Army Corps and "Armies" - August 1914

[Hoplophile]

In the course of tracing on the evolution of the army corps in the BEF, I have encountered a bit of a mystery. The War Establishments for 1914 make no mention at all of "army corps" within the Expeditionary Force. Instead, they make provision for something called an "army (a group of two or more divisions.)

An article that I found in the November 1913 number of the Journal of the Royal Engineers indicates that there were to have been two of these. This idea is supported by the mobilisation of two signal companies that were specially designed as "army headquarters signal companies. (These should not be confused with the one GHQ signal company or the six divisional signal companies.) Further evidence that there were to have been two "army" headquarters in the original Expeditionary Force comes from the way that various other "army troops" units were organised.

My question is whether anyone knows anything about the switch from "armies (groups of two or more divisions)" to "army corps" that took place sometime between the publication of the War Establishments for 1914 (December 1913) and the mobilisation of the Expeditionary Force (August 1914.)

[charlesmessenger]

According to the Official History, the decision to call them army corps within the Expeditionary Force was made on 5 August 1914 to conform with the French. It did not, however, apply to formations at home involved in home defence. They remained designated armies (initially First, Second, Third) under the control of Central Force (became Home Forces at the end of 1915) until well into 1916.

Charles M