ROYAL FUSILIERS (CITY OF LONDON REGIMENT)

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'The Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment)' was an infantry regiment in the British Army^[1].

Contents

History

Formation

The American Revolution

The French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars

The First World War

The Second World War

Post 1945

Nomenclature

References

History

Formation

It was formed as a fusilier regiment in 1685 by Lord Dartmouth, George Legge, from two companies of the Tower of London guard, and was originally called the 'Ordnance Regiment'. Most regiments were equipped with matchlock muskets at the time, but the Ordnance Regiment were armed with Fusils. This was because their task was to be an escort for the artillery, for which matchlocks would have carried the risk of igniting the barrels of gunpowder.

The American Revolution

The Royal Fusiliers played an active part in saving Canada from invasion by the army of the American Continental Congress during the autumn of 1775^[2] and winter of 1776. Later, the regiment was sent to New York and participated in the occupation of Philadelphia, the Battle of Monmouth (1778), the capture of Charleston (1779), and the southern campaigns under the command of General Cornwallis.

The French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars

The Royal Fusiliers formed part of the famed Fusilier Brigade in Wellington's Peninsular Army along with the 23rd Regiment of Foot (The Royal Welch Fusiliers) at the Battle of Albuhera on 16 May 1811.

The First World War

The Royal Fusiliers served with distinction in the First World War^[3], raising 76 battalions who wore the regimental cap badge.They served on the Western Front, in Africa, the Middle East and Macedonia. Members of the Royal Fusiliers won the first two Victoria Crosses of the war near Mons in August 1914, and the last two in North Russia. Its war memorial is on High Holborn, near Chancery Lane tube station, surmounted by the lifesize statue of a World War One soldier, and its regimental chapel is at St Sepulchre-without-Newgate.
The 38th through 42nd Battalions of the regiment served as the Jewish Legion in Palestine^[4].
The 25th (Frontiersmen) Battalion has no current links with the Legion of Frontiersmen, as the 25th Battalion was disbanded in 1918.

The Second World War

The Royal Fusiliers were involved in many notable battles of the war, including Operation Shingle, or as it is now known, the Battle of Anzio. Company C was ordered to hold the bridgehead against a Tiger I tank assault. There were many casualties ^[5] , including Eric Fletcher Waters, father of Pink Floyd band member Roger Waters, who wrote the song "When the Tigers Broke Free" about the attack.

Post 1945

On 23 April 1968 the regiment was amalgamated with the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers (5th Ft), The Royal Warwickshire Fusiliers (6th Ft) and the Lancashire Fusiliers (20th Ft) to form 3rd Bn. The Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.

Nomenclature

The Regiment became the 7th Regiment of Foot (Royal Fusiliers) in 1751, although a variety of spellings of the word "fusilier" persisted until the 1780s, when the modern spelling was formalised. In 1881, under the Cardwell Reforms when regimental numbers were abolished the Regiment became The Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment).

References

1. 'English and Welsh Infantry Regiments: An illustrated Record of Service' Westlake,R. (195) Stroud,GLS,UK Spellmount) ISBN 1873376243
2. Recreated Royal Fuzileers c. 1775
3. 'The 2nd City of London Regiment-Royal Fusiliers-in the Great War, 1914-19 ' Gray,W.E. (1929, London, Seeley,Service &Co)
4. [1]
5. Further details