The universal obligation to military service in the Shire levy was long established in England and its legal basis was updated by two acts of 1557 (4 & 5 Ph.

[1][2][3][4][5] The Kent Trained Bands were on high alert during the Armada crisis in 1588 and saw some active service during the English Civil War.

The militia was strongly supported by the Sackvilles, one of Kent's leading families, and despite several anti-militia riots in the county (at one point Major-General Lord George Sackville was besieged at Knole Park by an angry mob) the West Kent Militia was quickly formed at Maidstone.

The regiment's weapons were issued from the Tower of London on 20 November 1758 when it had reached 60 per cent of its establishment strength – one of the first units in the country to achieve this.

The adjutant of the West Kents, Edward Fage, produced his own manual which also included the more advanced training, such as field days.

At the end of May 1780 the West Kent Militia was ordered to Hilsea Barracks in Portsmouth, but on 6 June was diverted from its billeting area to Tottenham and Highgate, north of London, to assist in quelling the Gordon Riots in the city.

[14][7][18][20] From 1784 to 1792 the regiments were supposed to assemble for 28 days' annual training, even though to save money only two-thirds of the men were actually called out each year.

[23] The militia was already being embodied when Revolutionary France declared war on Britain on 1 February 1793; the West Kents had been called out in December 1792.

[14][7][18] The French Revolutionary Wars saw a new phase for the English militia: they were embodied for a whole generation, and became regiments of full-time professional soldiers (though restricted to service in the British Isles), which the regular army increasingly saw as a prime source of recruits.

After their trial Col Hutton of the West Kents and his opposite number of the Cambridgeshires took out newspaper advertisements declaring that the honour of their men had been vindicated.

Then to save time they were conveyed by waggons and then by barges on the Grand Junction Canal travelling at 40–50 miles per day to reach the embarkation port of Liverpool.

[26] The war ended with the Treaty of Amiens in March 1802 and all the militia were stood down, the West Kents being disembodied in April.

[14][7][18] However, the Peace of Amiens was short-lived and the regiments, whose training commitment had been increased from 21 to 28 days a year, were called out again in 1803, the West Kents being embodied in March 1803.

Under the Act, Militia units could be embodied by Royal Proclamation for full-time home defence service in three circumstances:[36][37][38][39] The West Kent Militia was redesignated as the West Kent Light Infantry in March 1853,[14][17][18] and Sir Thomas Maryon Wilson, 8th Baronet, was appointed colonel on 1 April that year in succession to Sir John Shaw.

War having broken out with Russia in 1854 and an expeditionary force sent to the Crimea, the militia began to be called out for home defence.

[42][51][52] Under the 'Localisation of the Forces' scheme introduced by the Cardwell Reforms of 1872, militia regiments were brigaded with their local regular and Volunteer battalions – for the West Kent LI this was with the 50th (Queen's Own) and 97th (Earl of Ulster's) Regiments in Sub-District No 46 (County of Kent) at Maidstone, where a Brigade Depot was formed in April 1873.

[53][54][55] Although often referred to as brigades, the sub-districts were purely administrative organisations, but in a continuation of the Cardwell Reforms a mobilisation scheme began to appear in the Army List from December 1875.

The division, the rest of which comprised militia regiments from London and Middlesex, would have mustered at Tunbridge Wells and Maidstone in time of war.

There were moves to reform the Auxiliary Forces (Militia, Yeomanry and Volunteers) to take their place in the six Army Corps proposed by the Secretary of State for War, St John Brodrick.

Once the pool of reservists had dried up, the 3rd Bn trained thousands of raw recruits for the active service battalions.

[14][18][51] As early as 1778 the Kent Militia regiments are reported to have worn red coats with grey facings,[17][20][69] but a 1780 source suggests this was light blue.

[17][34][42][51] The officers of the West Kents wore a silver shoulder-belt plate with the White Horse within an oval inscribed by the regimental name, on an eight-pointed cut star.

After the West Kents became light infantry in 1853 the White Horse and motto was worn inside the strings of a bugle-horn.

The coatee button had the White Horse and motto resting on a crowned garter inscribed 'West Kent Light Infantry'.

In that year the King drew the lots for individual regiments and the resulting list remained in force with minor amendments until the end of the militia.