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Re: Brother of Valentine Long WW1 solider.

Apologies for the delay in responding to this. There were two Alfred Longs who served in The Buffs overseas during WW1 and survived. Neither of them are listed with any other forenames. Unfortunately neither of their service records have survived. Both of them were Territorials but one joined the 4th Battalion, the other joined the 5th Battalion. These were the only two Territorial Battalions of The Buffs and as they were regionalised it is safe to assume that if the brothers had joined on the same day they would have joined at the same location and hencenthe same Battalion ie the 4th.

His service number was 1375. I have looked at a few other men with similar numbers and although it is a couple of hundred away from Valentine's it could be that they joined on the same day. He went overseas at the same time as Valentine and qualified for the 1914/15 Star too because he fought in Aden from 5/8/1915. At some stage after this he was transferred to the 5th Battalion. It was fairly common for men to be transferred from the 4th in India to reinforce the 5th in Mesopotamia. His new number in the 5th was 6213. I would estimate that this number was allocated in December 1915 although I cannot be 100% certain. When the Territorials were renumbered in 1917 he was given number 242984. He was demobilised on 20/5/1919.

So, although we cannot be cerain, on the balance of probabilities it may be that this is the brother of Valentine. It may also be the case that there was an AWG Long in the Regiment and he didn't go overseas with them therefore he wouldn't appear in my database.



Mick Mills

Re: Brother of Valentine Long WW1 solider.

On this special day I wanted to read again your
Comments on Valentine Long and to my complet
Surprise I found your reply to my question
regarding his brother!

For some reason I hadn't seen it before!

Just printed it out and will pass it to the family
today so he can be in their thoughts on this
special Sunday .

As before you response is so so considered
and on there behalf I thank you!!

Perfect!

Derek