A sample of a collection of service records of the King’s African Rifles and its forebears. While the whole collection dates from the organization’s origins at the end of the nineteenth century through to Kenyan independence in the 1960s, this sample runs to the latter part of the First world war (1917). Also included are a limited number of service records for the Somaliland Camel Corps and the East Africa Police. Each file details a soldier’s name, his origin and background, and records his life in service up to the point of discharge. The bulk of the collection is based around robust printed army forms completed by hand, but many files also contain loose sheets often on lower quality paper stock.
Custodial history: These files were produced by British colonial authorities for the administration of the King's African Rifles, a military unit operating across the British colonies and protectorates of East Africa. Upon Kenyan independence in 1963, the files passed into the possession of the Kenya Defence Forces.
Arrangement: This collection of paper files has been organised into a series of boxes by the Kenya Defence Forces. These boxes are nominally organised by year of attestation; however, some mixing of years has occurred within some boxes. A new classification scheme has been established as part of this project to provide each record with a unique reference. This reference can be read in the following way: the year is attached to the box, which is the year the men contained within it attested; the following number represents the box number for that year (some years having multiple boxes); the next number (the index number) shows the position of each file within a sequence in the box; and the final number is the man's service number. A combination of these last two numbers ensures a unique reference, but it must be noted that the index numbers have in places been duplicated within a box, while others do not exist in the sequence, leaving what looks like gaps.
Author(s)/Creator(s): King's African Rifles.
Original institution reference: KAR.
