Suffolk Regiment


The Suffolk Regiment was an infantry regiment of the line in the British Army with a history dating back to 1685. It saw service for three centuries, participating in many wars and conflicts, including the First and Second World Wars, before being amalgamated with the Royal Norfolk Regiment to form the 1st East Anglian Regiment in 1959 which, in 1964, was further amalgamated with the 2nd East Anglian Regiment, the 3rd East Anglian Regiment and the Royal Leicestershire Regiment to create the present Royal Anglian Regiment.

History

Early history

In 1685, the Duke of Norfolk's Regiment of Foot was recruited in Norfolk and Suffolk by the Duke of Norfolk. Raised to suppress the Monmouth Rebellion, it became part of the Royal Army and its Colonel Lord Lichfield remained loyal to James II after the 1688 Glorious Revolution. He was replaced by Henry Wharton and the regiment fought throughout the 1689 to 1691 Williamite War in Ireland, including the Battle of the Boyne, the Capture of Waterford and the Siege of Limerick in 1690.
After the October 1691 Treaty of Limerick, it returned to England before being transferred to Flanders. When the Nine Years' War ended with the 1697 Treaty of Ryswick, the regiment was saved from disbandment by becoming part of the Irish establishment, then spent the War of the Spanish Succession in Jamaica. Returning to Flanders in 1742 during the War of the Austrian Succession, it fought at Dettingen in June 1743 and Fontenoy in May 1745, where it suffered 322 casualties, the largest of any British unit involved.
As a result of the 1751 army reforms, it was renamed the 12th Regiment of Foot and in 1758, the second battalion was detached to form the 65th Regiment of Foot. During the 1756 to 1763 Seven Years' War, it fought at the battles of Minden, Villinghausen and Wilhelmsthal, as well as the Siege of Cassel. In 1782, it was given a county association as the 12th Regiment of Foot.

Napoleonic Wars

The regiment embarked for the West Indies in 1793 and took part in the capture of Martinique, Saint Lucia and Guadeloupe in 1794. It returned to England in 1795 and then embarked for India in 1796 where it took part in operations against Tipu Sultan including the Siege of Seringapatam in April 1799 during the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War. It also took part in the Invasion of Île Bonaparte in July 1810 and the Invasion of Isle de France in November 1810 during the Napoleonic Wars.

The Victorian era

While garrisoning the Australian Colony of Victoria in 1854, detachments from the regiment, the 40th Regiment of Foot and colonial police, suppressed the Eureka Rebellion, by gold prospectors at Ballarat. There was a skirmish involving the 12th regiment and a mob of rebellious miners. Foot police reinforcements had already reached the Ballarat government outpost on 19 October 1854. A further detachment of the 40th Regiment of Foot arrived a few days behind. On 28 November, the 12th Regiment arrived to reinforce the local government camp. As they moved near where the rebels ultimately made their last stand, there was a clash, where a drummer boy, John Egan and several other members of the convoy were attacked by a mob looking to loot the wagons.
Tradition variously had it that Egan either was killed there and then or was the first casualty of the fighting on the day of the battle. However, his grave in Old Ballarat Cemetery was removed in 2001 after research carried out by Dorothy Wickham showed that Egan had survived and died in Sydney in 1860.
While still in Australia, elements of the 1st Battalion served in the New Zealand Wars between 1860 and 1867.
The regiment was not fundamentally affected by the Cardwell Reforms of the 1870s, which gave it a depot at Gibraltar Barracks in Bury St Edmunds from 1873, or by the Childers reforms of 1881 – as it already possessed two battalions, there was no need for it to amalgamate with another regiment and it became simply the Suffolk Regiment. The depot was the 32nd Brigade Depot from 1873 to 1881, and the 12th Regimental District depot thereafter. Under the reforms the regiment became the Suffolk Regiment on 1 July 1881. As the county regiment of Suffolk, it also gained the county's militia and rifle volunteer battalions, which were integrated into the regiment as numbered battalions. After these reforms, the regiment now included:
Regulars
  • 1st Battalion
  • 2nd Battalion
Militia
Volunteer Force
  • 1st Suffolk Rifle Volunteers based in Woodbridge, renamed 1st Volunteer Battalion in 1888
  • 6th Suffolk Rifle Volunteers based in Sudbury, renamed 2nd Vol Btn in 1881
  • 1st Cambridgeshire Rifle Volunteers based in Cambridge, renamed 3rd Vol Btn in 1881
  • 3rd Cambridgeshire Rifle Volunteer Corps based in Cambridge, renamed 4th Vol Btn in 1881
The 1st Battalion served in the Second Boer War: it assaulted a hill near Colesberg in January 1900 and suffered many casualties including the commanding officer.
By contrast between 1895 and 1914, the 2nd Battalion, Suffolk Regiment was not involved in hostilities. It was stationed for the majority of the time in India. Garrison postings during this period include; Secunderabad 1895, Rangoon and the Andaman Islands 1896 to 1899, Quetta 1899 to 1902, Karachi and Hyderabad 1902 to 1905, Madras 1905 to 1907, Aden 1907, returning to England in 1908.
During its service in India the 2nd Battalion became known as a "well officered battalion that compared favourably with the best battalion in the service having the nicest possible feeling amongst all ranks". The 2nd was also regarded as a good shooting battalion with high level of musketry skills. The spirit of independence and self-reliance exhibited by officers and non-commissioned officers led to the 2nd Battalion taking first place in the Quetta Division of the British Army of India, from a military effectiveness point of view, in a six-day test. This test saw the men under arms for over 12 hours a day conducting a wide selection of military manoeuvres, including bridge building, retreats under fire, forced marches and defending ground and fixed fortifications.
In 1908, the Militia and Volunteers were reorganised nationally, with the former becoming the Special Reserve and the latter the Territorial Force. The regiment now had the 3rd of the SR at Gibraltar Barracks and the 4th and 5th TF battalions. In 1910 the regiment gained another Territorial unit, the 6th Battalion, after the breakup of the Essex and Suffolk Cyclist Battalion.

First World War

Regular Army

The 1st Battalion landed at Le Havre as part of the 84th Brigade in the 28th Division in January 1915 for service on the Western Front and then transferred to Egypt on 24 October 1915. It suffered some 400 casualties at the Second Battle of Ypres in May 1915.
The 2nd Battalion landed at landed at Le Havre as part of the 14th Brigade in 5th Division in August 1914. The value of the 2nd Battalion's 20 years of peacetime training was exemplified at the Battle of Le Cateau on 26 August 1914, a mere 23 days since Britain had declared war on Germany. In this action the 2nd Battalion undertook a fierce rear-guard defence out-manned and out-gunned by superior numbers of enemy. The 2nd Battalion held their defensive position despite losing their commanding officer, Lt. Col. C.A.H. Brett DSO, at the commencement of the action and their second in command, Maj. E.C. Doughty, who was severely wounded after six hours of battle as he went forward to take ammunition to the hard-pressed battalion machine gunners.
Almost totally decimated as a fighting unit after over eight hours of incessant fighting, the 2nd Battalion, Suffolk Regiment was gradually outflanked but would still not surrender. This was despite the fact that the German Army, knowing the 2nd Battalion had no hope of survival, entreated them to surrender, even ordering the German buglers to sound the British Cease Fire and gesticulating for the men of the 2nd to lay down their arms. At length an overwhelming force rushed the 2nd Battalion from the rear, bringing down all resistance and the 2nd's defence of Le Cateau was at an end. Those remaining alive were taken captive by the Germans, spending the next four years as prisoners of war and not returning home until Christmas Day 1918.
As an example of their valour and the level of training they had been subject to as a peacetime unit, it is noted that 720 men of 2nd Battalion, Suffolk Regiment total roll call of some 1,000, many of whom had been with the battalion since the 1899 posting to Quetta, were killed, wounded or captured. This fight-to-the-last-man defence at Le Cateau was later recognised as a key factor in preventing the German occupation of Paris. The battalion, due to the casualties sustained, was transferred to GHQ Troops before, on 25 October, transferring to the 8th Brigade of the 3rd Division and, almost a year later, transferred to 76th Brigade of the same division, where they were to remain for the rest of the year.

Special Reserve

The 3rd Battalion went to its war station in the Harwich Garrison, where it spent the war carrying out is twin roles of home defence and preparing reinforcement drafts for the Regular battalions serving overseas. It also spun off the 10th Battalion, which carried out the same task for the 7th, 8th and 9th Battalions until it became 26th Training Reserve Battalion in 1916.

Territorial Force

The 1/4th Battalion landed at Le Havre and joined the Jullundur Brigade of the 3rd Division in November 1914 for service on the Western Front. It ended the war as the pioneer battalion of the 58th Division. The 1/5th Battalion landed at Suvla Bay as part of the 163rd Brigade in the 54th Division in August 1915; it was evacuated from Gallipoli in December 1915 and moved to Egypt and saw action again at First Battle of Gaza in March 1917 and through the Sinai and Palestine campaign. The 1/6th Battalion served in home defence throughout the war.
Soon after the outbreak of war the TF formed 2nd Line battalions, initially to supply reinforcements to the 1st Line serving overseas, then as service battalions in their own right. The 2/4th, 2/5th and 2/6th Battalions served in home defence throughout the war. The 3rd Line battalions were formed in 1915 to supply reinforcements. The 3/6th Battalion was disbanded in 1916, the 3/4th and 3/5th amalgamated as 4th Reserve Battalion, and then absorbed the reserve battalion of the Cambridgeshire Regiment to form the Cambridge and Suffolk Battalion.
Members of the TF who had not volunteered for overseas service were formed into Provisional Battalions, 4th and 5th Suffolks forming 64th Provisional Battalion. The Military Service Act 1916 swept away the home/foreign service distinction, and all TF soldiers became liable for overseas service, if medically fit. On 1 January 1917 the provisional units became numbered battalions of their parent regiments, with 64th Provisional Bn, becoming 14th Suffolks, serving in bhome defence.
15th Battalion was formed in Egypt in 1917 from the dismounted Suffolk Yeomanry. It served as infantry in Palestine until the end of the war.