T/rank
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Why is the officers rank always preceded by a T? AWD000375g.
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I believe this is Training Second Lt.. Photographs here in this link for Training Second Lt's.
https://www.google.co.uk/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=Training+2nd+LtPosted
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by
cyngast
moderator
The T here indicates temporary, meaning the officer had been given the rank for a specific purpose and presumably a limited time. You won't always see a T before an officer's rank. It's coincidence that this page has two of them.
Tag any temporary rank using the given rank. These two men would be tagged as Second Lieutenant and Lieutenant.
There's some information about this here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_rank under the section "Types of Rank."
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cyngast
moderator
Marie, I think an officer in training was referred to as a cadet, although I may not have that right. Maybe someone else can sort this out better than I can, though. I can't find anything indicating a designation as Training Second Lieutenant.
The photos you have linked to are, I think, actually of training for second lieutenants. Google has come up with a confusing abbreviated phrase there.
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erik.schaubroeckscarlet.be
in response to cyngast's comment.
Is it normal that there are so many "temporary" officers in these companies? So far I came across 24 officers in this diary and 19 are "temporary". Two T/lieutenants even promoted to T/captains. Can the T be related with the Divisional Train?
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cyngast
moderator
in response to erik.schaubroeckscarlet.be's comment.
That's a really good question! The O.R.s in horse transport units had a T in front of their service numbers. I'll have to do some research on this.
In the meantime, you can continue to tag them using the rank without the T.
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Cynthia I think you are probably right that it is a Temporary not Training sounds more logical.
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ral104
moderator, scientist
Many commissions were for the duration of the war only, so a lot of the officers you come across in the diaries are actually 'temporary'.
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David_Underdown
moderator
temporary commissions were somewhat separate to the idea of temporary rank. If you held acting rank, often a more or less automatic promotion if those above you were killed or incapacitated, for a sufficiently long period the rank automatically became temporary, which effectively meant you couldn't lose it for the duration of the war. But it was still not substantive rank, so at the end of the war as the army was scaled back down many regular officers had to drop back down to their substantive rank (I think Monty was one). In the Second World War they called it war substantive rank instead to avoid the confusion. There was also brevet rank, which was essentially rank in the army rather than your regiment (in general you couldn't' be promoted unless there was a vacancy in the establishment, ie permitted numbers, of your regiment). Again you couldn't lose brevet rank (short of a court martial), but it didn't count (as it were) while you were doing normal regimental duty, so if you were a captain and brevet major serving with your regiment you'd be doing the duties of a captain, but if you were appointed to a staff position or similar you'd be a appointed to a major's position (and the date of any brevet rank also counted to the qualifying period in that rank to be eligible for promotion to the rank above the brevet rank). The British Army does like to make things complicated.
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David_Underdown
moderator
The T on other ranks' service numbers is different again. In transport units it normally does imply (horsed) transport, as opposed to M for mechanical transport. You also see it for Territorial in other corps and regiments, showing that the man is with a territorial unit within that corps
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ral104
moderator, scientist
in response to David_Underdown's comment.
And when you start trying to work out how much they all got paid, it gets even more convoluted!
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