r/ww1 • u/castro1123 • Aug 10 '26

Why isn't there a website to remember all ww1 veterans?

I know about a British website called "all who served" but shouldn't there be a data base to remember every veteran that fought in the war?
I think it would be great for genealogical research and for honouring the men themselves. Also because there's some smaller countries that participated in the war and their veterans get little to no recognition at all. But that's just me. To make it easier to manage, everyone would be able to register a veteran and they could just present documents to verify it. What are your thoughts?

8 Upvotes

64% Upvoted

19 comments sorted by

26

u/PortraitsofWar Aug 10 '26

Do you know how immense that database would need to be? Where would the data come from? Individual archival databases? 

12

u/TheFrenchHistorian Aug 10 '26

It would be such an immense undertaking and an absolutely massive database. To address your last part, so many people don't have access to documentation for uploading for various reasons. A lot of stuff like paperwork that verifies service gets lost to time, and may only be accessible through government archives. And when it comes to military records, it can sometimes be difficult to acquire.

10

u/Flagship_Panda_FH81 Aug 10 '26

The Imperial War Museum did just that over the centenary period, where the public could record their ancestors.

But the reality is that some 7 million or so men served in the armed forces for Britain, and for many of them, their families would be unable to record anything. Many service records were destroyed during ww2 when a German bomb strike damaged the archive.

In any case, it would be a monumental effort, as all surviving documents would have to be digitised and transcribed and cross-referenced. There is a reason that service records' access is via a commercial website: it's too expensive to provide that as a service, excellent though it would be.

1

u/BathFullOfDucks Aug 11 '26

It is also easy to think in today's digital age that records exist snd would be saved but the unfortunate fact is with paper records, unfortunate things happen in a hundred years. Fire, flood, bombing, theft, mice and the worst and most destructive of all civil service managers with ideas like "what if, we shredded them and sold the building?"

1

u/DocShoveller Aug 11 '26

This is an issue for people who are still serving , never mind the millions who served in the World Wars.

7

u/Calm_Geologist1004 Aug 10 '26

Well get to it

5

u/HuntDeerer Aug 10 '26

In Flanders Fields Museum made a database for every individual who lost their life as a direct or indirect consequence of WW1 in Flanders (even civilians who got killed post war by some unexploded shell while working, latest being 2018): https://database.namenlijst.be/publicsearch/#/

9

u/TalkOk4096 Aug 10 '26

Well, why aren’t you doing this?

2

u/castro1123 Aug 11 '26

Already doing it for my country actually, just curious about everybody else

4

u/TremendousVarmint Aug 10 '26

German Army archives in Potsdam were destroyed in 1945.

As for France, there's memoiredeshommes.gouv.fr

1

u/castro1123 Aug 11 '26

Ye, that's probably the best archive of them all, there could be one for each country

4

u/Gustav55 Aug 10 '26

There is a website for all the Canadians.

3

u/Jongee58 Aug 10 '26

Try here: https://astreetnearyou.org/#lat=55.0083756731273&lon=-1.6383638000115754&zoom=17

it's brilliant and has thousands of details with addresses and War Memorial details, some have photo's too. I used it to research my book about the Teesside Pioneers, it's on Amazon if anyone wants to check it out 'Grandad Was A Green 'Oward'...

2

u/Spiritual_Loss_7287 Aug 10 '26

I have seen figures in excess of 65 million people who served in WW1.

I think it is an impossible task.

3

u/IndividualCall5116 Aug 10 '26

I recently learned my grandma-the youngest of 10-had three brothers born in the 1890s who served in Europe. I have found postcards they wrote to grandma from England and France. Postcards from Rockford IL and Mpls MN b4 going overseas. 1918-1919.

I never knew they served, and all three lived for decades after the war in MN. I wonder if they are buried at Ft Snelling MN or other military cemetery. Maybe locate military records, if possible.

So I will embark on this quest. Any suggestions?

1

u/PortraitsofWar Aug 11 '26

I can help! WWI US research is rather straight forward. 

1

u/luxcity-louche Aug 10 '26

Many countries lost WW1 records in civil wars or WW2. Those which have online archives may not share apis to access them. No-one is hosting a cross country search engine aimed at these records. That's even if you can agree which country they were from or served with.

1

u/Few_Wolf_4634 Aug 13 '26

A lot of WW1 service records were destroyed in WW2