Lists of personal diaries, letters, memoirs

The letters, diaries, memoirs etc listed below could be linked to specific military units, but each name needs to be researched to find out exactly which unit they were in at the time. Can you help? Pick a name or document below, and try to find their military records to show which battalion they were in.

Here are some resources on researching World War One records to get you started.

Individual items

War diary kept by Captain Neil Cantlie, RAMC, with the 6th Division at the Battle of the Somme, Sept - Oct 1916

Typed letter from Captain Thomas H. Gibbon, RAMC, to his brother, re his service with the King's Own Scottish Borderers in France in the early weeks of the First World War

Ely, Dinsmore, 1894-1918. 'Diary letters of Dinsmore Ely, edited by his father, Dr. James O. Ely'. Library of Congress via Internet Archive.

Collections of items

A list of memoirs and diaries at firstworldwar.com

Some diaries listed on the Western Front Association site

A massive list of 'Diaries, Memorials, Personal Reminiscences' compiled by volunteers of the World War I Military History List (WWI-L). Pick a name, find out which unit they were with, and add them to the battalion/regiment page!

Digitised Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) papers from the Wellcome Library From their blog post '(Re)Discovering the Great War', 'The Wellcome Library has digitized over 130,000 pages of correspondence, personal and field diaries and reports, photographs and memoirs associated with the allied medical services during World War I. Drawn from material presented to the Royal Army Medical Corps Museum and Archive (now the Army Medical Services Museum Trust), the collection covers virtually every sphere of operations including the Balkan Front, the Dardanelles, East Africa, India, Italy, Malta, Mesopotamia and the Middle East, Russia, and South West Africa, as well as the Western and British Home fronts.'

The Great War Archive contains memoirs, letters and diaries, each of which could be linked to an Allied battalion or regiment.

Australian personal narratives

The State Library of NSW has a collection of WWI diaries online

Canadian personal narratives

If you're interested in finding records for Canadian battalions, the Canadian Great War project has a form to search for War Diaries by unit.

New Zealand personal narratives

Personal Histories of the New Zealand Mounted Rifles

Diaries listed in the National Library of New Zealand's WW100 digitisation project