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Hello Ian,
Add that QSA to his 1914 Star/BWM/AVM and LSCG and you would certainly have a super group to a very interesting gentleman.
Regards Frank

Thank you so much to Frank Kelley and Linneyl, I really do appreciate you taking the time to help me. Just what would the depot mean? I was able to find out quite a bit about Edwin, I was originally researching his older brother Albert who was in the third Bedfordshire Regiment in 1892 and was later with the RMLI . I found him on the 1901 census on the ship Northampton. By 1906 Albert had become a policeman in London. He married in 1906 and in 1907 he and Edith went to Canada. I haven't found any evidence of Albert having gone to South Africa, but I could be wrong about that.

I was reading some of the information online about what the MFP did in France during the Great War, but I do not know where in France the unit Edwin served with would of been. Edwin retired with a bit of disability pension (30%) in 1923, and in his file has a page saying who the informant for the death was, and where and what Edwin died of. Alas, it is so faded and smudged I can not read it. I wonder what he died of at such a young age (he was born 1878). I wondered if his disability was related to his early death. The file seems to indicate that his service had aggravated his disability but does not say what it actually was. I got these files from the findmypast website to which I have treated myself to a subscription.

I have attached a photo of the man I am fairly certain is Edwin. It was found in an old tin box in an attic in Vancouver, B.C. along with papers pertaining to his brother Albert and his wife Edith. Edith also had a brother in the Boer War, with the same medal and clasps, Wallace Dance, however he was never in the Coldstream Guards as this soldier is. Edwin is the only relative of either Albert or Edith Symonds who fits the picture. So I figure the chances of it being Edwin Symonds are my best bet.

Again my thanks for help with interpreting his record and the information.

The Depot was the headquarters of a particular regiment, the photograph shows a member of the Coldstream, the collar badges are representative of the Order of the Garter and the spacing between the buttons is absolutely unique to the regiment.

Your Picture.....





Mike

Thanks again to you Frank Kelly, this is most interesting stuff, it is the details that are so important when learning about these soldiers and their lives. I knew he was in the Coldstream Guards because another nice person shared their knowledge with me, but I did not know anything about the collar badges being representative of the Order of the Garter, or the buttons being unique. Thanks also for the explanation of the depot.

It is a very good photograph, very much like the "waxed" hair above his lip, despite his appearance here, he does, however, appear in the Coldstream's Defaulter's Book for disorderly conduct.