Pte H.E. Jones, 1st VB, South Wales Borderers

Description

Henry Edward Jones, a carpenter and joiner born in Builth in 1885, joined the 1st Volunteer Battalion of the South Wales Borderers on 21 December 1901, when he was 16, and remained in it until 21 March 1908. When Volunteer units were transferred into a new Territorial Force in 1907, the 1st Volunteer Battalion became the 'Brecknockshire Battalion', and he was attested into this battalion on 4 April 1908. These part-time soldiers were required to take part in regular training and were paid to attend summer camps. The photographer's name on the first two photographs - T. R. Hammond of Conway - suggests that these were taken while the South Wales Borderers were camped there, on the Morfa, in 1906. The first photograph shows Private Henry Edward Jones on his own; in the second picture he is in the middle of the back row. His records show that he also attended a camp in Slwch, near Brecon in 1908: the third picture is a postcard which he owned of a camp at Slwch, so that may also be from 1908. The fourth picture, where H.E. Jones is the first on the left in the back row, was taken by 'P. B. Abery, Builth Wells and Brecon' (see www.llgc.org.uk/en/discover/digital-gallery/photographs/p-b-abery/) and possibly also dates from the 1908 camp. The fifth one shows an unidentified camp: H.E. Jones is the man on the very far right, looking on. The sixth is a group photograph, the place and date of which have not been identified: H. E. Jones may be the ninth man from the right in the third row from the top. (He may have attended a camp in Morpeth.) The seventh picture shows his Certificate of Service, issued in 1908 when he left to join the Breconshire Constabulary. The eighth and ninth pictures are of a postcard from the camp at Porthcawl in 1909 sent to him by 'Harry', a former comrade in the Brecknockshire Battalion.