British Volunteer Corps

The Volunteer Corps was a British voluntary part-time organization for the purpose of home defence in the event of invasion, during the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars.

[1] Dundas had also received more practical proposals for volunteer forces from the Marquess of Buckingham, Arthur Young and General Sir William Erskine.

Further recruits were brought in by Pitt's appeal for volunteers in 1798, which came as Britain was facing the loss of Europe, failed peace negotiations, manpower shortages in the army, financial problems and potential rebellion in Ireland.

[7] At its height more than 300,000 men were members of the Corps and other volunteer units, a number matched by the regular army and militia only at the very end of the Napoleonic Wars.

One unit in Wolverhampton refused to act against food rioters and several volunteers in Devon actually led riots directed at farmers and millers in the winter of 1800–01.

[12] The infantry volunteers (but not the Yeomanry or artillery) were disbanded at the Peace of Amiens in 1802, but reformed the following year when Napoleon's planned invasion became a serious threat.