HMS Invincible Great War band

Shivrme · HMS Invincible Great War band

I have an interesting photo of HMS Invincible's band, taken 1915-16. It puzzles me though, as although 27 men are shown with instruments, with Bandmaster George Deacon seated in the center, only 4 of them are RM's, all others are RN, including the 7 drummers. The mystery is compounded in that the band lost with the ship consisted of only 17 members, but 8 are listed as RMB, the others as Musicians. Any thoughts?

2nd Clarinet

Post the picture you have on here and also a copy of the information you have together with links as to where the infomation was from.

Initially, I can provide possible answers as follows;

Officialy, 17 Members of the Royal Marines Band Service were killed when on HMS Invincible on 31st May 1916.

We would need to see the picture and see what uniforms are being worn for us to make any further observations.

The following cold explain why you have 27 people in the photo.

There may be Invincible Naval ratings and officers in the picture who augmented the band on certain occaisions.