The London Heavy Brigade, Royal Garrison Artillery was a unit of the British Territorial Force formed in 1908. It fought on the Western Front during World War I, and its successors served in the Mediterranean and North-West Europe theatres during World War II.
Origin When the Territorial Force was created in 1908 by the Haldane Reforms, each infantry division was allocated a heavy battery of the Royal Garrison Artillery (RGA). London provided two divisions, whose heavy batteries were manned by converting the existing 1st London Engineer Volunteer Corps (EVC) into the 1st London Heavy Brigade, RGA. The 1st London EVC had been raised in 1862 as the 1st City of London Engineer Volunteer Corps, nicknamed 'Old Jewry' from the quarter of the City of London where it was initially based, though the unit moved to the Barbican in 1868 and then to Islington in North London in 1877. From 1863 to 1868, it was attached for administrative purposes to the 1st Middlesex EVC based at the South Kensington museums.Beckett, Appendix IX.Westlake, p. 11.Barnes, Appendices III & IV.Litchfield pp. 162–3.Monthly Army Lists.Post Office London Directories.
The engineer unit sent a detachment of one officer and 25 other ranks to assist the regular REs during the Second Boer War in 1900, and a second section the following year.Watson, pp. 42–3.
The RGA brigade formed in 1908 was an administrative unit for the 1st and 2nd London Heavy Batteries, assigned to the 1st and 2nd London Divisions respectively. Its drill hall was at Offord Road in Islington.
World War I The two London divisions had just begun their annual training on Salisbury Plain when war was declared in August 1914: they promptly returned to their drill halls to mobilise. Both London heavy batteries were equipped with four 4.7-inch guns.Becke, Pt 2a, pp. 69–75.Becke, Pt 2a, pp. 141-7.
1/1st London Heavy Battery During the autumn of 1914, the 1st London Division sent most of its infantry battalions to relieve Regular troops in Malta or to supplement the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in France. By January 1915, what remained of the division in the UK was broken up and its support units, including 1st London Heavy Battery, were assigned to a new 2nd Line division (the 2/1st London) that was being organised. The battery organised its own 2nd Line unit, designated 2/1st.Becke, Pt 2b, pp. 9–15.
The new division, now numbered 58th (2/1st London) Division, spent 1915 and the early part of 1916 training around Ipswich. On 11 February 1916, the 1/1st London Heavy Battery left the division and moved to Woolwich to prepare for independent service overseas, the 2/1st London Heavy Battery having already joined 58th Division the previous September. The 1/1st Bty disembarked at Le Havre on 3 March 1916 and joined XXVII Heavy Artillery Group, RGA. Subsequently, it passed from one mobile or mixed-gun Heavy Artillery Group (HAG) to another, supporting the various armies of the BEF as operations dictated.
On 12 February 1917, the four-gun battery was made up to six guns when it was joined by a section from 193rd Heavy Battery, a New Army unit that had just arrived from England. By now, the heavy batteries on the Western Front had adopted the 60-pounder in place of the 4.7-inch. The battery was finally posted to 42nd HAG (later 42nd Heavy Brigade) on 23 December 1917 and remained with it (apart from short detachments) for the rest of the war.Farndale, Annex E.Farndale, Annex M.'Allocation of Heavy Batteries RGA' and 'Allocation of HA Groups', The National Archives (TNA), Kew, file WO 95/5494.
1/2nd London Heavy Battery The 2nd London Heavy Battery also formed 1st and 2nd Line units. The 1/2nd Bty landed in France with 2nd London Division (soon afterwards renamed 47th (1/2nd London) Division) on 15 March 1915. However, artillery policy in the British Expeditionary Force was to withdraw heavy batteries from the divisions and allocate them to HAGs. The 1/2nd Bty therefore transferred from the division to I Group, Heavy Artillery Reserve, on 31 March.Maude, Appendix C. It joined the 13th HAG, supporting V Corps, on 19 April 1915.
Kitchener's Wood
On 22 April, the battery was camped at 'Kitchener's Wood' en route to Ypres to be attached to the Indian Corps when the Germans launched a surprise attack (the 2nd Battle of Ypres) behind a gas cloud and broke through the French defenders. Although reportedly armed with only seven rifles, the Londoners fought a stubborn rearguard action as the Germans entered the wood, allowing the gunners to remove the breechblocks and firing pins from their 4.7s before escaping. The guns were recaptured by the 2nd Canadian Division but the position could not be held and the guns were abandoned.McWilliams & Steel, p. 47.Sir John French's despatch at FirstWorldWar.com The Germans subsequently reported their capture of the guns marked 'London', causing 'considerable anxiety in London, from the impression thereby created that the London Division had been at Ypres in the gas attack, and had been driven back to such an extent as to lose their heavy guns'.Maude, p. 12.
The battery was subsequently re-equipped. On 1 March 1917, it was made up to six guns when a section joined from 199th Heavy Battery. Like the 1/1st, the 1/2nd London Heavy Battery moved from one HAG to another as required until 8 July 1917, when it returned to become a permanent part of the mobile 13th HAG (later 13th Heavy Brigade) for the rest of the war.
2/1st London Heavy Battery Raised in 1914 from volunteers, this battery joined 58th (2/1st London) Division at Ipswich on 24 September 1915, initially serving alongside its 1st Line battery. In July 1916, 2/1st and 2/2nd London Heavy Batteries formed part of 'C' Brigade of RGA heavy batteries attached to Southern Army defending Eastern England.TNA file WO 33/765. The battery did not accompany 58th Division when it went to France in January 1917. Instead, it joined the newly formed 71st Division on 9 March 1917. On 12 February 1918, it formed part of 226th Mixed Brigade when it was transferred to 67th (2nd Home Counties) Division, and the battery served as a training unit with this formation until the end of the war, without leaving the UK.Becke, Pt 2b, p. 104.
2/2nd London Heavy Battery This battery served with 60th (2/2nd London) Division from 9 April 1915 until 24 January 1916, when it was transferred to 61st (2nd South Midland) Division. It did not accompany the division to France in June 1916 but, like 2/1st Battery, it was part of 'C' Brigade RGA in Southern Army and then joined 71st Division.Becke, Pt 2b, p. 27. From then on its career was the same as the 2/1st Battery.
Interwar The brigade re-formed at Offord Road in 1920 as 14th (London) Medium Brigade, RGA, soon being renumbered as 53rd (London) Medium Brigade, in the Territorial Army. The reformed brigade now had four batteries, having absorbed the pre-war III London Brigade, Royal Field Artillery, (numbered CCLXXXII, or 282 Brigade during the war), which had been founded as the 2nd Middlesex Artillery Volunteers in 1861. It served as 'Army Troops' in 47th (2nd London) Divisional Area with the following composition:Litchfield, pp. 151–2.Titles and Designations. 209 (London) Battery 210 (London) Battery (Howitzer) 211 (London) Battery (Howitzer) 212 (London) Battery (Howitzer)
There were minor changes in designation, in 1924 when the RGA was absorbed by the Royal Artillery (RA), and in 1938 when RA brigades were redesignated as regiments. Just before the outbreak of war in 1939, 211 and 212 (London) Batteries were split off to form a duplicate regiment, numbered "64th Medium Regiment".
World War II
53rd (London) Medium Regiment On the outbreak of war in September 1939, the regiment formed part of London District.British London District on 3 September 1939 at Patriot FilesLondon District 1939 at British Military History53 Med Rgt at RA 39–45. Once again, orders to mobilise arrived during the regiment's annual summer camp. The regiment was to be included in the first contingent of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) to go to France, so it returned to Offord Road for mobilisation. On the day war was declared (3 September), it moved to Kempton Park Racecourse, where drafts of reservists arrived to replace the men who were under-age or unfit for overseas service. It embarked on 2 October.Chronology at 53rd Regt website.BBC People's War
Dunkirk The regiment formed part of II Corps of the BEF.Joslen, p. 462.Ellis, France & Flanders, Appendix III Corps 1940 at British Military History2 Corps at RA 39–45. The BEF was deployed along the Franco-Belgian border during the months of the Phoney War, but when the Germans attacked Belgium on 10 May 1940 it began a carefully planned advance to the line of the River Dyle. 53rd Medium Regiment was in position behind this line by 15 May, firing its first shots in support of 7th Guards Brigade.Ellis, France & Flanders, Ch. 3 . But the Germans had penetrated the French line on the River Meuse on the night of 12/13 May, and on 16 May the BEF began retiring to avoid being cut off. By 21 May, II Corps artillery, including 53rd Medium Regt, was in position to support the infantry dug in along the River Escaut and attempting to hold off the Germans.Ellis, France & Flanders, Ch. IV .
However, because of pressure elsewhere, the Escaut line could not be held and the BEF continued its retreat to the Ypres–Comines Canal where it halted again. The 53rd Regiment reached Marcq on 26 May. By now, German troops had broken through to the coast to the south on 20 May, and the BEF was encircled. It began a withdrawal to the seaports. The British artillery put down harassing fire to delay the German forces following up, but ammunition was running short. On the night of 26 May the Corps Commander RA (CRA) ordered the 53rd to fire off as much ammunition as possible and then put its guns out of action. The regiment joined the retreat the following day.Ellis, France & Flanders, Ch. VIII .Ellis, France & Flanders, Ch. IX .
II Corps' flank was now threatened by the retreat and later surrender of Belgian forces and on 28 May the Germans reached the extreme left of the BEF's perimeter at Nieuwpoort. Brigadier Hon E.F. Lawson, the CRA of 48th (South Midland) Division was given the task of shoring up the perimeter. Lawson seized on the gunners of 53rd Medium Regiment who were marching that way. Fighting as infantry alongside other II Corps artillery and engineer units and some French detachments, they were the only troops available to defend the line. They endured heavy mortar and machine-gun fire, and the Germans established a bridgehead in Nieuwpoort, but the gunners repulsed all subsequent attacks that day until relieved by 4th Division. This prevented a German breakthrough to the beaches east of Dunkirk where General Headquarters was positioned and where the evacuation of the BEF (Operation Dynamo) was proceeding.Butler & Bradford, pp. 158–9.Bryant, pp. 144–5, 149.Ellis, France & Flanders, Ch. XIII . II Corps withdrew for evacuation on the night of 31 May/1 June, destroying and abandoning all its guns, transport and equipment.Ellis, France & Flanders, Ch. XV .
Home defence For the next four years, 53 Medium Regiment served in Home Forces, initially in Southern Command to defend the British Isles,Southern Command at RA 39–45. later preparing for the liberation of Continental Europe as part of 4th Army Group Royal Artillery (AGRA) in I Corps.British Artillery in World War 2. The regiment supplied a cadre of experienced officers and gunners when the infantry of 8th Battalion, Buffs, were converted into 9th Medium Regiment on 1 December 1942.Frederick, p. 739.
D-Day