UK Military Service Records: WW1, WW2 and How to Order

UK military service records are the personnel files kept by the British Army, Royal Navy and Royal Air Force for the men and women who served in them. A surviving file can give a date and place of birth, next of kin, a physical description, units, postings, promotions, wounds and the date of discharge. First World War records are at The National Archives in Kew, and most can be searched online. Second World War records of people born before 1940 are being moved from the Ministry of Defence (MOD) to The National Archives; the rest are still requested from the MOD through GOV.UK.

This guide explains which series survive, where they are now, how to order copies, and where to look if your relative served in the Polish forces instead.

First World War army service records

Most First World War records of soldiers (non-commissioned officers and other ranks) were destroyed when the War Office record store was bombed in September 1940. The National Archives estimates that only about a third survive, many of them scorched or water-damaged. They are in two series:

WO 363, the service records, often called the “burnt documents”. They cover men who served between 1914 and 1920, including some regular soldiers who had enlisted before the war.
WO 364, the pension records, which survived because they were stored separately. They cover men discharged with a pension, often because of wounds or sickness.

Both series can be searched by name on Ancestry and Findmypast (subscription sites) and viewed free on those sites in the reading rooms at Kew. A typical file holds the attestation form, a medical sheet and a record of postings.

Officers

First World War army officers’ files are in WO 339 (regular, Special Reserve and many temporary commissions) and WO 374 (mostly Territorial Force and temporary officers). These files were also weeded and partly destroyed, so some hold little more than a note of death. Both are catalogued by name in Discovery, The National Archives’ free online catalogue, and can be seen at Kew or copied for a fee.

Medal index cards and medal rolls

Because so many service records were lost, the medal index cards in WO 372 are often the place to start. There are over five million, covering most soldiers who served overseas between 1914 and 1920. A card gives name, regiment or corps, rank, service number and medals, and often the first theatre of war and the date of arrival there. The cards are searchable by name in Discovery and free to view at Kew; online downloads are charged. The medal rolls behind them, and the Silver War Badge rolls for men discharged through wounds or sickness, are in WO 329 and are online at Ancestry.

First World War Navy and RAF records

Royal Navy ratings (sailors below officer rank) who joined between 1873 and 1924 are in the registers of seamen’s services, ADM 188, which can be searched and downloaded in Discovery for a fee. The National Archives holds records only for ratings who enlisted before 1929. If such a man was still serving after 1928, his continuous record card for 1929 to 1950 is in ADM 363. Anyone who joined in 1929 or later is still with the MOD.

The Royal Air Force was formed on 1 April 1918. Airmen’s service records in AIR 79 cover service numbers from 1 to 562875 and airmen who served up to 1939, including men who came from the Royal Flying Corps and Royal Naval Air Service. They are searchable on Findmypast. RAF officers who served in 1918 and 1919 are in AIR 76, searchable and downloadable in Discovery for a fee.

Second World War and later: the MOD transfer

Until recently, almost every record of service after the early 1920s was held by the MOD. Under the Ministry of Defence service records project, The National Archives is taking in the records of all three services for personnel born up to 1 January 1940, which covers almost everyone who served in the Second World War. The transfer is due to finish in 2027, and Ancestry is publishing digitised army records in phases.

At the time of writing (September 2026) the position is:

Who	Where the record is	How to get it
Army soldiers (non-officers) born before 1940	The National Archives (transfer complete)	Search Discovery; if not catalogued, use TNA’s “Request a military service record” service
Army officers whose service ended after April 1922	MOD	GOV.UK form, no MOD fee
Army soldiers born after 31 December 1939	MOD	GOV.UK form, no MOD fee
RAF personnel born before 1940	Transfer under way: some at TNA (AIR 84 officers, AIR 85 airmen), some still at MOD	Search Discovery first, then follow the GOV.UK guidance
Royal Navy and Royal Marines after the First World War	MOD (Navy transfer not yet started)	GOV.UK form, no MOD fee

Ordering from The National Archives

Many transferred army records are already catalogued in Discovery in new series such as WO 420 (Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers), WO 438 (Royal Army Service Corps and Royal Engineers other ranks) and WO 440 (Auxiliary Territorial Service). Search by surname and year of birth. Records open 100 years after the person’s birth. If he or she was born within the last 115 years, you may be asked for proof of death, such as a death certificate, a CWGC certificate, a published obituary or a grant of probate. Medical information stays closed for 115 years from birth.

For records not yet in the catalogue, use the “Request a military service record” service on The National Archives website. Since 2 February 2026 there are two options: a standard service at £42.25 for digital copies of the core documents, delivered within 30 working days, or a full record check at £48.87 plus £1.04 per digital page. Check the fees before you order, as they are reviewed.

Ordering from the MOD

For records still with the MOD, apply online or by post through the “Get a copy of military records of service” pages on GOV.UK. The MOD has charged no fee for records of deceased personnel since 1 April 2023. Give the full name, date of birth and, if you have it, the service number. A death certificate is not compulsory, but without one some information may be withheld unless the person died in service or was born more than 116 years ago. GOV.UK warns that a search can take up to a year and asks applicants to send no more than five applications a month.

If they died in service: the CWGC

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission commemorates members of Commonwealth forces who died between 4 August 1914 and 31 August 1921, and between 3 September 1939 and 31 December 1947. Its free Find War Dead search usually gives service number, rank, unit, date of death, age and the cemetery or memorial, and sometimes the names and address of parents or a widow. The National Archives accepts a CWGC certificate as proof of death when you order a Second World War record.

Unit war diaries: what the unit was doing

Service records rarely describe fighting. The unit war diary records daily locations and actions, and sometimes names officers and casualties.

First World War: army unit war diaries are in WO 95. Diaries for France and Flanders, Gallipoli and Mesopotamia can be downloaded from Discovery for a fee.
Second World War: diaries are arranged by theatre, including WO 166 (Home Forces), WO 167 (British Expeditionary Force, 1939 to 1940), WO 169 (Middle East), WO 170 (Central Mediterranean, including Italy), WO 171 (North-West Europe) and WO 172 (South-East Asia). Most have to be seen at Kew.
RAF: squadron operations record books are in AIR 27.

Search tips and pitfalls

Start with the service number. It appears on medal cards, CWGC entries and discharge papers, and it separates men with the same name.
Try every spelling. Polish and other Eastern European names were written down by ear: Wiśniewski can appear as Wisniewski, Visnefski or Wishnesky, and many men later took an English name. See our guide to anglicised Polish surnames.
Do not trust the age. Under-age and over-age enlistment was common, so search a range of birth years.
Expect gaps. A missing First World War service record usually means it burned in 1940, not that the man did not serve. Build the story from medal cards, war diaries and the CWGC instead.

An illustrative example

Suppose a family photograph shows a great-grandfather in khaki with “1916” on the back. A medal index card search finds a man of that name in a London regiment, with a service number and the date he entered France. There is no WO 363 file, but a WO 364 pension file survives because he was discharged after being wounded. His attestation form gives his birthplace as “Plock, Russia”, that is Płock in Russian Poland. The WO 95 war diary then shows where his battalion was on the day he was wounded. (This example is invented to show the method.)

Polish soldiers: a different set of records

Many families searching British records are really looking for a relative who served in the Polish forces. For them, the British series above usually will not help.

Polish Armed Forces under British command. Soldiers, airmen and sailors of the Polish Army, Air Force and Navy in the West are not in the British Army, RAF or Royal Navy series. Their files are held by the MOD, and GOV.UK has a separate application route for Polish service personnel who served under British command in the Second World War. Our guide to MOD Polish service records explains what these files contain and how to apply.
The Polish Resettlement Corps. From 1946, men who chose not to return to communist Poland could enlist in the Polish Resettlement Corps, which eased them into civilian life in Britain. These records are also with the MOD. See Polish veterans’ resettlement in Britain.
Poles who later joined the British forces. Some Polish veterans, and many of their sons, later enlisted in the British Army or RAF, or did National Service. That later service is in the ordinary British records described above, under the rules for their date of birth.
Polish-born men in the British Army, 1914 to 1918. Poland was not yet an independent state, so a Polish-born soldier’s papers usually give his birthplace as Russia, Germany or Austria, or spell the town the English way. His records are in WO 363, WO 364 and WO 372 like anyone else’s.

Unit histories, photographs and personal papers of the Polish forces are also held at the Polish Institute and Sikorski Museum in London, which is worth contacting as well as the MOD.

From a British service record to Polish records

A British service file often gives exactly what you need to continue in Poland:

Place of birth. Even a distorted town name can be matched to a Polish parish or civil registry office. The next step is the birth entry; see finding a birth entry in Poland.
Date of birth. Combined with the place, it narrows the search to one register year.
Next of kin. A parent’s name and address in Poland, or a wife married abroad, leads to the family’s entries in Polish registers.
Religion. Attestation papers often record it, telling you whether to search Catholic, Lutheran, Orthodox or Jewish registers.

If the file shows service in both the Polish and British forces, request both: the Polish file from the MOD and the British file from The National Archives or the MOD, depending on the dates above.