 other men but these are both indexing errors for the surname Towers.

A further search of the campaign medals for which information is held at the UK National Archives does not bring up any matches. He is not on the roll for the CGHGSM either so I am struggling to see where his prior service came from.

If you have a FindMyPast subscription, you can search their register. Alternatively, you may be able to visit the National Archives in London (?) to papers relating to service in Her Majesty's forces. This is the same index that FindMyPast have on line.

Yeh, I've trawled through as many sources as I can including FindMyPast (found the 2 medal rolls previously and edited the original post to include them) but to no avail. Its fustrating to have found so much and to have hit this brickwall now in South Africa where I can't locate any information about his life previous apart from knowing he said he had served in the forces prior to the boer war, Whilst his Wife is simply refered to as Hester the whole time with no maiden name listed as there marriage record seems to have been lost to time so it seems impossible to go back any further unfortunately at this point.

I Appreciate you trying for me incase I had missed anything but i guess its looking like the only records if any will have not been digitised yet in the National Archives or be somewhere in South Africa unless they have just been lost through the years unless anyones got any other ideas?

Jake,

Here are two possibilities in SA. Attached is a headstone of a John William Lowers who died in 1954 and is from the Stellewood Cemetery in Durban and below is the SA Archives ref for a John William Lowers who died in 1966 also in Natal. Both show wife's names.



DEPOT NAB
SOURCE MSCE
TYPE LEER
SYSTEM 01
REFERENCE 1278/1966
PART 1
DESCRIPTION LOWERS, JOHN WILLIAM. BORN IN CAPE PROVINCE. S SP LOWERS, MARGARET
BEATRICE. BORN GIELINK. DECEASED ESTATE.
STARTING 19660000
ENDING 19660000