Armoured Regiment War Establishment, Korea 1951

Bit of a long shot this one, but does anyone have an armoured regiment WE for circa 1951?

I'm particularly interested in the size of the carrier troop, and the allotment of tank dozers. Also whether the full tank establishment was 52 or 64 tanks.

Thanks in advance...

 

Thanks VP. I'm taking a big interest in Centurions in Korea at the moment (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) so any info is gratefully received.

 

Something to rummage around:

Google Scholar

 

I don't have the WE (I had to draw the line somewhere, and it turned out to be around 1947...) but there is a diagram showing the communications layout in the 1952 issue of 'procedure for radio telephony', signals training, all arms, pamphlet no.7. I didn't get chance to scan it tonight but should do tomorrow.

In brief, and assuming I'm interpreting the symbols correctly, it outlines four tanks per Troop, with four Troops per Squadron, plus four more at SHQ. Allowing for the usual four at RHQ that would give a Regiment 64 at full strength. It is possible that 52 was the lower establishment figure, allowing for one tank per Troop or one Troop per Squadron to be inactivated. There's mention of a dozer at SHQ and a Recce Troop of perhaps seven vehicles.

There's the briefest of outlines here on the Armoured Regiment circa 1950;

The Royal Armoured Corps in the Cold War, 1946–1990

The kind of vague detail that would drive me mad 20 years ago!

Gary

 

I had to crop them a lot to get the files below 2MB, the second scan is just missing the links to Engrs and LO on the bottom left and right respectively.

There was a WE issued for an Armoured Regiment in the period Jan-Mar 1947, ref II/157/2, held in WO24/963. I don't know if that formed the basis for the above, or whether there was a local variation used in the Korean War.

Gary

 

Thanks very much Gary!

I'll get hold of that WE file if the National Archives ever re-opens.

8th Hussars took 53 Centurions to Korea in Oct-Nov 1950, but by the time of the Imjin battles in Apr 51 they were up to 64 tanks, so it looks like they were innitially on an LE.

Their Recce Troop initially was six Cromwells and one Daimler Scout Car, but after the infamous Cooperforce disaster at least some of the Cromwells were replaced with Daimler Armoured Cars. I'm not sure if the carrier troop was a sub-unit of the Recce Troop or a separate entity in itself. My sense of neatness makes me suspect the former...

Dozers were Centaur Dozers, but these may have been replaced by Sherman Dozers by October 1951. There is a bit of confusion here, as the 8th Hussars were often partnered up with 55 Field Squadron RE, who also may have had Centaur Dozers, so on the rare occasions that Dozers were employed it is difficult to tell who was doing what.

 

Just been inspired to go into the bowels of my hard drive to find this:



This is from WO 279/765 Notes on the British Army 1952, which I never thought would come in useful!

No sign of a dedicated carrier troop here, which reinforces my suspicion that this was part of 8th Hussars' Recce Troop.

 

Have enclosed a pdf of 1953 Divisional Tank Regiment which may be of some use to you

 

Thanks very much Tony!

A Divisional Regiment RAC was an armoured regiment configured for the anti-tank role in an infantry division, and from that WE, it looks like it was generally equivalent to an armoured regiment at the Lower Establishment.

From a document that Tolbooth has kindly provided me with, this was the OOB for 'C' Sqn 8th Hussars during the Imjin River battles, which suggests that the squadron carrier troop had two carriers:



So this looks like an improvisation that was unique to 8th Hussars in Korea, as far as I can tell. I wonder if the other squadrons also had an equivalent carrier troop?

Note that the three attached Royal Artillery tanks are actually Cromwells, and these had an active and direct role in the Imjin battle - somethng that you don't hear about!

Also, with regard to 16b, what on earth is a Cornet?

 

Cornet was the equivalent of 2nd Lt, supposedly abolished in 1871 but still used in some cavalry regiments (they do like to be different!)

 

Winston Churchill while serving as a cornet in the 4th Queen's Own Hussars (1895). Churchill's formal rank was second lieutenant.

Cornet (rank) - Wikipedia.

Learn someit nu everyday

TD

 

They did like to blow their own trumpet, didn’t they.

 

I realise this is a bit late but thought it might be useful to add the fuller WE info that was missing from the discussion previously. This is from WE II/601/2, An Armoured Regiment (Higher Establishment), notified in ACIs 29th June 1949, effective 6th July 1949

Personnel -

Regimental Headquarters - officers, 17 other ranks (4 tanks)

Headquarter Squadron - 10 officers, 185 other ranks

Squadron HQ - 3 officers, 4 ORs
Reconnaissance Troop - 2 officers, 34 ORs (6 light tanks, 6 scout cars)
Intercommunication Troop - 1 officer, 17 ORs (9 scout cars)
Administrative Troop - 4 officers, 130 ORs

Three Squadrons, each - 8 officers, 181 other ranks

Squadron HQ - 4 officers, 27 ORs (4 tanks, 2 to be CS types; 1 tank dozer and 1 scout car)
Administrative Troop - 78 ORs (1 ARV)
Four Troops, each - 1 officer, 19 ORs (4 tanks)

Total, including attached - 39 officers, 745 other ranks, 784 all ranks

First Reinforcements -

10 officers, 104 other ranks

Transport -

Motorcycles - 8
Car, heavy utility - 1
Cars, 5-cwt - 11
Trucks, 15-cwt, GS - 6
Truck, 15-cwt, wireless - 1
Trucks, 15-cwt, water - 4
Half-tracked, personnel - 16
Lorries, 3-ton, GS - 52
Lorry, 3-ton, office - 1
Lorry, 3-ton, kitchen - 4
Lorry, 3-ton. machinery - 4
Lorry, 3-ton, store (6x4) - 5

Scout cars - 18
ARVs - 3
Tanks (Universal), CS - 6
Tanks (Universal) (includes 8 control tanks and 2 command tanks) - 58
Tanks, Light (2 control) - 2
Dozers - 3

The Lower Establishment version does not lend itself to typing up an easy summary, as transport was based on 'unrestricted use', with a second category of 'additional for training and IS duties'. I would assume IS is Internal Security. The key reduction for AFVs was each Troop being three rather than four tanks, for 52 Universal types in total, with the other AFV types being as above. However, some of these were split between the two categories, with 4 scout cars (from the IC Tp) and 2 tanks (from RHQ). Personnel was reduced to 34 officers and 601 ORs.

Gary

 

While I can't add anything to this excellent post, my list of Canadian war establishments has the Canadian version of this, which was titled "E/RCAC/2/2." It contains the two major differences Canadian WE's had to the British ones.

First, the administrative troop in headquarters squadron has the addition of a paymaster (Lt or Capt) and pay sergeant, both from the RCAPC. Second, unlike the British version, all the attached personnel, like the RCAMC medical officer, RCASC cooks, RCOC armourers, etc, are shown as establishment rather than attached. These two differences also applied to infantry battalions and artillery regiments.

Permanently attached was an RCEME LAD Type C and either the W1, W2, W3 or W4 Troop from an Armoured Divisional Signal Regiment, RC Sigs. (Canada did not organize an Armoured Division Signal Regiment, just the two troops required to support the two armoured regiments.)

In 1950, Canada had only two regular force armoured regiments:
Royal Canadian Dragoons (1st Armoured Regiment)
Lord Strathcona's Horse (Royal Canadians) (2nd Armoured Regiment)

Neither was at full strength and had a main role of training the reserve armoured regiments, the RCD training in the East and the LSH in the West. Each regiment would also supply one reinforced squadron for overseas service, either to the Canadian brigade in Korea or with the NATO brigade in Germany.

Cheers.