4th battalion border regiment ww2

At the time of the merger, 1st Battalion was in India. 'D Company' held on to Incheville for several days until they ran short of ammunition. and I met their M.O. From the recollections of Trouble with Mexico caused the regiment to be stationed on the Texas border in 1913. They had not been informed as to our whereabouts. The 8th Army eventually arrived on December 8th and we were subsequently transported back by truck to railhead at Buq Buq and then in goods wagons to a transit camp in the Canal Zone of Egypt, from which we were given four days leave in the fleshpots of Cairo, especially Shepherds Hotel and the Mena House at the Pyramids. H.W.W. Just before Christmas we again moved, this time to Malvern, in the neighbouring county of Worcester, the home of a famous English school. Now it was a question of taking over internal security that had been under Vichy French control. In any case, I hope you find out what happened. Anyway, we can but try! Thoroughly enjoyed it. (2d, 3d, and 4th Battalions ordered into active Federal service 2 May 1992 at home stations; released 9 May 1992 from active Federal service and reverted to state control) Reorganized 1 October. You should be able to get hold of a book in English entitled 'Finest Hour' by Tim Clayton and Phil Craig (1999), Hodder & Stoughton. The National Army Museum works with a network of Regimental and Corps Museums across the UK to help preserve and share the history and traditions of the Army and its soldiers. We arrived in Tobruk Harbour just after dark in the evening, after an uneventful journey, during which we had the nicest English breakfast of bacon and eggs in the Wardroom that we had tasted since coming to Egypt. Volunteer battalions had been created in reaction to a perceived threat of invasion by France in the late 1850s. 1 Kings Own later fought in Italy with the 10th Indian Div. I had been left behind the advance attending an officer of ours who had been wounded by one of our own tanks, and when we were being guided back to join the battalion, as we approached, we saw two crowds like at a football match with about a quarter of a mile between them. This is a list of battalions of the Border Regiment, which existed as an infantry regiment of the British Army from 1881 to 1959. You might also try writing to (or visiting) the Town Hall in Rennes and asking what records they might have. Battalion - A battalion comprised three or more companies and was commanded by a lieutenant colonel. 41 The battalion was disbanded on 4 April 1946. The badge of todays regiment includes the Lion of England of the Kings Own and the laurel wreath awarded to the 34th for their part in the rearguard which saved the Army at the Battle of Fontenoy in 1745. Organised as "rifle volunteer corps", they were independent of the British Army and composed primarily of the middle class. For any other comments, please Contact Us. It continued in British Army service until 1959, when it merged with The Kings Own Royal Regiment (Lancaster) to form The Kings Own Royal Border Regiment. But knowing what is there and what to ask for is not easy. Men of the 4th Battalion, Border Regiment travel in the back of a lorry, France, May 1940. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. R.E. Stretchers and litters were constructed of bamboo and casualties were evacuated with Nagas acting as stretcher-bearers. The fighting took place in Picardy, Artois and finally in Normandy. 1st Battalion, The Durham Light Infantry Depots were open in Bowerham Barracks, Lancaster for The Kings Own, and in The Castle, Carlisle for The Border Regt. 1940 1945 I know what you mean about the problems of getting information, David, when you are not either the person who served in the Forces or their Next of Kin. The officers were billeted in, and had the Officers Mess in, the school buildings, the school having been evacuated by staff and pupils. READ MORE. The regiment lost over 7,700 men during the war. This infantry regiment was created in 1881. By 1920, all of the regiment's war-raised battalions had disbanded. Now, with some air cover, the Battalion reached the shelter of woods on the outskirts of that town, 'Radio Normandie' being situated there. Many men from 'D Company' of the Borders were killed or captured. It continued in British Army service until the 1881 reforms, when it was amalgamated with the 34th (Cumberland) Regiment of Foot to form The Border Regiment. This record is held by King's Own Scottish Borderers Regimental Museum. In addition 12 battalions of the Home Guard were affiliated to the regiment, wearing its cap badge. The battalion, nicknamed the Magnificent Bastards, is based out of Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, California and are a part of the 5th Marine Regiment and 1st Marine Division. On forming up we travelled by train to railhead further south and then by road to Bawli Bazar. Over the six-month period, the Bn. After being earmarked for support in General Archibald Wavell's offensive 'Battleaxe' the next departure was for the Syrian campaign. The Border Regiment. 6 Border were a beach landing group at the Normandy landings. It was then sent to South Africa in 1899, where it fought throughout the Boer War (1899-1902). They were small, around 5 ft. in height, but wiry and capable of running up and down hills with heavy loads. Evacuation of casualties was a further problem. Thought the presentation & interpretation made the subject accessible". had attacked a strongpoint ahead of us and occupied it and we passed through them with a squadron of Matilda tanks and, by daylight, had occupied an escarpment short of El Adam. The Durham Light Infantry Bn. Nowhere in the Naga Hills was there 50 yards of flat terrain. So, into the breech stepped the Naga Hillmen. It would seem reasonable therefore to assume your Mr. Hutchinson and his comrades transited through Rennes shortly before. At this point I should mention that the 51st Regiment of the Royal Field Artillery, comprising of men from Carlisle and all over Cumberland were present during the whole of the siege. It continued in British Army service until 2006, when it was merged into The Duke of Lancasters Regiment. After kitting up we were transported one morning to the dockside in Alexandria and boarded R.N. "Now little remembered, regarded and even by-passed in the history of the time, there were men who fought on in France after the main force of the B.E.F. The size of a regiment could range from 1,000 to 5,000 troops. The Loyal Edmonton Regiment (4th Battalion, Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry), or L Edmn R, is a Primary Reserve infantry unit of the Canadian Armed Forces based in Edmonton, Alberta. The 1st Battalion 7th Infantry Regiment and the 4th Battalion 7th Infantry Regiment (from Aschaffenburg, Germany) patrolled the Czechoslovakia border with Germany for years in preparation for war with The Soviet Union (USSR . Thanks to the step-like formation of the paddy fields, where we jumped down every few yards, and to the poor marksmanship of the Japanese, we arrived without any casualties in the jungle area, for the Japanese opened up with everything they had rifles, machine guns, mortars and grenades. The 1st Bn The Kings Own fought at Le Cateau and in the retreat from Mons in the first actions in the 1914-18 War. 4th Durham Survey Section They were part of the 70th British Infantry Division]". At one time or another these units were part of the garrison: 1st Royal Northumberland Fusiliers (Machine Guns) Pte. included our brigade, 23 Bde., and the 4th Border Regiment. To find out more about how we collect, store and use your personal information, read our Privacy Policy. On the retreat of the German / Italian Forces, the 4th Battalion The Border Regiment occupied the airfield of El Adem. The Luftwaffe harassed the evacuation which is when your uncle was unfortunately killed. Bn. But then at night, the Australian artillery returned the compliment tenfold! 4th Marine Regiment. After that it was Suez, Egypt, and a transit camp, until we entrained for the Western Desert. 2nd Battalion The Border Regiment on the North-West Frontier of India, c1933. Fighting on in France in 1940 after Dunkirk. We were given fourteen days leave, which Bob Watt and I took together. Both predecessor regiments were affiliated with counties just south of the English-Scottish border, in what is now Cumbria, and so the new unit was named The Border Regiment. There was much suffering but also much success, including the taking of many prisoners. I might point out that 4 Border was in peacetime a Territorial Army unit, in other words part-time soldiers and there were still a considerable number of T.A. The vessel in which I travelled was the destroyer, Jackal. It was against a Japanese occupied village named Phakedzumi. WO 169 / 1737 1st Northumberland Fusiliers In 1959, it was amalgamated with The Border Regiment to form The Kings Own Royal Border Regiment. From there patrols were sent out, during which areas occupied by the Japanese were attacked and in all cases the enemy were routed with many casualties and few casualties sustained by our troops. Two whole Divisions, plus many lines of communications and troops were drawn into battle with the Germans. It then participated in the Cherbourg Peninsula operation while attached to 2nd Armored Division from 19 July through 2 August 1944. The regiment was continually called upon to fight hostile Indians, guard the courts of justice, assist revenue officers, aid in executing convicted criminals, supervise elections, pursue outlaws and murderers, and in general institute lawful proceedings where anarchy reigned. We set sail down the Bristol Channel on 21st March. The regiment's territorial components formed duplicate second and third line battalions. Amongst all this chaos we noticed a guard mounting of the Durham Light Infantry, complete with blancoed equipment this within a week or so of one of the bitterest battles of WW2. To give the reader some idea of the preparedness for, and the attitude of the British Indian Establishment, it is of interest to relate that the first action of the authorities was to try to carry out a customs examination of a mobilised British division arriving in the country complete with weapons and transport from a war zone to a potential war zone. Under orders from the 10th French Army Commander, the 4th Border moved North-West to the line of the River Bresle. those of the BBC. This dragon now appears on the regimental buttons. 6th Rajputana Rifles, 4th Bn. However, 21 days in 38th British General Hospital in Bangalore and a fortnights convalescent leave in Ootacomund, a very popular hill station in peace time with quite a colony of permanent British residents, soon put me on my feet and I never looked back. At this time, the Japanese advance into India west of the Chindwin had begun and we were quite ignorant of the exact location of the forward Japanese troops and felt that there was a threat to the railway line with its many bridges, but we arrived safely without incident at Mariani. The 4th Regt particularly distinguished themselves at San Sebastian in Northern Spain in 1813, where they were instrumental in breaching the wall of the town. Again, intensive training was carried out for the next three months and again all enjoyed the amenities, which were just as good as in Hereford. 2 Border soon followed with the 7th Dlv, and fought in the first Battle of Ypres in defence of the Channel Ports. During the training period from October the only time the Bn. those of the BBC. It deployed to the Western Front in March 1916, remaining there for the rest of the conflict. at that time had no other role than a training role, we set off in motor transport and arrived at Patna on the River Ganges, where we were billeted at Patna University, which was not operating and without students. To be perfectly honest, until this last year when I have been a volunteer story-gatherer for this "People's War" project, most of the WW2 research I have done has been in France, and a little bit in Belgium and the Netherlands. After a few days, an H.Q. Almost the last sight of land which we had before going out into the Atlantic Ocean was the coast of County Antrim, Northern Ireland, where my wife, Hazel, was then living and where she stayed for most of the war. 01 FEB 44; 21 July - 10 AUG 44 ; 01 APR 45- 22 JUN 45; 19 FEB 45; 01 FEB 44. The HQ of the battalion was in Kendal, then in Westmorland. By the outbreak of the Second World War (1939-45), 1st Battalion was back in Britain. As so often happened, things did not work out that way. The Volunteer Training Corps were raised with overage or reserved occupation men early in the war, and were initially self-organised into many small corps, with a wide variety of names. From Brest, they went by ship to Southampton, where they arrived on the morning of June 18th 1940. Copyright 2023. Another of the companies reached the north bank of the Somme and were engaged in mortar machine gun and rifle exchanges with the Germans. A.E.F. All of the component units were federalized during the Spanish American War as the Second Infantry, Texas Volunteers. Both battalions marched many miles over the veldt during the Guerilla war that followed. It had been from this airfield of El Adem that the garrison of Tobruk had suffered the attentions of the Luftwaffe dive-bombers almost daily. that Tobruk Force, as we were called, would make diversionary incidents on the night of November 18th and that the real assault would be by the 8th Army to relieve Tobruk, which they expected would be on November 20th. I shall describe briefly our training and operations, so as to give the reader some idea of the conditions obtaining. Little in the way of operations were carried out, though the battalion did march to Shabe Bazar and B company was sent to a supposed area of Japanese activity at Taung Bazar, but despite active patrolling no contact was made with the Japanese. The railway complex at Rennes was bombed during mid morning Monday 17th June. This page has been archived and is no longer updated. Early in the year, disorders amongst the civil population in India organised by the Gandhi Congress Party resulted in a call for assistance of the military to the Civil Power to restore order. Arroyo dos Molinos is unique to the regiment, mainly on account of the fact that the English 34th met and defeated in battle the French 34th, capturing their drums and drum-majors mace, both of which are still in possession of the regiment and trooped every year on the anniversary of the battle. The regiment captured an Imperial Chinese Dragon Standard which hangs in Kendal Church, and was awarded the Dragon as a regimental badge. 2nd Battalion, 4th Marines was constituted in April 1914 during World War I when it was activated as one of the three . 4th (Westmoreland & Cumberland) Battalion, Border Regiment during the Second World War 1939-1945. Exactly how many were killed in this evacuation I am unsure, but all together, with the Lancastria, other ships and on the trains it must have been 2000+. This page has been archived and is no longer updated. Not in any way belittling the heroic battles fought around Kohima by the 2nd British and 7th Indian Divisions, the harassing operations by 23rd Brigade of which 4 Border Regt. Moved to billets in Blackpool. were evacuated. The Bn. This is a list of regiments within the British Army's Royal Armoured Corps during the Second World War.. On the creation of the corps in 1939, just before the outbreak of the Second World War, it comprised those regular cavalry and Territorial Army Yeomanry regiments that had been mechanised, together with the Royal Tank Regiment. Then, after yet another railway journey, this time at night, they arrived at Brest. Hutchinson M.B.E. The days 16 - 18 June 1940 were really vital to what happened in France, because it was when De Gaulle was trying to get the French Government to continue fighting the war, and Ptain took over and asked the Germans for an Armistice. Delhi, hence Louis Mountbattens action on arrival to take command of S.E.A.C. The Naga Hillmen were 100% loyal to us and never let us down. Orders soon arrived for us to move south towards the area of the Japanese L. of C. Our first objective was Mokokchung in the Naga Hills, east of Kohima. Meanwhile, 2nd Battalion was in India on the outbreak of the war. It continued in British Army service until the 1881 reforms, when it was amalgamated with the 55th (Westmorland) Regiment of Foot to form The Border Regiment. The withdrawal of the Japanese from the Imphal/Kohima area had begun. Gaya is supposed to be the birthplace of Buddha and there is an interesting Buddhist temple there, although India was at that time largely Hindu/Moslem and Buddhism associated more with Ceylon and countries further east. All volunteer battalions were renumbered to create a single sequential order. to land in Gallipoli in April, 1915. Normal infantry training was resumed and included two weeks jungle warfare training, which gave us a welcome change of location from our camp area. On 1 June 1945, a third Active Force component of the regiment, designated '4th Battalion, The Regina Rifle Regiment, CIC, CAOF', was mobilized for service with the Canadian Army Occupation Force in Germany. After its posting in India and Burma from 1890, it moved on to South Africa in 1905. There appears to have been strict censorship in operation at the time. But then, on hearing that Rouen had fallen into enemy hands, Fcamp became the destination. The result was that, although no ground was secured by the attack, the next day the enemy had moved off westward. Over a period of a few days, an army veterinary team removed the vocal chords of the brigades mules under anaesthetic without causing much distress to the mules, which were given 10 days convalescence and seemed none the worse for their operations, which were a big success. [All the above relieved the Australian infantry. Have a look at pages 181-187. They were also given the task of relieving the Black Watch Battalion who were in the village of Incheville. In the event that you consider anything on this page to be in breach of the site's House Rules, please click here. Platoon, with Major Douglas Scott in command, attacked various areas around the village itself.

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