Messrs COX and Co Enquiry Office

Messrs COX and Co Cheque

 One of the valuable sources of information we have used during our research is what we refer to as the “COX and Co booklet”.  COX and Co-is a collection or “List of the British Offices taken prisoner in the various theatres of war between August 1914 and November 1918‘‘. It has been  compiled from records kept by the Messrs COX and Co Enquiry Office in London. 

Cover of 1919 Messrs COX and Co List

 Messrs COX and Co were bankers and regimental agents set up in colonial times and at colonial outposts who  arranged for Officers’ pay, insurance, income tax returns and even provision of his clothing. The bank  had expanded from the staff of 180 at the onset of war to 4500 in 1918 with women replacing men called up during the war.

Their task during WWI was to issue pay and manage Officers' bank accounts. They cleared cheques for Officers departing for or returning from the front. They would often  be clearing 50,000 cheques per day.

Due to the volume of inquiries about injured soldiers in the Expeditionary Force a Messrs COX and Co Enquiry Office opened in a small room of Lord Harrington‘s house  adjoining the bank in September 1914 and expanded a few months later into the Music Room in his house until the end of the War. Between September 1914 and February 1919, the Enquiry Office was never closed to the public for a single day.

At the outset the aim was to give advice and information to relatives regarding wounded Officers. Here they  were able to collect information about Officers, especially their whereabouts and condition and also assisted in the conveyance of messages to and from wounded prisoners in hospital in France.

This task expanded when they began  collecting information about missing or Prisoner of War Officers. Often the first information of an officer being a POW and therefore alive was that his cheque was cashed. A high volume of cheques cashed by offices in captivity passed through Messrs COX and Co Bank. It is known that a volunteer from the COX and Co Enquiry Office wrote to relatives stating that “Missing Officer”  had cashed a cheque in “XYZ city” on “date” . Such a valuable use of information. What a godsend this must have been for worried families. 

Part of the Preface from Messrs COX and Co List

 After the war the information was compiled into a fantastic database with information about 8700 Officers.  It was originally  published in 1919 by Messrs COX and Co. It was completed from the records kept by the Enquiry office.  

The information recorded on each officer includes

• POW's surname, first name
• Rank
• Service Unit
• Dates reported missing  
• Dates taken prisoner of war
• Date of internment
• Date of repatriation

Some listings contained more records such as deaths in captivity.

There is no such similar record of soldiers in the expeditionary Force who were taken prisoner.

Why were the Officers cashing cheques?  Lt Eduard  W Desbarats Flying Officer from Canada wrote in his memoir about cashing cheques to buy little supplements to their food parcels from the Red Cross.

From the memoir of Lt Eduard Desbarats shared by Alexandre Desbarats

The Messrs COX and Co Bank fell on hard times due to the downturn in business after the War and was taken over by Lloyds of  London in 1923.