1st Surrey Rifles
The 1st Surrey Rifles was a volunteer unit of the British Army from 1859 until 1993. It saw considerable service on the Western Front, at Salonika and in Palestine during World War I. It served as a searchlight unit and as a light anti-aircraft regiment during World War II.
Origins
An invasion scare in 1859 led to the creation of the Volunteer Force and huge enthusiasm for joining local Rifle Volunteer Corps. The 1st Surrey RVC or South London Rifles was one of the first such units formed, being based on the existing Peckham Rifle Club and recruiting many other members from the Hanover Sports Club at Peckham. The first officers were commissioned into the unit on 14 June 1859, and the headquarters was established in Camberwell. The following year it absorbed the 3rd Surrey RVC, also based at Camberwell, which became No 2 Company. The 1st Surrey RVC was active in trying to take over other South London groups: in November 1859 it made an unsuccessful approach to a new sub-unit formed in Putney. By the end of 1860 the strength of the 1st Surrey RVC was eight companies, recruited across Camberwell, Peckham and Clapham, under the command of Lt-Col John Boucher, formerly of the 5th Dragoon Guards. In 1865 they opened a new headquarters and drill hall in Camberwell. The uniform was Rifle green with red facings. An affiliated Cadet Corps was formed at Dulwich College in 1878.Following the Childers Reforms, the 1st Surrey RVC became the 1st Volunteer Battalion of the East Surrey Regiment on 1 July 1881, but without changing its title. Under the Stanhope Memorandum of December 1888, the battalion was assigned to the Surrey Volunteer Infantry Brigade, whose place of assembly in case of war was at Caterham to man the outer London Defence Positions. By 1907, the brigade had been split into separate East and West Surrey brigades, the 1st Surrey Rifles forming part of the East Surrey Brigade based at Worplesdon. Volunteers from the unit served in the 2nd Boer War, earning the battle honour South Africa 1900–02.
Territorial Force
Under the Haldane Reforms, the former Volunteers were subsumed into the Territorial Force in 1908. The newly created London Regiment consisted entirely of TF infantry battalions, with no Regular component. The 1st Surreys' recruiting area of South London had been incorporated into the new County of London since 1889, and so it became the 21st Battalion, The London Regiment and formed part of 6th London Brigade in the 2nd London Division. Its headquarters and all eight companies were located at Flodden Road, off Camberwell New Road.World War I
Mobilisation
The battalion had just arrived at Perham Down on Salisbury Plain on 2 August 1914 for its annual training when the order to mobilise was received, and it immediately returned to Camberwell. Within four days, sufficient volunteers had been recruited to bring it up to full strength, and the battalion marched to billets in St Albans for intensive training. A few officers were left at Flodden Road to form the nucleus of a reserve battalion, which was fully recruited before the end of September. The two battalions were later designated 1/21st and 2/21st Londons.1/21st Londons
The 2nd London Division was sent to reinforce the British Expeditionary Force on the Western Front in March 1915. The 1/21st Bn disembarked at Le Havre on 16 March and first went into the trenches on the evening of 2 April near Béthune, the four companies being distributed among the four battalions of 1st Brigade for initiation into trench warfare. Later that month the division took over its own section of line, the 1/21st being in front of Festubert.Festubert
The Battle of Festubert began on 15 May and, on 25 May, the 47th Division extended the British offensive by launching an attack from Givenchy just north of the La Bassée Canal. 6th London Brigade, was chosen to make the attack on a two-battalion front by the 1/23rd and 1/24th Londons, with the 1/21st in support. The brigade was harassed by artillery and machine-gun fire in the days before the attack, which went in at 18.30 on the 25th, against German trenches known as the 'S' Bend. The leading battalions swept across No-Man's Land with comparatively small losses, but once in the German front-line trench came under fierce enfilading fire from German guns that had pre-registered their own trenches. The lead companies of the First Surreys, waiting in the British front trenches, were also heavily shelled, and then met with intense small-arms fire when they crossed No-Man's Land to support the attack. They then had to put the captured trenches into a defensible state to ward off counter-attacks, while A and C companies brought up supplies, evacuated wounded, and dug a communication trench from the old front line during the night. Daybreak on 26 May revealed that the left flank of the battalion was 'in the air', with a party of Germans behind it still inflicting casualties. It took all day to fortify this flank and build up parapets that could be handed over to the relieving battalion that night. The First Surreys lost two officers and 32 NCOs and men killed in this action, and three officers and 120 NCOs wounded, and won the battle honour Festubert 1915.Loos
After rest and reorganisation, the First Surreys returned to frontline duty in June 1915, holding relatively quiet sectors for the next three months while mentoring the Kitchener's Army men of 15th Division. The First Surrey's Regular Army adjutant, Capt H.B.P.L. Kennedy, was promoted to command the battalion. In late September, preparations began for the Battle of Loos, in which 47th Division was to play a major part. 142 Brigade's role was to provide a firm flank to the division's attack, and distract the enemy's attention with dummy figures in No-Man's Land. The attack started on 25 September and, on the night of 28 September, 142 Bde went up to relieve the division's leading brigade, the First Surreys taking up positions among the coal mine workings of Loos. For the rest of the winter, the battalion was rotated through the dangerous defences in the area around Lone Tree and the Hohenzollern redoubt.Vimy
In Spring 1916, the division was moved to the Vimy Ridge sector near Arras. This was quiet to begin with, but in April intensive mining operations were begun by both sides, and on 20 May the Germans attacked and took some ground from the division. The 1/21st and 1/24th Bns counter-attacked on the evening of 23 May. The 1/24th was held up, but A Company of the First Surreys went ahead and recaptured the old line, holding it for about an hour and causing heavy casualties to the enemy. However, they were unsupported by flanking forces and were compelled to return: 'Nothing was left to show for this gallant and costly action beyond a few yards of our old front line'. To hold its position against German counter-attack at the end of the action, the battalion had to be reinforced by a company of the 1/22nd Londons, by the divisional engineers and pioneers and by the tunnelling companies. The First Surreys suffered 187 casualties of all ranks in this action.High Wood
The First Surreys were relieved on 27 July and marched south to take part in the Somme offensive. On arrival, the battalion underwent intense training, before going into the line near High Wood on 10 September. On 15 September, as part of the Battle of Flers-Courcelette, 47th Division attacked to complete the capture of High Wood, with 142 Bde in reserve. The First Surreys moved into Mametz Wood at 06.30 to be close to the fighting line, and at noon were released to 140 Bde. At 15.30, the battalion was ordered to capture a length of enemy-held trench that lay between 140 and 141 Bdes. All went well until the leading platoons topped the ridge east of High Wood, when they came within view of the enemy's guns. Whole platoons were wiped out by direct hits, but the others carried on until they were able to make a determined assault on the trench. The 'Starfish Redoubt' was carried and connection made with the remnants of 140 Bde, but the losses made it impossible to continue to take the second objective. Of the 19 officers and 550 men who had gone into the attack, only 2 officers and 60 men remained, the rest being dead or wounded.The battalion was pulled out the following morning and marched back to collect a draft of 300 inexperienced men from the 2/5th East Surreys. By 27 September, the First Surreys were back at High Wood in reserve. On 8 October they attacked again, in an attempt to capture 'Diagonal Trench' near Eaucourt l'Abbaye and the Butte de Warlencourt. The attack was meant to be a surprise after a 1-minute hurricane bombardment, but the troops could make only 2–300 yards, still some 200 yards short of the objective, before they were compelled to dig in and form a chain of outposts. The exhausted 47th Division was relieved the following day and sent to the Ypres Salient for the winter.
Messines
The First Surreys went into the line near the much fought-over Hill 60, now a quiet sector used by both sides to rest exhausted divisions. It was not until May 1917 that the battalion began training for a new attack at Messines. Assisted by a series of large mines, the pre-dawn assault at Messines was highly successful. The First Surreys, in support for 142 Bde, moved forward and by 06.15 were in their jumping-off position in the newly captured trenches. A and C Companies advanced and took 'Oaf Line', the German support line, after which they were to seize the spoil bank thrown up from canal construction, then wheel right and cross the canal. B and D Companies jumped off towards the spoil bank at 07.30, but the unit to their left was held up in 'Battle Wood', from which enemy machine-guns enfiladed the battalion as it advanced. Only a foothold could be gained on the spoil bank, so the divisional commander withdrew the troops and ordered a fresh bombardment of the position from 14.00 to 19.00. Reinforced, the First Surreys were due to renew the assault when the Germans put down an intense barrage, rendering attack impossible. The following day the battalion had to fend off several German counter-attacks. At Messines – generally considered a successful battle – the battalion's casualties were seven officers and 237 other ranks killed and wounded.After rest, the battalion went back into the front line on 1 July, and held the line or was in support until 25 July. Although this was a quiet period, the First Surreys were among the first units to experience the new German Mustard gas, which caused significant casualties. Even in camp in July and August, the battalion suffered from long-range shelling and night bombing. losing a steady trickle of key personnel. The 47th Division next went to the Arras front, where it held the Gavrelle and Oppy Wood sectors until late November, when it was sent to take over ground captured during the recent Battle of Cambrai.