Caribbean Regiment
The Caribbean Regiment was a regiment of the British Army during the Second World War. The regiment went overseas in July 1944 and saw service in Italy, Egypt and Palestine.
History
There had been resistance from the War Office to forming a new West Indian regiment, but those who made their own way to the UK were able to enlist in the British Army. Nearly 10,000 British West Indians travelled and joined the army in Britain. Following discussion between the Colonial Office and the War Office, the Caribbean Regiment was formed in April 1944 of 4,000 volunteers. The recruits were drawn from the Imperial fortress of Bermuda and all over the British West Indies; most were members of local Volunteer Defence Forces. A few officers and non-commissioned Officers were also drafted in from other British Army units.Many Bermudians were already serving in various regiments and corps of the army, as well as in the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force when the Second World War began, with many others joining thereafter.
In Bermuda, the manpower of the reserve units, recruited primarily to defend the dockyard was increased by additional recruiting, which began before the declaration of war, but with the regular component of the garrison having been drastically reduced during post-First World War cutbacks to the regular army, the garrison would remain under-strength 'til the establishment of the Bermuda Base Command of the United States Army. Despite this, and the threat posed by German surface vessels, submarines, and aircraft, as during the First World War volunteers from the local units were soon formed into a contingent for overseas service. This was nominally a Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps contingent to the Lincolnshire Regiment, but a handful of volunteers from the Bermuda Militia Artillery and Bermuda Volunteer Engineers were attached for the transit, separating to join their parent corps in England. This contingent departed Bermuda in June, 1940, following which concern of denuding the garrison meant a moratorium was placed on any further drafts being sent overseas by the local units. By 1943, the United States Army and United States Marine Corps establishment in Bermuda was larger than that of the British Army, the threat posed by the German navy had greatly diminished, and the moratorium against overseas contingents was lifted.
A detachment of 104 officers and men from the Bermuda Militia Artillery and Bermuda Militia Infantry, arrived on two ships on 13 and 23 April 1944 to form the training cadre of the new regiment at Fort Eustis, a US Army base near Williamsburg, Virginia.
The Bermudians prepared for the arrival of the volunteers from West Indian colonies, who meanwhile had collected into two contingents beginning on 1 April 1944, one at Trinidad and the other at Jamaica. They arrived under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Hugh Wilkin, OBE, MC, The Queen's Own, who became the Commanding Officer of the new regiment. Whether a badge was authorised for the regiment is unclear. Although created as a regular line infantry regiment of the British Army, the regiment never appeared in the Army List, in which the badge of a unit, if one was authorised, is described. At least some of the Bermudians wore the General Service Corps cap badge, which was used by the Bermuda Militia Infantry while serving with the Caribbean Regiment. A blue, yellow, and green regimental flash was authorised for the Caribbean Regiment, and the Bermudian contingent was authorised to wear the name Bermuda as a distinguishing mark.
In order of the number of strength, the regiment was made up of drafts from Trinidad, Jamaica, Barbados, British Guiana, Bermuda, the Windward Islands, and the Leeward Islands. Newly recruited men were tested in Virginia for fitness, with those not found fit returned to their colonies. With more experience, and a generally higher degree of education, many of the Bermudian men were made non-commissioned officers and distributed around the regiment. Some of the South Caribbean soldiers had already trained for deployment to the Pacific. The Bermuda Militia Artillery and Bermuda Militia Infantry contingent had previously joined with the Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps' Second Contingent to the Lincolnshire Regiment in 1943 to form the temporary Command Training Battalion, stationed at Prospect Camp while training for the war in Europe.
The new regiment trained in Virginia, where the regiment was the first to celebrate the King's birthday in the U.S. since the American Revolution. The King's Birthday Parade was attended by Lieutenant-General Sir Gordon Nevil Macready, 2nd Baronet, the Head of Mission of the British Army staff in Washington DC, who reviewed the regiment and presented the Commanding Officer with special messages from the Secretary of State for War and the Secretary of State for the Colonies. The message from the Secretary of State for War read:
The message from the Secretary of State for the Colonies read:
The Regiment left the USA for Oran, in North Africa, in June 1944. Oran was handed over to Free French Forces before their arrival, and the Regiment went on to Naples, Italy, in July 1944, where it was employed in general duties behind the front line. L/BDA/95 Private W.C. Baxter of the Bermuda Militia Infantry died there on 4 September 1944 of an abscess of the liver and was buried at the Naples War Cemetery. In October, it escorted 4,000 German prisoners of war from Italy to Egypt, where it was used in mine clearance work around the Suez Canal area.
The regiment never saw front line action. This was due partly to inadequate training and partly because of the anticipated political impact in the British West Indies if heavy casualties had been incurred.
The Caribbean Regiment left Port Said in December 1945 on the troopship Highland Monarch, reaching St. George's Town, Bermuda, on 5 January 1946. The Bermudian contingent disembarked there and was transferred by the rescue tug HMS St. Blazey to the City of Hamilton, from where the one-hundred officers and other ranks were driven in lorries to Prospect Camp. The remainder of the Regiment departed Bermuda aboard Highland Monarch for the West Indies, where the Regiment was disbanded. The Bermudian contingent members were returned to their original unit before being placed on the Reserve and discharged from active service. Some were recalled to form part of the contingent sent from the various Bermuda-raised units to the London Victory Celebrations of 1946, and placed back onto the Reserve on their return to Bermuda.