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William Powderley

Private, Leinster Regiment – Anglo Boer War

- Queens South Africa Medal with clasps Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal and South Africa 1902 to 3327 Pte. W. Powderley, Leinster Regt.

William Powderley was born in the Parish of St. Paul’s, Dublin, Ireland in 1874 the son of William Powderley. The family lived at 10 Francis Street in Dublin.

Times were hard and jobs were few and it was no wonder that William, at the age of 18 years 10 months, followed in his older brother Matthew’s footsteps and enlisted with the Leinster Regiment on 4 February 1892.

Powderley completed the Short Service Attestation Forms at Dublin and, after being declared fit by the Doctor was assigned no. 3327 and the rank of Private in the 2nd Battalion. Physically he was 5 feet 4 ½ inches in height and weighed 119 pounds with a fresh complexion, grey eyes and red-brown hair. He had no distinguishing marks about his person but claimed to have had service with the 5th Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers since February 1891.

On 16 February 1894 he was posted to the 1st Battalion this coincided with a move from Ireland to India for a period of 344 days. Powderley then transferred to the 2nd Battalion being posted to Malta on 6 January 1895. After 313 days on the island they were moved to Bermuda from 15 November 1895, to Halifax in Nova Scotia on 20 October 1897 and then on 6 May 1898 to the West Indies.

The 2nd Battalion, with Powderley in tow, arrived in South Africa from the West Indies in January 1902. In February they were holding the Heilbron branch line during the big drives. They were moved to the Wilge River to hold a line there, and on 27th February had 10 casualties. They were afterwards taken to Pretoria and the Central Transvaal.

Powderley saw out the war which ended on 31 May 1902 but, instead of sailing with the regiment to Mauritius, he was invalided home on 6 June 1902.

For his efforts he was awarded the Queens Medal with clasps Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal and South Africa 1902.

Another very good QSA, it took me an awful long time to get a really good specimen example to this particular regiments second battalion, despite remembering to bother looking over the last decade or so, although, it was certainly worth the wait.

As usual a fantastic write up and research......

Mike

Thanks Mike and Frank

Not much of a write-up on Powderley I'm afraid. He proved singularly difficult to research - aside from his papers there was very little else to go on with Familysearch.org and FMP lacking in content.

Regards

It is a nice medal, although, their 2nd Battalion actually remained on garrison duty at Pretoria after the war, to enforce the new administration, their 1st Battalion, had, of course, returned to Fermoy and a good welcome, so he would have been most unlikely to have sailed to Mauritius anyway as discharge would normally have occurred in the case of men like Powderley.