Contacting the IA and R.F.I.

[intellivore]

In my quest for knowledge about my retired military rifles, I have tried contacting the MoD about my Enfield No 4, since Fazakerly no longer has offices, that I can find.

Now I have contacted the Indian Army and Rifle Factory Ishapore with the specifics of my 2A1, and hope my efforts pay off. Here's what I wrote to them:

"I have purchased an ex-Indian Army, Rifle Factory Ishapore made, 2A1 7.62x51mm caliber rifle. The serial number stamped on the rifle is N7238, except the magazine, which bears the serial number L7860, the stock bears rack number 83.

"I am wanting to get information on how to track the serial number through Army records to get both the service history, including regiment assignment, and servicing history including repairs.

"Who would I contact to begin the search? What procedures do I need to go through? Are there fees associated with such searches?"

Well, gents, what do you think the odds are? I'm hoping that information can be found. To quote one of my favorite films:

"But how to get there, Mister Sharpe? Lists! And how to be noted that you were there? Lists! And what does he send home? But lists of dead, dying, sick, honored, and gazetted Captain!"

My time in the Navy reinforced that the military runs on paperwork and lists, my wife's time in the Army did the same for her and we both agree, there have to be lists!

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Brian Dick]

I'd say the odds are less than slim. Others more in the know will chime in here soon enough but I can tell you that the MoD didn't keep records of serial number-to-unit issue and the Indian government has always been very secretive even if they did. Good luck!

[intellivore]

That and the MoD lost a lot of records due to the fires in the underground all those years ago...

Surely 40 year old repair records cant be classified material....

[Beerhunter]

I weould say that you have almost no chance at all.

As far as I know the MoD simply does not have those records anymore. If they still exist they will be in the National Archive at Kew, West London.

As to the Indians, see above plus the Indians are notoriously secretive about this kind of thing.

[Peter Laidler]

I wrote a long winded article about the inns and outs of the supply system in the UK Military Intelli. And your request is likely to be................ Well......., have you ever heard the well known phrase or saying 'you're pixxxxg into the wind'. You should have saved yourself the stamp and just read that thread if anyone could be so kind as to resurrect it.

As for writing to the Indian Govt., well the same phrase or saying applies there! I was a good friend of the Indian Army Liaison Officer at the Infantry HQ here. And it took me almost 2 years to get a copy of the Indian Army Bren EMER and the 7.62mm SMLE CHS gauges. If you know some Civil Servant in Delhi................

[Brit plumber]

I know if I was the Indian Army, still working with paper records, with millions of individual kit that had been in service for decades, I wouldn't keep records for very long at all. The paperwork I fill out daily for aircraft is only kept for 2 years before it goes through the shredder.

[stencollector]

With today's computerized record keeping, there would be a better chance that some data could be saved, but even then not likely. Small arms are just too plentiful and (in the big picture) inexpensive to warrant detailed record keeping. We do it for vehicles, artillery guns, and certain high cost equipments. But even trailers did not get detailed record keeping until the last decade or so....they were handled on bulk work orders.

[Beerhunter]

With today's computerized record keeping, there would be a better chance that some data could be saved,

As a computer museum curator, I have to disagree. Digital information is much more ephemeral. We have papers in the archive from the 1950s (The UK subsidiary was only formed in the 1950s.) but already computerised stuff from the 1990s has been lost - for ever!

[stencollector]

I guess you could win or lose either way.

My experience with the Cdn military was that we started entering our workorder data into the computer system dating back to approx 1978. A few years ago I was looking for data on a military vehicle we were working on overseas, and I mistakenly typed in the wrong plate number. When I saw the data, I was surprised to see data for an old M38A1Cdn jeep that had been disposed of around 1986. Some quick checks showed that the data was there for about 95% of the older SMP vehicles. In the data was the unit history, the purchase price, the workorders and man hours spent, and modifications completed over the years. To a collector this kind of stuff is gold. Any equivalent paperwork would have been disposed of long ago. We used to keep old paper workorders for 7 years, and once a vehicle left the service, the files were retained for 3 more years then tossed. There is not a national archives big enough to hold all the paper produced by the military, nor an archivist who would be able to search it all in any meaningful way.

That was my experience with military pattern vehicles. But as to small arms, as I mentioned before, we bulk reported those, so there would be no searchable data. Any of those workorders would have been tossed in the bin decades ago.

Unfortunately, the Canadian Forces Registration system only has the potential of 99,999 potential numbers, and as the numbers go around the clock, eventually the numbers attached to obsolete equipment get written over. At that time I assume tha data will be lost.

[intellivore]

'Dear Sir / Madam,

Your e-mail has been received by us and is being forwarded to concerned Dte/Branch. For future reference you may quote ID No -**** for your query.

With Regards,
Webmaster, Indian Army'

well, here we go, down the rabbit hole!