The 304th Infantry Brigade was a formation of the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

organised from surplus

Royal Artillery The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery (RA) and colloquially known as "The Gunners", is one of two regiments that make up the artillery arm of the British Army. The Royal Regiment of Artillery comprises t ...

(RA) personnel retrained as infantry towards the end of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

Origin

By the end of 1944,

21st Army Group The 21st Army Group was a British headquarters formation formed during the Second World War. It controlled two field armies and other supporting units, consisting primarily of the British Second Army and the First Canadian Army. Established in ...

was suffering a severe manpower shortage, particularly among the infantry. At the same time the German ''

Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...

'' was suffering from such shortages of pilots, aircraft and fuel that serious aerial attacks on the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

could be discounted. In January 1945 the

War Office The War Office was a department of the British Government responsible for the administration of the British Army between 1857 and 1964, when its functions were transferred to the new Ministry of Defence (MoD). This article contains text from ...

began to reorganise surplus anti-aircraft and coastal artillery regiments in the UK into infantry battalions, primarily for line of communication and occupation duties in North West Europe, thereby releasing trained infantry for frontline service. The 304th Brigade was one of seven brigades formed from these new units.Joslen, p. 400.

Composition

The 304th Infantry Brigade was formed on 22 January 1945 by conversion of the Headquarters of 38th Light Anti-Aircraft Brigade within the 2nd Anti-Aircraft Group. It was commanded by Brigadier C.A.H. Chadwick, followed by Brigadier F.W. Sanders from 24 May 1945, and comprised the following Territorial Army RA units: *

630th (Essex) Infantry Regiment, Royal Artillery The 28th (Essex) Searchlight Regiment was a volunteer air defence unit of Britain's Territorial Army (TA) from 1935 until 1961, at first as part of the Royal Engineers, later in the Royal Artillery. During the Second World War it defended the app ...

formed by 28th (Essex) Searchlight Regiment RA (TA). *

637th (The Northamptonshire Regiment) Infantry Regiment, Royal Artillery The 1st Northamptonshire Rifle Volunteers were a unit of the British Army raised from 1859 onwards as a group of originally separate Rifle Volunteer Corps (RVCs). They later became the 4th Volunteer Battalion of the Northamptonshire Regiment and s ...

formed by 50th Searchlight Regiment RA (TA) (The Northamptonshire Regiment), which had originally been converted from the 4th Battalion

Northamptonshire Regiment The Northamptonshire Regiment was a line infantry regiment of the British Army in existence from 1881 until 1960. In 1960, it was amalgamated with the Royal Lincolnshire Regiment to form the 2nd East Anglian Regiment (Duchess of Gloucester's O ...

638th (Royal Northumberland Fusiliers) Infantry Regiment, Royal Artillery The 2nd Northumberland Rifle Volunteer Corps, also referred to as the Tynemouth Rifles, was an infantry unit of Britain's part-time force, the Territorial Army. The corps was raised during the expansion of the Volunteer movement in the 1850s and ...

formed by 53rd (Royal Northumberland Fusiliers) Searchlight Regiment RA (TA), which had originally been converted from 5th Battalion, Royal Northumberland Fusiliers.

Service

After infantry training, including a short period attached to the 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division, the 304th Brigade was sent to

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

in June 1945 following the liberation of that country (

Operation Doomsday In Operation Doomsday, the British 1st Airborne Division acted as a police and military force during the Allied occupation of Norway in May 1945, immediately after the victory in Europe during the Second World War. The division maintained law ...

Notes

References

Lionel Ellis Lionel Frederic Ellis CVO CBE DSO MC (13 May 1885 – 19 October 1970) was a British Army officer and military historian, author of three volumes of the official ''History of the Second World War''. Between the two World Wars, he was General ...

, ''History of the Second World War: United Kingdom Military Series: Victory in the West'', Volume II: ''The Defeat of Germany'', London: HMSO, 1968/Uckfield: Naval & Military, 2004, . *

External sources

British Military History website

The Royal Artillery 1939–45

The Patriot Files

BBC WW2 People's War
{{Use dmy dates, date=June 2017 Military units and formations established in 1945 Infantry brigades of the British Army in World War II