Once again, its component units continued to serve, in North Africa, Italy, North-West Europe, and Burma.

The division was again reformed in the TA in 1947 before being merged with the Home Counties District in 1961, thus ending its separate existence.

Two Army Troops battalions of the Royal Sussex Regiment were also attached for training, but were not integral to the division.

2nd Line units performed the home defence role, although in fact most of these were also posted abroad in due course.

[6] The division sailed from Southampton on 30 October 1914 with 13 infantry battalions and 3 artillery brigades (nine batteries of four 15-pounder BLCs each, but without ammunition columns).

[6] The infantry brigade staffs, the IV Home Counties (H) Brigade, RFA, the Home Counties (Kent) Heavy Battery, the engineers, signals, ambulance and train units were all left behind and most were soon posted to other divisions on the Western Front.

The battalions were posted to Lucknow (2), Cawnpore, Fyzabad, Mhow, Kamptee, Jubbulpore, Jhansi, Dinapore, Fort William, Rangoon and Maymyo and the batteries were posted to Kamptee, Mhow (2), Jullundur, Multan, Ferozepore, and Jubbulpore (3).

For example, the 1/4th Buffs[c] moved from Mhow[17] to Aden in August 1915,[18] to Bareilly in January 1916,[19] and to Multan in July 1918 where it remained until the end of the war.

[22] The Territorial Force was effectively disbanded in 1919, but started to reform from 1 February 1920 as the units commenced recruiting.

Infantry were no longer to be included as Army Troops or part of the Coastal Defence Forces so the pre-war total of 208 battalions had to be reduced by 40.

[42] By 1939 it became clear that a new European war was likely to break out, and the doubling of the Territorial Army was authorised, with each unit and formation forming a duplicate.

Initially in Southern and then Eastern Command, the division was sent overseas where it joined the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in France on 1 April 1940 and was assigned to III Corps (Lieutenant-General Ronald Forbes Adam).

[60] After returning to England the division, much reduced in manpower and woefully short of equipment and now under the command of Major-General Arthur Percival (who had taken command in late June 1940, until late March the following year), spent nearly two years on home defence, anticipating a German invasion which never occurred, travelling through the counties of Kent and Sussex and serving under I and XII Corps.

[40] On 29 May 1942, the division, now under the control of the War Office and commanded by Major-General Ivor Hughes, departed the United Kingdom to take part in the North African Campaign.

It arrived in Cairo, Egypt on 24 July – the long journey being due to sailing via the Cape of Good Hope.

[h] The 131st Brigade remained in the 7th Armoured Division for the rest of the war, taking part in the rest of the North African Campaign, culminating in May 1943 with the surrender of almost 250,000 Axis soldiers as prisoners of war, the Allied invasion of Italy from September–November 1943 and in the North-West Europe campaign from June 1944 until Victory in Europe Day in May 1945.

TA units were reactivated on 1 January 1947, though no personnel were assigned until commanding officers and permanent staff had been appointed in March and April 1947.

[74] The division, under the command of Major-General Philip Gregson-Ellis, was reformed in 1947; it included the Northamptonshire Yeomanry, and 47th (London), 131st (Surrey), and 133rd (Kent & Sussex) Infantry Brigades.

[78] Just before the outbreak of the First World War, the division commanded the following units:[3][79] Home Counties Divisional Engineers Royal Army Medical Corps Home Counties Divisional Train, ASC The division commanded the following units in the Second World War:[79][40][81] 44th (Home Counties) Divisional Engineers Royal Corps of Signals Machine Gun Battalion Reconnaissance The division was reformed after the Second World War with the following units:[79][75] The Home Counties Division had the following commanders, from formation in April 1908 to disembarkation in India:[82] When the division was re-established after the First World War, it had the following commanders until it was disbanded in the Middle East on 31 January 1943:[82] When the division was re-established after the Second World War, it had the following commanders until 1 May 1961 when the Territorial Army divisional headquarters were merged with regular army districts:[82]