The Staffordshire Regiment

Contents

1.1 Zulu War
1.2 World War I
1.3 World War II
1.4 Gulf War I
1.5 Amalgamation

3 Victoria Cross Winners (External Links)

History

The Staffordshire Regiment (Prince of Wales') or Staffords was formed in 1959 by the amalgamation of The South Staffordshire Regiment and the North Staffordshire Regiment (Prince of Wales'). The Staffords can trace their history back to 1705 when a regiment known as the 38th Foot was raised at Lichfield by Colonel Luke Lillington.

Zulu War

During the Zulu War the South Staffordshire Regiment was located in South Africa and its battalions took part in a number of engagements there. One such engagement was in Hlobane, when the 2nd Battalion along with Boer troops were sent to attack that Zulu stronghold. The forces soon besieged the Zulus but a relief force of some 27,000 warriors arrived. The British and Boer forces, only 675 men in total, withdrew at the sight of this immense opposition. The next day some 25,000 Zulu warriors attacked the camp, located at Khambula, but were forced back after a onslaught from the British forces. The Zulus incurred over 2000 casualties, with the British force suffering just 29 casualties.

World War I

During WWI, there was an astonishing 35 Staffordshire battalions in existence. At the Battle of Festubert, an action designed in support of the large French action at Vimy Ridge in 1915, the 1st Battalion, South Staffordshire Regiment, performed with great distinction, as did every other regiment involved. The 22nd Brigade, of which the Staffords were part, were chosen to lead the right-side assault on the German trenches, though heavy machine-gun fire caused many casualties forcing the 22nd Brigade to halt, to allow a 15 minute bombardment to take place. After the bombardment ceased, the 22nd Brigade started moving again, with the Staffords now part of the assault. They succeeded in reaching the German front, despite incurring a large number of casualties. They soon worked along the trenches with the use of grenades. The Staffords and 2nd Battalion, Queens successfully secured territory from Stafford Corner to the old positions of the German front, not to mention the La Quinque Rue, achieving all their objectives. The 1st Bn. South Staffordshires, continued to have a relatively successful day, taking further ground in the German trenches and capturing at least 190 German soldiers. All these results by the Staffords were achieved on the first day of the assault, the 16th May.

The battalion suffered heavy casualties, with 261 officers and men being killed, though even this did not come near to the casualties that other regiments suffered at Festubert.

Many of the Staffordshire battalions participated in the Battle of Loos were they suffered horrendous casualties. The 1st Staffords were once again part of 22nd Brigade. Gas was used for the first time by the British in this battle, sometimes with tragic effect on their own forces. 22nd brigade moved towards its target, shrouded in the gas cloud but were cut down in swathes. Appalling losses were incurred by the 1st Staffords and 2nd Royal Warwicks, losing 70% of their men.

The 2nd Staffords were part of 6th Brigade. Their gas attack faced tremendous problems, owing to the wind. One officer from the Royal Engineers believed it to be too dangerous and risky to release the gas in such poor conditions, but Brigade HQ ordered him to proceed with the gas attack. The gas cloud, as the officer of the RE had possibly expected, incapacitated 130 men of the 2nd Staffords due the dense cloud not advancing on the German trenches. Fighting continued for the rest of the day and into the next. The Stafford battalions were in the thick of it for much of the time, even repelling German counter-attacks, against, at times, heavy odds.

The South Staffordshire Regiment battalions as a whole suffered horrendously during the Battle of Loos, losing 1,174 men. The 6th North Staffordshire Regiment itself suffered 315 dead. British casualties in all were rather high. Approximately 61,000 British casualties were incurred, mainly at the main fighting at Loos and Givenchy. 7,776 of these were killed.

World War II

Sicily

The 2nd South Staffords took part in the Sicily Landings, the first landings to take place in German occupied Europe. The 2nd Staffords were to be flown in by Gliders a technique still in its infancy. Approximately 130 gliders were intended to land in Sicily, but due to extremely bad conditions, only 87 managed to do, many crashing into the sea. Unfortunately, many of the crew and troops onboard these aircraft drowned before naval vessels could reach them, though many were saved.

The troops that were now on Sicily were scattered across the Italian island, and many were only in small units, with a seemingly impossible task before them: to capture and hold all their objectives. Ponte Grande Bridge, a key objective for the Allied invasion, was tasked to C Company of the South Staffords to capture before the enemy could blow it up. Two Gliders had survived to land near the objective, but one blew up on landing, leaving just 15 Platoon to assault the German positions at the Bridge. The Staffords, along with elements from other companies of the regiment, as well as glider pilots and Royal Engineers, succeeded in overwhelming the Germans there, capturing the Bridge intact. They succeeded in withholding numerous attempts to retake the bridge, lasting for over 15 hours, until finally, their ammunition had been expended and they were forced back by German troops. Luckily though, elements from the Royal Scots Fusiliers managed to arrive in time to relieve the exhausted Staffords, recapturing the bridge before it could be destroyed by the retreating German forces.

Arnhem

The 2nd South Staffords, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Derek McCardie and part of the 1st Airlanding Brigade, of the vast forces preparing to launch Operation Market Garden, the planned invasion of the Netherlands . They were landed, being ordered to proceed to Arnhem Bridge, held by 2 Para, being gradually besieged by overwhelmingly strong German forces. Their progress was continually hampered by seven German ambushes, before eventually encountering heavy German opposition in the area of St. Elizabeth's Hospital. Attempts were made to group together the Staffords and 11 Para, though this soon failed, and the situation soon degenerated into street battles, in which the Staffords suffered severe casualties. The battalion won two VCs during these engagements, a impressivehievement that no other battalion matched in WWII. During Operation Market Garden, the South Staffords lost 85 men, with 558 missing and 124 being evacuated, out of a total of 767 men that had originally been landed in the Netherlands .

Gulf War I

In October 1990 The Staffordshire Regiment was deployed to Saudi Arabia as part of 7th Armoured Brigade, better known as the 'Desert Rats'. The deployment was in response to the dictator Saddam Hussein's invasion of the sovereign territory of Kuwait, claiming it to rightfully belong to Iraq. The Staffords comprised 45 Warrior APCs, with a company of Grenadier Guards being attached to the regiment. A company from the 1st Battalion, The Prince of Wales's Own Regiment of Yorkshire. They were involved in fierce fighting with Iraqi forces from the beginning of land operations to the end. They covered an astonishing 290 km/180 miles in just 100 hours.

Amalgamation

As part of the reorganisation of the infantry announced in 2004, it was announced that the Staffordshire Regiment would merge with the 22nd (Cheshire) Regiment and the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment into a new three battalion regiment to be called the Mercian Regiment.

Other Information

Colonel-in-Chief: HRH The Duke of York KCVO, ADC
Current Colonel: Brigadier Simon James Knapper CBE, MC
Anniversaries: Anzio (22nd January), Ypres (31st July), Arnhem (17th September), Ferozeshah (21st December)
Marches:
- Quick: The Staffordshire Regiment
- Slow: God Bless The Prince of Wales
Alliances:
- 4^e Batallion Le Royal 22^e Régiment (Châteauguay) - Canada
- Antigua and Barbuda Defence Force
- 7th Battalion, The Baluch Regiment - Pakistan
- The Jamaica Regiment