British yeomanry during the First World War
On the Western Front, they were initially used in their traditional role, but during the campaign in Gallipoli, the 2nd Mounted Division fought dismounted.
Later, the yeomanry fought on the Macedonian front where, as part of the British Salonika Army, they were once again employed in the mounted role.
Several regiments serving in the Middle East were converted to infantry and used to form the 74th (Yeomanry) Division, which then fought on in Palestine before being transferred to France.
In 1918, other yeomanry regiments were transferred to the Western Front to form battalions of the Machine Gun Corps.
By the 1800s, nationally there were only around 1,500 men, but fear of renewed French militarisation saw a large increase in their numbers by the middle of the century.
[5] By that time, the yeomanry volunteer had to provide their own weapons and equipment and attend twenty-four days drill a year.
[8] After the start of the Second Boer War, the British Government called for volunteers and in response 10,000 men enlisted in the Imperial Yeomanry.
[10] Erskine Childrers was a proponent of 'mounted infantry' such as Yeomanry replacing tradition schools of sword-armed cavalry, and wrote a pamphlet decrying the 'German' school of thinking as un-English; He wrote that during the war, it was Yeomanry and the 7,000 colonial mounted contingent, not the 5,000 regular British cavalry, that led the way in tactical development; if only because they had been correctly trained to use the right weapons and tactics for the conflict.
[16] Twelve regiments were broken up to provide divisional reconnaissance squadrons for infantry divisions on the Western Front.
The largest contingent, forty regiments, served in the Middle East, thirty-one of them in a dismounted role during the Gallipoli Campaign.
[nb 1] The second line regiments mostly remained in Great Britain as mounted troops until after 1915, when they were eventually transferred to other formations.
[24] As the war progressed, they were issued with brodie helmets, hand grenades, trench mortars and Hotchkiss light machine guns.
Still wearing blue and red uniforms, with breast and back metal plates and plumed brass-steel helmets.
[32] The 7th Mounted Brigade also served, as an independent unit, with the British Salonika Army on the Macedonian front.
[29] Other yeomanry regiments that had served at Gallipoli and withdrawn to Egypt, were formed into the 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Dismounted Brigades, and deployed to defend the Suez Canal.
[33][nb 2] The Victoria Cross is the United Kingdom's highest award for valour in the face of the enemy.
The first was awarded 21 August 1915, to Private Fred Potts of the Berkshire Yeomanry, during the Battle of Scimitar Hill part of the Gallipoli Campaign.
[36] Lance-Corporal Harold Sandford Mugford of the Essex Yeomanry attached to the 8th Squadron, Machine Gun Corps was the second recipient 11 April 1917 during the Battle of Arras.
[37] Major Alexander Malins Lafone of the Duke of Cambridge's Hussars for his actions on 27 October 1917 in the Battle of El Buggar Ridge.
[39] A posthumous award to Acting Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver Cyril Spencer Watson also of the Duke of Cambridge's Hussars, while commanding the 2nd/5th Battalion, Kings Own Yorkshire Light Infantry on 28 March at Rossignol Wood during the German spring offensive in France.
[40] The last award was on 31 October 1918 to Sergeant Thomas Caldwell of the 12th (Ayr and Lanark Yeomanry) Battalion, Royal Scots Fusiliers at Audenarde France during the Hundred Days Offensive.
[nb 4] After the war, the British Government decided to reduce the number of yeomanry regiments down from the pre-war total of fifty-five.
