The North Irish Horse was a yeomanry unit of the British Territorial Army raised in the northern counties of Ireland in the aftermath of the Second Boer War. Raised and patronised by the nobility from its inception to the present day, it was one of the first non-regular units to be deployed to France and the Low Countries with the British Expeditionary Force in 1914 during World War I and fought with distinction both as mounted troops and later as a cyclist regiment, achieving eighteen battle honours. The regiment was reduced to a single man in the interwar years and re-raised for World War II, when it achieved its greatest distinctions in the North African and Italian campaigns. Reduced again after the Cold War, the regiment's name still exists in B (North Irish Horse) Squadron, the Scottish and North Irish Yeomanry and 40 (North Irish Horse) Signal Squadron, part of 32 Signal Regiment.
History
Background The raising of Militia units in Ireland commenced with the "Militia Act 1793", which in Ireland was used in conjunction with the compulsory disbandment of Lord Charlemont's Irish Volunteers, who had become a political entity and "out of the scope of official influence". The scope of the Militia was broadened by an act of the Dublin Parliament in 1796, which led to the raising of forty-nine troops of cavalry, later renamed yeomanry. A troop normally consisted of a captain, two lieutenants (commissioned by the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland) and forty men, along with a permanent sergeant and trumpeter. Troops were grouped together under the command of a regular army brigade major. The force was known collectively as the "Irish Yeomanry". Each man provided his own horse. The falling need for this force eventually led to its disbandment in 1834. With the advent of the Boer War, a parliamentary decision was taken to raise squadrons of Yeomanry Cavalry under the "Militia and Yeomanry Act 1901" for service in South Africa. Because of the pressing need to raise this force quickly, normal cavalry training with swords or lances (known as the arme blanche) was dispensed with and the new yeomanry was issued only with rifles in a break with cavalry tradition. This new force was called the Imperial Yeomanry. Six companies were quickly raised in Ireland, including the 46th (1st Belfast), 54th (2nd Belfast), 60th (North Irish), and the 45th (Dublin) (known as the Dublin Hunt Squadron) commanded by Captain the Earl of Longford. The 45th, 46th, 47th and 54th formed the 13th (Irish) Battalion Imperial Yeomanry. The 47th (Duke of Cambridge's Own) was raised from rich "men-about-town" in London by the Earl of Donoughmore and paid £130 each for their horses and equipment. The officers of the battalion included the Earl of Leitrim, Sir John Power (of the Powers whiskey family) and James Craig (later Lord Craigavon), and was known as the "Millionaires Own".
Formation Following the South African war, sixteen new yeomanry regiments were formed, two of these in Ireland. King Edward VII approved the formation of the North of Ireland Imperial Yeomanry and the South of Ireland Imperial Yeomanry in 1901. Their formation was sanctioned and gazetted on 7 January 1902. Recruiting for the North of Ireland Imperial Yeomanry did not begin until 1903, with four squadrons being raised:
RHQ and A Squadron at Skegoneill Avenue in Belfast, B Squadron in Derry/Ballymena, C Squadron in Enniskillen D Squadron in Dundalk. The first training camp was held at Blackrock Camp, Dundalk in 1903; thereafter, camps were held every third year at the Curragh and other years at Ballykinlar, Dundrum, Magilligan and Bundoran. The regiment became part of the special reserve in 1908 and its name was changed to the North Irish Horse as part of the Haldane Reforms, the formation of the Territorial Force, which created the Special Reserve of Militia and Yeomanry regiments in Ireland. The North Irish Horse, along with the other Militia battalions, remained on the Special Reserve list until 1953. This arrangement gave the Irish units precedence in the line over the Territorial Army regiments just after the Cavalry of the Line, but also guaranteed the use of the Militia and Yeomanry in overseas conflicts. The first commander was the Earl of Shaftesbury, whose adjutant was Captain RGO Bramston-Newman, 7th (Princess Royal's) Dragoon Guards, from Cork. Senior NCOs from regular Cavalry of the Line units became the permanent staff instructors (PSIs). On 7 December 1913, the Duke of Abercorn was appointed as the regiment's first honorary colonel.
The First World War The declaration of war against Germany in August 1914 found the North Irish Horse at summer camp, as was its sister regiment, the South Irish Horse. The Expeditionary Force squadron (designated A Squadron) under the command of Major Lord Cole, consisting of 6 officers and 154 other ranks, along with its counterpart in the South Irish Horse (designated B Squadron) was assigned to the British Expeditionary Force. Both squadrons sailed from Dublin on the SS Architect on 17 August 1914. They were the first non-regular troops to land in France and be in action in the First World War. They were joined shortly afterwards by C Squadron of the North Irish Horse under the command of Major Lord Massereene and Ferrard DSO. Three more squadrons of the 'Horse' were to join the regiment in France landing on 2 May 1915, 17 November 1915 and 11 January 1916. A total of 70 officers and 1,931 men of the regiment went to war between 1914 and 1916. The North Irish Horse did not stay together as a unit, but squadrons were attached to different formations in the BEF as and when required:
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