While I was looking up a German unit for one of the forum subjects I used several sources to determine what German divisions would be present on the date in question. The British Official History of the War, 1917, Vol. 2, P. 229 mentions that the '1st Foot Guard Regiment' faced several Canadian battalions near Lens on 21 August.

I did a little cross checking and found that this regiment and its division , the 1st Guard Division, left for the Russian front in July 1917 and did not return to the west until October. Obviously the regiment could not be fighting the Canadians in August near Lens.

Further checking into several German regimental histories put me on the right track, the 1st Guard Reserve Division and the 1st Guard Reserve Regiment.

I have come across similar errors in the 1916 Volume 2 on the Somme. While I have not checked every reference I can only recommend that the information is not taken at face value in every case and some cross reference work is needed. The same applies to the German Official History where British units are mentioned. These too require some further work before the information can be relied upon.

Has anyone come across similar problems with other books?

Ralph

I was once reading the about the exploits of a particular officer in a regimental history who changed rank 3 times (two promotions and one demotion) within the space of an hour (and one paragraph) !!!

Dave.

Ralph,

The difference between active, reserve and landwehr regiments was not always clear for researchers of other nations (and even the Germans made a lot of mistakes in the regimental histories). You always have to check what is told.

Jan

In the book about the battle of Fromelles 'Don't Forget Me Cobber' the author details correspondence between the Australian historian Charles Bean and the British Official Historian Edmonds.

Edmonds had written to Bean that he should take some information out of his piece on Fromelles for the Australian Official History regarding the High Command's mistakes of the battle with the comment 'What good does it do even if it's true'
Thankfully Bean chose to ignore this advice.

The author then details that Edmonds was less than truthful with many instances of the British Official History.

Hi Ralph

You will find mistakes in every type of research material, weather its books, C.W.G.C. records, unit War Diaries, Official Historys ect.. We all make mistakes at some time or another, a over worked and sleepy clark could for example type an 8 instead of 9 and your end up with the wrong date of death.

I always look at as many souces of information as possible on the subject I am working on, but sometime the more souces of information the more muddy the water becames.

Annette

I have to agree with Annette about the reasons for mistakes in published documents. The problem is, once a mistake is put 'on the record' it's replicated by researchers in the books or articles they publish. For example, in researching the story of Mrs. C. S. Wood (the Canadian silver cross mother) her name changes from Wood to Woods due to a mistake made in the 1937 publication of The Epic Of Vimy. From that point on you find the use of either Wood or Woods in stories about her. It's frustrating to say the least!

Garth

The 1916 volume has Lt Col Rickman of the Accrington Pals being killed on the first day of the Somme. He actually survived the war only to die in a factory accident some years later.

I agree with all of the information supplied so far. I for one never take anything at face value and need to verify facts and details. Sometimes they are verified but as I mentioned above many times they are not.

I am especially concerned when I translate materials from German as I want to make sure I am providing an accurate translation so I often try it several different ways (then ask my son for help, he is quite good in German).

I started this thread after making some discoveries that bothered me as I do not recall it being discussed before. There are many researchers such as myself out there and a word of warning at the start of any project is always beneficial.

I have seen similar errors in recent publications such as Battleground Europe series and at least one error can be traced to the first edition of Martin Middlebrook's book First Day on the Somme.

Forewarned is forearmed.

Ralph

Ralph-Unfortunately this is a common phenomenon-incorrect information in one book being copied uncritically to others and then acquiring a spurious authority precisely because it appears in several sources. I have encountered it not only in WW1 research but in other historical contexts and when setting general knowledge quizzes. (Rod Stewart did not play harmonica on the record 'My Boy Lollipop' despite what numerous pop quiz books say!) A particular Great War example is the belief that the two Australian VC winners buried at Tyne Cot won their awards for capturing the pillboxes preserved in the cemetery. This is completely incorrect as I discovered when researching last year's battlefields tour but is faithfully reported in several popular guidebooks, including the Holts', Scott's book on the cemeteries of the Ypres Salient and the otherwise pretty authoritative 'Pillboxes on the Western Front' by Oldham. I'm not sure where the original mistake occurred. I am pretty sure that one of the Holts' guidebooks originated the similarly inaccurate story that Private Dancox won his VC for capturing one of the pillboxes preserved at Langemark cemetery.

[QUOTEthis is a common phenomenon-incorrect information in one book being copied uncritically to others and then acquiring a spurious authority precisely because it appears in several sources]

You are right there Mark, people think the information is correct if it appears in several books.

I agree Ralph, a word of warning at the start of any project is always beneficial.

Regards
Annette