The 9th
Army Group Royal Artillery
An Army Group Royal Artillery (AGRA) was a British Commonwealth military formation during the Second World War and shortly thereafter. Generally assigned to Army corps, an AGRA provided the medium and heavy artillery to higher formations within the ...
(9 AGRA) was flexible British Army unit used to command artillery units at
corps
Corps (; plural ''corps'' ; from French , from the Latin "body") is a term used for several different kinds of organization. A military innovation by Napoleon I, the formation was first named as such in 1805. The size of a corps varies great ...
level during and shortly after 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 ...
. It provided a coherent command structure that could be switched between divisional or corps actions en masse. The basic units were medium artillery regiments, but others were added and removed as circumstances required.
9th AGRA was formed on 1 May 1943 from the artillery elements of
79th Armoured Division
The 79th Armoured Division was a specialist armoured division of the British Army created during the Second World War. The division was created as part of the preparations for the Normandy invasion on 6 June 1944, D-Day.
Major-General Percy Hob ...
, whose purpose had been transformed from a general armoured unit into one using specialised armoured vehicles. It was attached to
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 ...
during the advance from Normandy into Germany.
Landing in Normandy on 12 July 1944, postponed from 18 June due to bad weather, the AGRA consisted of the following regiments:
[Arty-Boys. The History of 10th Medium Regiment Royal Artillery. ]
*
9th Medium Regiment, RA
*
10th Medium Regiment, RA
*
11th Medium Regiment, RA
*
107th (South Nottinghamshire Hussars Yeomanry) Medium Regiment, RA
*
146th (Pembroke and Cardiganshire) Medium Regiment, RA
*
59th (Newfoundland) Heavy Regiment, RA
*
3rd Super Heavy Regiment, RA (Enabled Oct 1944)- was still undergoing training in UK.
* 738 Artillery Company,
Royal Army Service Corps
The Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) was a corps of the British Army responsible for land, coastal and lake transport, air despatch, barracks administration, the Army Fire Service, staffing headquarters' units, supply of food, water, fuel and dom ...
(RASC)
*
No 660 Squadron, RAF (Air Observation Post).
References
Military units and formations established in 1943
Army Groups Royal Artillery
Military units and formations disestablished in 1945
{{UK-mil-unit-stub