"Penninsular British Regiments with 2 Battalions in the Field" Topic

Hello,

I have seen occasionally in OOBs that a British Regiment will be listed with both Battalions in the field (88th Connaught Rangers in 3rd Div at Fuentes De Onoro for example). Would anyone be able to shed more light on this? It doesn't seem to be very common from what I've seen. Did each battalion carry 2 flags? Would they fight as 2 battalions or as in "left and right wings" as I've heard the nearly full strength Guards did?

Thank you

It was rare for both battalions to be brigaded together and most regiments seem to have had only one deployed with the main army under Wellington. The was however a famous occasion when all three bns of the 95th met up. The officers partied so hard the French outposts stood to arms all night thinking a major attack was imminent.
Each redcoat bn usually carried a King's colour and a regimental/colonel's colour. Not the various Rifle regiments though.

As you probably know, at this time, most British regiments consisted of two battalions. The 1st was the 'field' battalion which deployed for operations. The 2nd was the 'depot' battalion which stayed at home and was responsible for recruiting, training and feeding forward casualty replacements. Each battalion had its own pair of flags both carrying a King's and a Regimental Colour. Some regiments did have more than two battalions (most famously the 95th) but this was rare.

In the equally rare event that more than one battalion of a regiment was deployed then they acted as independent elements within a brigade (if indeed they were in the same brigade), the lowest multi-unit tactical formation in British 'doctrine'. I am certainly not aware of British regiments acting as multi-battalion units within a brigade. This would require a bespoke command structure and would likely lead to confusion.

I'm not sure the above is quite correct. AIUI the British infantry establishment was based on the regiment, an administrative structure of unspecified strength. The regiment would have companies, or cadres thereof, or the numbers to assemble such, knocking around at its depot. As and when called upon to do so, a regiment would generate a battalion from the companies available. Those not used to make the service battalion would remain in the depot as a training cadre, around which recruits could be assembled and trained before despatch to the service battalion as drafts, or in some cases to form a further service battalion.

In this era, these field battalions, Rifles included, were usually expected to consist at minimum of a grenadier company, a light company and eight centre companies. They didn't have to do so. The Foot Guards regiments commonly had men sufficient to form three ten-company battalions plus a depot cadre, but they had more than three light companies – typically about five or six, if memory serves. So the possibility exists that Foot Guards battalions had more than one light company each. This would make perfect sense if they were fielding full paper-strength battalions of 1,100 or so men. Such a large battalion would split into two 'wings', a left and right, each of the normal battalion strength. Each wing might legitimately then need its own light company, hence why they might have two such per battalion. This puts an interesting slant on the Guards light companies' defence of Hougoumont. You tend to assume this meant four companies, but it seems possible that it was more.

It also seems possible that more or fewer than ten companies might form the 1st battalion. There were plenty such in the Waterloo army, for example – KGL battalions with six companies, for example; part-battalions of Rifles, and so on.

The battalion that went on service was thus the 1st battalion because it was the first generated. Nominally, what was left was now the "2nd battalion", although it might be a total of 40 men in one company. There was no permanent 1st battalion, other than by default where no battalion was yet on service. If a second battalion were required, and a regiment formed one at home, and meanwhile the existing 1st battalion concluded its mission and returned to the depot, the one that then went overseas would become the 1st battalion. That which had just returned would revert to being the home establishment.

Where you had a case of two or more battalions being generated by the same regiment, there'd be no obvious reason why they operate together. More battalions being required, the Army would just tap up whoever's depot was best placed to generate one, and send it where needed. This might be the first from one or the second or the third from another.

Popular units such as the Guards, Rifles, and Lights had no trouble attracting recruits, so were capable of creating full-strength second and third battalions and so on. Others would try to hit their headcounts by canvassing the militia for recruits. Where they actually went might not even be the same continent as where the previous battalion was.

We tend to think of battalions as permanent, and in many armies they were, but in the British army you joined a regiment and were assigned to a company, and that was about as permanent as it got.

One place to look and assess is Appendix II of Oman's Wellington's Army which is the 'Divisional and Brigade Organization and Changes 1809-1814.

Oman also lists the Establishment of the British Infantry of the Line as of July 1809 in Appendix I of the same volume.

On page 338 are the numbers of single, double, and regiments with more than two battalions. The 1st, 24th, 27th, 60th, and 95th had more than two battalions, 61 regiments had two battalions, and 37 had a single battalion.

Of the Foot Guards, the 1st had three battalions, the 2d and 3d had two battalions.

Cuirassier, that is the first time I have seen the system described in that way. May I ask your sources?

Cuirassier's right on all major points. Try Glover's Peninsular Preparation, or Oman.

What sometimes happens in the Peninsula is that they sent the extra battalion out from home, they brigade them together for about a month operating independently if there's a battle in the interval, then transfer people to bring the 1st battalion to full strength, sending cadre home to recruit and train. So if you catch just the right roster you've got two battalions of the same regiment in the same brigade, but it's more an optical illusion than a policy: look again and one of those battalions will disappear.

It's also evident when you look at strength returns from the era. They will mention things like so-and-so regiment having 4 companies or 12 companies of whatever at Lympne or 7 troops (if cavalry) at King's Mews. They're not referred to as 1/Whatever and 2/Whatever Foot, unless second battalions had been expressly raised to serve as such.

Nor do the cavalry appear for the most part to have had permanent squadrons. They would have 8 to 10 troops and service squadrons would each comprise two troops. Depending on the horse and manpower situation, this might mean three or four squadrons being sent on service.

There is a table here of second battalions

link

from which it can be seen that 30-odd regiments had an actual second battalion at some point, two had three battalions, and one had six. The 4th took in 3,000-odd militiamen, used them to form a 2nd and 3rd battalion, and sent them both off to Flanders. The 68th Foot only had 199 effectives in total until it absorbed 2,246 Irish militiamen, allowing to form two full battalions.

In pretty well all cases though the rationale for forming a second battalion was to generate one that could be deployed somewhere. A regiment could, like the 68th, go from having effectively a cadre, to having a 1st battalion plus a residual cadre, to having a 1st and a 2nd battalion plus a different residual cadre.

Cuirassier, as it happens i was just wondering about the guards and Highlanders (peninsula 1811-1812) that had (compared to the rest of the british army) quite large battalions. Are there any good sources about how they operated? This is the first time i have heard of them being split into two wings.
Thanks in advance!

Having researched British Authorised Establishments from the original documents at the National Archives I can say that some of the posts above are wrong. The only Infantry Regimental establishments were the three Regiments of Foot Guards. Every other Infantry establishment was by individual battalions, which were frequently different for each battalion in any one regiment.

There is no instance of battalions exchanging 1st and 2nd numbers,

The Appendix in Oman's Wellington's Army is particularly misleading as it comes from a normally reliable source, but his analysis of strengths by Regiments is deeply flawed, as I explain in my article.

Originally the system was that 1st Battalions were brought up to 1,000 (later 1,200) R&F and sent abroad with the Field Army whilst 2nd Battalions were normally 400 R&F and remained at home. However as the war went on more and more 2nd Bns were increased in strength and sent abroad.

Cavalry establishments were by Regiments, with various numbers of Troops, normally 8.. These Troops were paired up to form Squadrons, but the word Squadron doesn't appear in the Authorised Establishments.

The whole system is explained in the article on my website:

link

To answer another query, there is a quote in a memoir about the 42nd Black Watch operating in 2 wings in the Peninsula. It is on my PC as opposed to the iPad which I am writing this on but I will dig it out.

Rod

Thanks Rod. Lots of fascinating information and more in line with what I understood.

In 1794 a second lieutenant was authorised for infantry regiments. This was to allow for the battalion to operate as two 'wings' but it also made an additional field officer available for staff appointments.

Later in 1794, young Lieut Col. Hon. Arthur Wesley, commanding officer of HM 33rd Regiment in the Low Countires, was placed temporarily in command of the Third Brigade (nominally commanded by Maj Gen Nisbet Balfour who had been appointed a district commander on the Waal), while the second Lieut Colonel, the more experienced and older John Sherbrook commanded the battalion. Later the more senior Lieut Colonel Alexander Mackenzie of the 78th took over command after his regiment joined the brigade.

On occasion a battalion might find itself short of both lieutenant colonels with a major in command. Most regiments began the French wars with a single battalion. Then gradually, as the years wore, on we find a 2nd battalion being formed and operating as Rod has described.

CORRECTION "In 1794 a second lieutenant _colonel_"

Interesting discussion. However a few things should be noted.
For Waterloo at least, of the 26 British Bns. present only 14 were 1st Bns., 8 -2nd Bns. and 4 -3rd Bns. As I understand it those units were somewhat quickly assembled for the campaign and basically what was available.
As for the number of companies in various units: the 27th Ft. only had 7 cos. because the other 3 had not arrived in Europe from N. America. Also the first two Bns. of the 95th were 6 Cos. each due to a low number of men and were reorganized as 6.
The KGL Bns. were reorganized into 6 Cos. each due to low numbers and the transfers of the extra Officers and Sgts. into the Hanoverian Ldwr.

I had a brief look at Reid's Osprey "Wellington's Army in the Peninsula 1809-14" which has a detailed organisation charts for all the divisions and tracks changes with time. I only looked at line regiments and ignored the 95th.

Broadly Robert Piepenbrink is correct- if the 2nd battalion was in the field and the 1st battalion arrived, within a couple of months the 2nd was sent home and the fit men drafted into the 1st. However, there were exceptions where both served in the field. Here are a few, there may be others.

The 1/52nd and 2/52 served together in the same brigade from March 1811 to February 1812 before the 2/52nd went home to recruit.

The 1/7th and 2/7th served together in the same brigade for 7 months until the 2nd were drafted into 1st after Albuera.

The 1/5th and 2/5th were together for 2 months and fought at Salamanca.

The 1/48th and 2/48th were in the same division (2nd) for roughly 2 years but in separate brigades until amalgamated in 1811.

I understand that there was an ongoing struggle between Wellington and Horse Guards over retaining experienced troops. Horse Guards preferred to withdraw battalions and rebuild them while Wellington wanted to retain them. The Provisional battalions were a way around this. Perhaps the replacement of 2nds by 1sts was another compromise.

I've read that officers in the 1st battalion were considered to be more senior than those in the 2nd at the same rank.

"Broadly correct" may raise my average. I should certainly have remembered at least the 52nd. A couple of points:

A lot of 1st battalions went to Walcheren and were years recovering from "Walcheren Fever" so Wellington got a lot of 2nd battalions early on. As 1st battalions arrive later, we get that little dance described above.

There seems to have been a consensus that somewhere between 400 and 300 rank and file a battalion was no longer effective. Early in the Peninsular War, Wellington sends some such home. Later on, he's merging them into provisional battalions. I think in most of Trockledockle's cases, when another battalion arrived, the battalion already serving was still effective. When the combined strength got under 1,000, they were merged.

Oman has a long bit on the struggle between Wellington and the Horse Guards in the lull between the Salamanca and the Vittoria Campaigns. Oman's basic argument was that a "seasoned" Peninsular vet was so much less likely to be in the hospital or the guardhouse that he was worth two Johnny Raws fresh out from the UK, who would of course require twice as much food and supplies. The Horse Guards of course want to pump up weak units, but the war would have been over before Wellington got those regiments back, if he ever did. The end results were something of a compromise. A certain number of understrength units were sent home, and about twice as many men in green units sent out--as Oman points out, from Wellington's point of view, little or no improvement.

The 1st and 2nd battalions of the 4th Foot were also together in Pringle's Brigade of the 5th Division at Salamanca and Villamuriel in 1812.

link

Garry

Thank you everyone for your expertise and thoughtful discussion. For the above mentioned units, would they both have a Kings Colour and Battalion Colour? Would you model anything different between the battalions?

All battalions (with the usual exceptions e.g. 95th, Provisional) carried both flags. The flags may have had something small to designate which battalion they were. Have a look at the 3/1st here. The Guards had different flags for each battalion (same site).

link

As far as I know, the uniforms were essentially the same. The buttons may have been different but not noticeable on wargaming figures.

The Colours either used the old system of a small diagonal flame coming from the bottom of the Union Jack on the Regimental Colour for 2nd Bns or a number in the centre of the Union Jack.

I model each battalion in a different pose.

Rod