Finding Next of Kin - want to return War Medal

[jorian]

My Dad was an inveterate collector of all things silver and gold. Coins, jewellery, watches, pens, even weapons. Really anything made from a precious metal.

He passed a few years back and I am slowly going through his things. Today I found a medal of sorts. After a quick search on the net I found that medal was given to servicemen after WW1 (what did people do before the web?). Our man was a clerk in the Royal Naval Canadian Volunteer Reserve. The RNCVR had three geographic commands spanning the entire country so his hometown could be anywhere. He died in 1956 and left a wife somewhere and presumably kids. If it were my grand dad I'd like the medal.

I plan on contacting the RNCVR to see if I can get a bit more info but with the ratcheting up of privacy laws I doubt I'll get much.

So I ask the brain trust, how do I find someone's NoK or remaining family?

Here's a pic of the medal.

[rusnak]

https://youtu.be/OVxl__61vKI

[jorian]

The perfect response.

[LeeH]

Good resource:
Find A Grave - Millions of Cemetery Records and Online Memorials
If you have the name and date of death, you may be able to find where he's buried. Could be that his next of kin have posted photos or other info on his page.

[Scuba Steve]

It has a name on the reverse side? Is that sort of thing normal? I may have to go take a look at one from WW2 that turned up over 10 years ago to see if there's something written on it.

[jorian]

His name and a number are printed on the edge along with the initials of the regiment. The back has a pic of King George.

[GWN7]

Here's a list of possible government agencies to find out more information about that person: Looking for Canadian Forces Member Military Service records?

While they won't be able to give you much information if they can tell you where he joined up (City/town) you can get lists of people with the same last name from most major library's and start asking if they were related to him.

[wdfifteen]

They are a pain in the keister to deal with, but I've gotten good results with Ancestry.com

[R.N.C.V.R]

Hey Jorian,

I saw this post and made an account to clear some things up and give you some information. The RNCVR was only around until 1923, and was founded in 1914 I believe. What you have is a British War medal, it was the common medal for WW1 and would have been given out to anyone in the British Empire who served. On the rim should be in order: his name (usually initials for first and middle, then his last fully spelled out), his rank in abbreviation, his service number (which will be able to tell you about what year he joined in) and finally R.N.C.V.R. I specifically collect medals to the RNCVR and do research on the medals, you can order up this mans service file for $25 (I have someone who gets them from LAC). I own 4 of them to the RNCVR and have to say the information is 100 years old, so next of kin is truly not around the same spot. I haven't found a family yet, and have many next of kin names but cannot find anything. It is sad and I wish the medals could be with next of kin, but the chances of finding them are so slim. I would gladly take it off your hands and pay shipping and order up a service file for him and try to contact the family if there is anything. Until then it could sit with my other RNCVR medals on display for others to see (I make displays for different military events). At least then it would be appreciated and on display for the time being until the family could hopefully be found. I just started collecting last year, and am a first year history university student.

Bryce