The regiment was raised in Philadelphia, Province of Pennsylvania, as the Volunteers of Ireland in 1777 and went to New York City with the British Army in April 1778.

The regiment was the primary unit in the Battle of Hobkirk's Hill in April 1781, as well as the relief of the Loyalist fort, at the Siege of Ninety-Six in May 1781.

They remained in South Carolina until the British surrender of General Lord Cornwallis, at Yorktown in October 1781.

[1] The soldiers of the Volunteers of Ireland were mustered out in New York City, and thereafter taken by ship to Nova Scotia.

This was in response to the policy of resettlement for British colonists displaced from their lands during the war, coupled with the fact that the vast majority of soldiers were Irish, and England had no desire to return Irish emigrants back to either England or Ireland, because it needed new settlers in Canada.