History Of The British 1st Division During The World Wars

The 1st Division was an infantry division of the British Army that was formed and disestablished numerous times between 1809 and the present. It was raised by Lieutenant-General Arthur Wellesley for service in the Peninsular War (part of the Coalition Wars of the Napoleonic Wars). It was disestablished in 1814 but re-formed the following year for service in the War of the Seventh Coalition and fought at the Battle of Waterloo. It remained active in France until 1818, when it was disbanded. It was subsequently raised for service in the Crimean War, the Anglo-Zulu War, and the Second Boer War. In 1902, it was re-raised in the UK. This latter event saw the division raised as a permanent formation, rather than being formed on an ad hoc basis for any particular crisis.

In 1914, the First World War broke out and the division fought on the Western Front throughout the entire period. In 1919, it was used to form the Western Division as part of the British Army of the Rhine occupation force in Germany. The 1st Division was reformed a few months later in the UK. In the inter-war period, it dispatched troops to take part in the Irish War of Independence, to take part in the Occupation of Constantinople, to oversee the 1935 Saar status referendum, and for service during the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine. In the Second World War, the division fought in the Battle of France, was evacuated at Dunkirk in 1940 and fought in the Tunisian and Italian campaigns. It ended the war in the Middle East.

During the Cold War, it was garrisoned in various locations across Africa and the Middle East before it returned to the UK. It was then disbanded and reformed in Germany, where it became the 1st Armoured Division in the 1970s. It latter fought in the Gulf War, served in Bosnia, took part in the Iraq War, and in 2014 was renamed the 1st (United Kingdom) Division.

Background

The 1st Division was formed on 18 June 1809, by Lieutenant-General Arthur Wellesley, commander of British forces in Spain and Portugal, for service during the Peninsular War. After the conclusion of the War of the Sixth Coalition, the division was broken-up in France and its troops dispersed to the UK or were sent to North America to take part in the ongoing War of 1812. It was reformed the following year, when the War of the Seventh Coalition began and it subsequently fought at the battles of Quatre Bras and Waterloo. The latter notably saw the division help repulse the final attack of the day, which had been launched by the French Imperial Guard. With the end of the war, the division formed part of the Army of Occupation that was located in France. It remained there until December 1818, when it was disbanded upon the British withdrawal and the end of the occupation.

Over the course of the 19th century, the division was raised on three more occasions for service in the Crimean War, the Anglo-Zulu War, and the Second Boer War. In response to the lessons learnt following the latter, reforms were initiated throughout the British military. This included the founding of a permanent 1st Division in 1902, rather than one having to be formed on an ad hoc basis for a particular crisis or war. The Haldane Reforms of 1907, saw additional changes within the British Army. For the division, this saw it become part of Aldershot Command and it increase in strength as additional forces were attached to it. It then composed the 1st Brigade based at Aldershot, the 2nd Brigade at Blackdown, and the 3rd Brigade Bordon. The reform saw artillery, signals, and Royal Engineers also permanetly attached to the division.

First World War

The division was a permanently established Regular Army division that was amongst the first to be sent to France at the outbreak of the First World War. It served on the Western Front for the duration of the war. On 31 October 1914 divisional commander General Samuel Lomax was seriously wounded by an artillery shell and died on 10 April 1915 never having recovered from his wounds.

The division's insignia was the signal flag for the 'Number 1'. During the war, the division was involved in the following battles: Battle of Mons, First Battle of the Marne, First Battle of the Aisne, First Battle of Ypres, Battle of Aubers Ridge, Battle of Loos, Battle of the Somme, Battle of Pozières, Third Battle of Ypres, Battle of Épehy.

Interwar period

With the Armistice of 11 November 1918 ending the First World War, the Allied Powers agreed to occupy the Rhineland as a way to guarantee future reparation payments. It was also agreed that the occupation would last no longer than 15-years. A six-day grace period was allowed, following the armistice, during which only the German military were authorised to move. On 18 November, the 1st Division started its advance to Germany, crossed the frontier on 16 December, and reached its occupation area based around Bonn on 24 December. In January 1919, the occupation force became the British Army of the Rhine and demobilisation of veterans began. This started at a rate of 1,200 men per day and increased to 2,400 by the end of the month, with drafts of teenagers replacing them. In March, the division was redesignated as the Western Division.

The division was reformed at Aldershot on 4 June 1919 and remained based there until the outbreak of the Second World War. While the division itself did not move, it did send troops to reinforce the British Army in Ireland during the Irish War of Independence and later to assist in the Occupation of Constantinople. In 1935, divisional signal personnel were dispatched to the Territory of the Saar Basin. They assisted the international supervisors who were overseeing of the 1935 Saar status referendum. The following year, the division sent detachments to Mandatory Palestine to bolster the British presence there, during the opening stages of the Arab Revolt.

By September 1939, on the outbreak of the Second World War, the division was known as the 1st Infantry Division. It was under the command of Major-General Harold Alexander, and consisted of the 1st Infantry Brigade (Guards) as well as the 2nd and 3rd Infantry Brigades.

Second World War

The division was sent to France in mid-September 1939, arriving there on 20 September,Joslen, pp. 35–36 where it formed part of I Corps of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF). The division remained in France for the next few months until evacuated from Dunkirk in Operation Dynamo in June 1940.

North Africa

In late February 1943, the 1st Division, left the United Kingdom, destined for French North Africa to take part in the final stages of the Tunisian Campaign. The division, arriving there on 9 March. Soon, the division, which had been stationed in the Medjez-Bou Arada sector. The division was engaged mainly in patrolling and began preparations for an offensive to end the war in North Africa. On the night of 20/21 April the division took part in the Battle of the Medjez Plain, where it was pitted against the Hermann Göring Division which, with the commander having anticipated an offensive, had launched his own offensive with the intention of spoiling the Allied attack. The offensive, however, was soon repulsed (although an entire company of the 1st Battalion, Duke of Wellington's Regiment had been overrun) with the aid of the divisional artillery and Churchill tanks of the 142nd (Suffolk) Regiment Royal Armoured Corps (142 RAC), part of the 25th Army Tank Brigade, and the 1st Division suffered only 106 casualties.

The next few days saw the 1st Division engaged in particularly hard fighting, with the 2nd Brigade, attacking a ridge known as Gueriat el Atach. The attack failed, at a cost of over 500 casualties, with the supporting 142 RAC losing 29 of 52 tanks, mainly from enemy Tiger tanks. Among those killed were Lieutenant Willward Alexander Sandys-Clarke of the 1st Battalion, Loyal Regiment (North Lancashire), who was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for his heroism in stalking and destroying an enemy machine gun. The ridge was taken the next day, 24 April, by the 2nd Battalion, Sherwood Foresters, of the 3rd Brigade.

Two days later, the 24th Guards Brigade moved to an attack an objective named Bou Aoukaz. No opposition was encountered, aside from mines, and they were ordered by Division HQ to assault Bou Aoukaz on the afternoon of 27 April. The Bou was taken, but with heavy casualties to the 1st Irish and 5th Grenadiers, mostly from enemy shells and mortar. It was discovered that the Germans had retreated, being apparently amazed at the tenacity of the Guards. The 1st Scots Guards had been ordered to assault the Bou from the left flank. However, a machine gun had held them up, which was silenced by Captain Charles Lyell and four guardsmen. They were then fired on by an 88 mm gun, which was silenced by Captain Lyell, who was killed while bayoneting the 88 crew, with the survivors fleeing. Captain Lyell was posthumously awarded the VC. The Bou was taken but soon given up, due to a communications failure.Blaxland77, p. 245 The Scots Guards renewed the assault upon the Bou the following day, only to be repulsed. The day afterwards, the Germans, knowing how vital the Bou was, being the key to Tunis, launched a huge counter-attack, which fell upon the 24th Brigade. It was during this period that the division earned its third VC, belonging to Lance Corporal John Kenneally of the 1st Irish Guards.

Fighting continued for the next few days until mid-May, when the Axis forces in North Africa surrendered.

Italy

The division arrived on the Italian Front in December 1943, initially to serve under command of the Eighth Army but soon became part of the US Fifth Army. Operation Shingle was an Allied amphibious landing against Axis forces in the area of Anzio and Nettuno, Italy. The operation was intended to outflank German forces at the Winter Line and enable an attack on the Italian capital of Rome. The resulting combat is commonly called the Battle of Anzio. The division came under the command of the US VI Corps.

The landings began on 22 January 1944. Although resistance had been expected, as seen at the Salerno landings during September 1943, the initial landings were unopposed, with the exception of desultory ''Luftwaffe'' strafing runs. By midnight, 36,000 soldiers and 3,200 vehicles had landed on the beaches. A mere 13 Allied troops were killed, and 97 wounded; about 200 Germans had been taken as POWs. The British 1st Division penetrated 2 miles (3 km) inland, the U.S. Army Rangers captured Anzio's port, the 509th Parachute Infantry Battalion captured Nettuno, and the US 3rd Infantry Division penetrated 3 miles (5 km) inland.

There was severe fighting throughout the next few weeks as the Germans launched several fierce counterattacks in an attempt to drive the Allied force back into the sea. Testimony to this was when, on 17 February, Penney was wounded by shellfire and command of the 1st Division was taken by Major General Gerald Templer of the recently arrived 56th (London) Infantry Division, from 18 to 22 February, when Penney resumed command.

Because of the fighting seen by the division throughout February and March, the 24th Guards Brigade was withdrawn from the division, due to a lack of Guards replacements (even at this stage of the war the Guards were the only infantry regiments in the British Army to receive drafts of replacements from their own regiment), and replaced by the 18th Infantry Brigade from the 1st Armoured Division, which was in North Africa at the time.

Operation Diadem was the final battle for Monte Cassino the plan was the U.S. II Corps on the left would attack up the coast along the line of Route 7 towards Rome. The French Expeditionary Corps (CEF) to their right would attack from the bridgehead across the Garigliano into the Aurunci Mountains. British XIII Corps in the centre right of the front would attack along the Liri valley whilst on the right 2nd Polish Corps would isolate the monastery and push round behind it into the Liri valley to link with XIII Corps. I Canadian Corps would be held in reserve ready to exploit the expected breakthrough. Once the German Tenth Army had been defeated, the U.S. VI Corps would break out of the Anzio beachhead to cut off the retreating Germans in the Alban Hills.

As the Canadians and Polish launched their attack on 23 May, Major General Lucian Truscott, who had replaced Lucas as commander of U.S. VI Corps, launched a two pronged attack using five (three American and two British) of the seven divisions in the bridgehead at Anzio. The German 14th Army facing this thrust was without any armoured divisions because Kesselring had sent his armour south to help the German 10th Army in the Cassino action. The 18th Infantry Brigade, which was temporarily attached to the division from February to August, returned to command of the 1st Armoured Division and were replaced by the 66th Infantry Brigade became a part of the division for the rest of the war.

In the fighting for the Anzio beachhead, 8,868 officers and men of the 1st Infantry Division were killed, wounded or missing in action.

Post war

After the war, the division only remained in Palestine for a short time. It was transferred to Egypt for a few months before going back to Palestine in April 1946. Two years later, as the British mandate over Palestine ended, the division returned to Egypt, also spending periods in Libya up until 1951. In October of that year, as British forces pulled out of Egypt outside of the Suez Canal Zone, the division garrisoned that small area. After British forces withdrew from Egypt, the division returned to the UK for a short while in 1955 and 1956. It remained in the until 30 June 1960, when it was disbanded due to there being no need for an additional divisional headquarters in the UK. It was reformed the following day, when the 5th Division was renamed. The new division was based in Germany as part of the British Army of the Rhine. During April 1978, a reorganised took place and the formation was renamed the 1st Armoured Division. Under this banner, in 1990–1991, it fought in the Gulf War. When the Cold War ended, the British government restructured the army as part of Options for Change and this saw the division again disbanded on 31 December 1992. In 1993, the 4th Armoured Division, based in Germany, was renamed as the 1st (United Kingdom) Armoured Division. During the 1990s, the division was deployed to Bosnia as part of peacekeeping efforts and in the 2000s fought in the Iraq War. In 2014, the division was redesignated as the 1st (United Kingdom) Division in 2014.

See also

* List of commanders of the British 1st Division
* List of wartime orders of battle for the British 1st Division (1809–1945)
* History of the British 1st Division between 1809–1909
* British Army Order of Battle (September 1939)

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{{DEFAULTSORT:01 Infantry Division
Infantry divisions of the British Army in World War I
Infantry divisions of the British Army in World War II
Military units and formations established in 1809
British military units and formations of the Crimean War
Military units and formations disestablished in 1978
1809 establishments in the United Kingdom