Number of British infantry regiments 1914 - 1918

[Private Wilkinson]

Can anyone please tell me the total number of British infantry regiments that existed 1914 - 1918? 

[Michelle Young]

http://www.longlongtrail.co.uk/army/regiments-and-corps/the-british-infantry-regiments-of-1914-1918/

This might help.

[Ron Clifton]

Hello Private Wilkinson, and welcome to the Forum!

Are you sure that you mean "regiments" and not "battalions"?

The British Regular Army began the war with 74 regiments, totalling 157 battalions. The Territorial Force had an additional ten regiments. The total number of battalions serving during the war is given by E A James in "British Regiments 1914-18" as 1,761, buteven this figure excludes certain battalions which served as Officer Training units.

Ron

[Private Wilkinson]

Thanks Ron. Yes, I mean 'regiments'. The Long Long Trail appears to list their number as 89. http://www.longlongtrail.co.uk/army/regiments-and-corps/the-british-infantry-regiments-of-1914-1918/

What is your source for '74', plus the additional 10 TF regiments?

Thanks.

[EDWARD1]

Checking my copy of British Regiments 1914-18, the contents page lists 75 Regiments and 11 TF but page 136/7 lists 74 and 10. The differences between the two are that the contents page includes The Guards Machine Gun Regiment and The Inns of Court OTC

Eddie

[Bordercollie]

5 hours ago, EDWARD1 said:

Checking my copy of British Regiments 1914-18, the contents page lists 75 Regiments and 11 TF but page 136/7 lists 74 and 10. The differences between the two are that the contents page includes The Guards Machine Gun Regiment and The Inns of Court OTC

Eddie

While the LLT includes not only the 75 + 11 but also the Channel Islands Militia, the British West Indes Regiment and the Royal Newfoundland Regiment to give the total of 89. Those three were not included by James presumably because they recruited in Crown Dependencies or Overseas Territories.

[aodhdubh]

On 13/07/2021 at 15:31, Bordercollie said:

While the LLT includes not only the 75 + 11 but also the Channel Islands Militia, the British West Indes Regiment and the Royal Newfoundland Regiment to give the total of 89. Those three were not included by James presumably because they recruited in Crown Dependencies or Overseas Territories.

It's a subject made tortuous by the schizophrenic make up of the British military (that is, armed land forces) between the Union and the present.

 

Within Britain (and after Ireland was merged into the Kingdom of Great Britain to form the united Kingdom) and the British Isles, the various separate regular and reserve forces were increasingly consolidated during the 19th Century...most notably with the abolishment of the Board of Ordnance and the absorption of the Ordnance Military Corps (Royal Artillery, Royal Engineers, and Royal Sappers and Miners) and various previously civilian Ordnance departments (e.g. Commissariat Department, Ordnance stores, transport, et cetera) into the British Army. The various Reserve Forces in the British Isles (generally referred to as local forces, or auxiliary forces after the British Army Regular Reserve was created to avoid confusion) remained structured as separate forces, but their units increasingly lost their unique identities to mostly become sub-units of regiments and corps that included British Army, Yeomanry, Militia, and Volunteer elements. Although still nominally, and to some degree structurally, separate forces, the War Office also took operational control of them away from the Lords Lieutenant of counties and replaced Militia Tax and whatever other local funding with Army Funds. The only point of distinction between whether a British military unit was considered part of the British Army or not was down to whether or not it received any Army Funds from the War Office. Outside the British Isles, but within British sovereign territory, this evolution was different. In India, which was not considered a colony, and instead of being administered by the Boards of Trade, the Home Office, the War and Colonial Office, and the Colonial Office,  was administered by the East India Company 'til the Mutiny, and after that by the India Office, the East India Company's forces were generally divided, with those recruited from Europeans becoming part of the British Army and those recruited from the "native" population becoming the (British) Indian Army. Military units in the colonies were mostly of the reserve types and generally continued to exist in the state that those in the British Isles had been in before their control and funding had been taken over by the War Office, and retained their unique identities (ie, were not re-titled as sub-units of regiments or corps containing regular army sub-units). Often mistakenly thought of as "not British", these were entirely British military units, just not part of the British Army unless they were funded by the War Office...which was usually not the case as the British Government was always miserly about funding the military/army, and in the colonies it always tried to shove responsibility for funding these units onto the local Governments. As the local Governments in most colonies were entirely or largelly made up of officers appointed by the British Government (either on orders from the Secretary of State for the Colonies, or by the local Governor, himself appointed by the British Government), and as the British Government has never gotten around to creating seats in the British Parliament to represent colonials, the British Government usually got its way.

 

The exception to that is in the Imperial Fortress colonies, Bermuda, Gibraltar, Malta...and Halifax, Nova Scotia up to a point. Bermuda and Nova Scotia were both parts of British North America. In 1867, most of British North America confederated to form the Dominion of Canada, with the Dominion Government being a responsible government (that is, not subordinate to the London Government). By comparison, as colonies are parts of the British territory and state, the local governments within them have only what authority and responsibility is delegated to them by the national (British) Government, which retains sovereignty. The British Army withdrew from the Dominion of Canada, except small defensive garrisons for the Royal Naval Dockyards at Halifax and Esquimalt (these garrisons would also be withdrawn in 1905 when the Royal Navy Dockyards at Halifax and Esquimalt were closed). This meant the British Army Commander-in-Chief of the Maritimes, a Lieutenant-General, was abolished as the Canadian Militia took over responsibility for defence. Two British North American colonies were not included in the dominion. the main base of the squadron of the Royal Navy's North America Station (later North America and West Indies Station, then America and West Indies Station as it absorbed other stations) had alternated seasonally between the Royal Naval Dockyards at Bermuda and Halifax 'til the 1820s, and was thereafter at Bermuda year round as Bermuda, unlike Halifax, was both impossible to attack overland and virtually impregnable against attack from the ocean due its barrier reef. It's over-large garrison had been part of the garrison of the Maritimes. As the formation of the Dominion meant the British Army would have little in the way of forces it could employ and remove as it saw fit as British Army units were replaced by local-service militia under control of the Dominion Government, it is highly unlikely that Bermuda would have been permitted to join the dominion even if it wanted to. The Governor of Bermuda, 'til then normally a Major-General subordinate to the Commander-in-Chief of the Maritimes, became thereafter normally a Lieutenant-General rated a General Officer Commanding.

 

Bermuda is a curiosity as it has had an elected house of Assembly since 1620. Prior to the independence of the continental colonies (including Virginia, which Bermuda was originally part of and retained close links with, and the Carolinas, settled from Bermuda in the 1670s and also closely linked by blood and trade), it had been left largely to its own devices, including for defence. It's position was potentially strategic, off the East Coast of North America, but as Britain controlled that coast it's only concern regarding Bermuda was keeping its strategic potential from being realised by an enemy, so it had a small regular garrison from 1701, alongside the militia and the volunteer infantry. The Militia, in which all men aged 16-60 were required to serve (unless excepted due to volunteering as a Captain of Fort, being clergy, or otherwise) in Bermuda contained nine companies (one for each parish) and a Troop of Horse, but as most Bermudian men were mariners, there were generally too few in Bermuda at any time. US independence changed ll of that, leaving Bermuda as the only British territory between Nova Scotia and the West Indies, and in an important location to dominate the US coastline and to police the western North Atlantic. The British Government consequently became much more involved in Bermudian affairs thereafter, but was unwilling to abolish the local assembly, and so found its attempts to force the colonials to shoulder much of the economic eight of the garison (very alarming to the local Assembly members as the garrison was unusually large and expensive, and Bermuda unusually tiny and underpopulated, with a consequently small tax base, and they were wary of being saddled with the entire cost of defence. As in the British Isles, the reserve forces were allowed to lapse after the Napoleonic Wars and the American War of 1812. The British Government itself had a lengthy period of economic austerity that saw drastic cutbacks both to the regular army and to the reserve forces in the British Isles, so this was not unusual. As the British Government wanted Bermuda adequately defended, but was unwilling to adequately fund that defence, it spent the next eight decades begging the Bermuda Assembly to reconstitute the reserve forces to no avail until it was able to blackmail the local government into passing acts to raise two militia and one volunteer unit in 1892, of which only the Bermuda Militia Artillery, in 1895, and Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps, in 1894, were actually raised. Although the local Assembly had relented as far as passing the bills, it specified that it did so only providing the units were entirely funded by the British Government. Ad mentioned previously, the only point of distinction between whether or not a British military unit was considered part of the British Army or not was whether or not it received Army Funds from the War Office, this meant both units were considered parts of the British Army from the outset. The other key difference in an Imperial fortress like Bermuda, compared with less strategic colonies, was the large garrison with various regular units and detachments, which meant both part-time units were fully integrated into the brigade structure of the garrison.

 

There were, of course, a number of regular units also raised and depoted in colonies, that received Army Funds (including the oft-mentioned West India Regiment), but in most colonies there was either no military defence, or only a locally-funded, part-time unit.

 

That's a lot to read through, but important to understand before considering what British Army units existed in 1914 or 1919. Leaving out the Indian Army and the military forces of the Dominions, the British military was composed of the British Army and various separately-funded auxiliaries in the British Isles and British colonies. The Army List is the easiest way to work out which of these were parts of the British Army and which were not. Those colonial units that were not considered part of the British Army are usually grouped at the back with those of the Dominions, which is confusing as the colonial units were still part of the British state and the Dominion units were not. I have been meaning to go through them, year by year, and compile easy to scan lists, minus the names of every officer, but it is a time consuming project. The "Schedule of Arrangement" of the Army List is useful as the corps and forces of the British army are laid out in order of precedence (within that, regiments and units are laid out according to their original orders of precedence before the consolidation of various forces...that means Militia, Volunteer, and Territorial (though increasingly grouped with parent regiments, with territorial officers listed after regular) sub-units of a regiment may be listed separately with the relevant force from the regular sub-units). This is not completely true as Militia and other subunits of say the Royal Regiment of Artillery are listed with that corps, even if on the Order of Precedence of the British Army they are placed separately. By example, the Militia units (which clearly is treated as including Volunteer and Territorial units) of the Imperial fortresses of Bermuda and Malta (Gibraltar having none at the time) and those of the Channel Islands were treated as a single corps for purposes of the order of precedence within the British Army...within that, they were ordered according to the precedence of the parent corps...so Bermuda Militia Artillery, raised in 1895, took precedence over the Bermuda Volunteer Rifle corps, raised in 1894...militia was generally considered senior to volunteers, in any case. Looking through the Army List, however, the Bermuda Militia Artillery officers are listed together with (as the last subdivision) the rest of the Royal Regiment of Artillery, and ahead of the Royal Engineers and the corps of regular infantry. The Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps, by comparison, is generally found grouped after the regular infantry and various other corps, together with the Militia infantry of the Channel Island (which, curiously, are not actually sovereign British territory, unlike the colonies, and are strictly speaking legally part of France) and Malta, and the last actual operational unit of the British Army listed (though in later years, there might be other units listed after it).

 

See the first pair pages below from the "Monthly Army List" from December, 1919. In the Schedule of arrangement, see from XI onwards for the arrangement of corps and units under which officers are listed. Note the Bermuda Militia Artillery listed at 2 e within the Royal Regiment of Artillery instead of on the next page under XIII, where you will find the Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps listed (as 6) with the Channel Islands (4) and Malta (5) Militias.

 

In that arrangement, the British Army units end at XIII 12, and is followed by the Indian Army at XIV.

 

The "Monthly Army List" does not have the "Oversea and Dominion Officers" listed, but you will will find them in the "Quarterly Army List"...see the second pair of pages below which is from Part III of the Quarter 4, 1919 Army List. To see the actual units requires picking through the following pages (for British Army units in the preceding pages, this is not possible as it is a gradation list, and officers are not listed by corps or regiment as in the monthly Army List). Subtract the Dominion units and the remaining colonial units would all be under the British Government, but not receiving Army Funds from the War Office and so for that reason only not considered parts of the British Army. There is a rather glaring note about Bermuda under "IMPERIAL CORPS" (no mention of Malta's being left out, though).

Edited 17 July , 2022 by aodhdubh

[Chasemuseum]

On 13/07/2022 at 01:15, aodhdubh said:

I have been meaning to go through them, year by year, and compile easy to scan lists, minus the names of every officer, but it is a time consuming project.

please do. Your article above is very interesting and the subject - the structure of the modern British Imperial Army, painful to comprehend at the best of times.