Tag Archives: Royal Lancers

Hold your horses

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In 1919, the peacetime British Army was authorized to retain three regiments of household guards cavalry and 28 regiments of line Dragoons, Hussars, and Lancers– all horse-mounted, including three full brigades based in the home islands and others stationed around the Empire. This didn’t even include 14 volunteer part-time mounted Yeomanry regiments in the Territorials, or units in the British Indian Army.

This would soon change dramatically.

Most British regular cavalry regiments were mechanized between 1928 and the outbreak of World War II, with younger men and officers moving on to the new type of service and older ones, well, not.

This sunsetting led to Brig. Gen H. Clifton-Brown, Tory MP for Newbury and the former commander of the 12th Lancers, lamenting in March 1935, “I am sorry that we cannot go on clinging to the horse, but I hope we shall cling to him as long as we can.”

The last British line cavalry to hand over their horses was the 2nd Dragoons (The Royal Scots Greys), who were seen as a sort of household Scottish cavalry regiment and treasured their nationally renowned grey mounts, famous for their role at Waterloo.

While the more or less “English” household cavalry was allowed to keep at least some of their horses, a lobbying campaign by Scottish Members of Parliament, bowing to public opinion against the War Office’s plans, kept the Greys mounted into May 1941, only then moving to American-made Grant medium tanks.

By this time, even the household regiments had moved over, keeping just a few horses for the Guards’ ceremonial duties.

Riders in the “Farewell Grey Horse Race” in Ramle, Palestine, 1941, where the Greys were based at the time.

Ironically, the last British mounted force to unsaddle was a territorial yeomanry unit, the Queen’s Own Yorkshire Dragoons, which were converted to an armored role on 1 March 1942. 

While the BEF lost 28,314 War Department vehicles and another 20,588 impressed civilian vehicles at Dunkirk, they had no horseflesh to leave in France.

Well, enter the world of stranger things, where everything old is seemingly new again, from NATO Battle Group Poland, –a U.S.-led battle group, in partnership with Great Britain, Romania, and Croatia– comes these images of the British Army’s Royal Lancers on Op CABRIT, conducting a “low profile mounted recce” with elements of the Polish 2nd Lubelska Brigade.

The (Amalgamated) Lancers Paying Homage

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Located at Cambrai Barrack in Catterick is The Royal Lancers (Queen Elizabeths’ Own) of the British Army, a fairly new regiment, only being formed in 2015. Nonetheless, it was created via an amalgamation of several other Lancer regiments to include the 9th/12th Royal Lancers (Prince of Wales’s) and the Queen’s Royal Lancers, the latter of which had been formed by a 1993 amalgamation of the 16th/5th Lancers and the 17th/21st Lancers, carrying the history of those two regiments (which had also been amalgamated in 1960 and 1922, respectively). Hence, today’s Royal Lancers tend the history and lineage of no less than a half-dozen old Napoleanic and Crimean-era “pole cavalry” regiments.

The coolest of which, the 17th Lancers (Duke of Cambridge’s Own) (the original skull head “Death or Glory Boys”) has lingered on in the center of the unit’s cap badge and banners, along with the traditional black beret of the Tank Corps.

A battalion-strength unit, today’s Royal Lancers are built around four Sabre Squadrons (A, B, C, and D) with CVR(T) Scimitars (but are converting to Jackals) and Panthers to perform an armored scout/recon role in 1 Armoured Infantry Brigade.

The Royal Lancer’s daily driver, the CVR(T) Scimitar, includes light armor and a fearsome 30 mm L21 RARDEN cannon. A design that dates to the 1970s and saw combat in the Falklands and against Saddam, Scimitar is supposed to be retired by 2023 and the British are giving them away to the Ukrainians.

Of course, the Lancers are moving to the lighter and faster, but almost totally unarmed and unarmored, Jackal, but hey…

Still, with an amalgamated lineage that dates to 1759, the Lancers have a certain cavalry record to uphold.

They provide dismounted lance-wielding marching platoons for events such as the Queen’s Jubilee, the only unit authorized to do so.

And there are always Lancer wedding parties.

Note the red caps, a throwback to the lining of the old Lancer czapka of the 19th century

The officer’s dress mess uniform (augmented by the retiree-standard bowler hat and pinstriped suit with umbrella) is a throwback to Wellington. For reference, today’s RL’s mess dress tunic runs a paltry £2,285, showing that, while times may have changed since the old days, they haven’t changed all that much.

A contemporary Royal Lancer officer in mess dress flanked by the original constituent lancer regiments: from left to right: 17th, 9th, 16th, RL, 12th, 5th, and 21st Lancers. Note the czapkas on the legacy uniforms

This all brings us to this week where the Colonel of the Regiment, Commanding Officer, Padre, and other Lancer representatives traveled to Montreuil-Sur-Mer, France, for the unveiling of the renovated statue of the iron-hearted Field Marshal Douglas Haig, 1st Earl Haig, KT, GCB, OM, GCVO, KCIE, commander of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) from 1915 to the end of the First World War.

Haig, born seven years after Balaclava, had commanded the 17th Lancers and was Colonel of the Regiment of the 17th/21st Lancers. His Lancer uniform is in the IWM.

“Soldiers from the Regiment conducted a Lance Guard for the unveiling ceremony and the church service afterward, performing admirably in ceremonial dress despite the extreme 34-degree heat!” noted the regiment.