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Following the relief of C Company 1 RUR, in mid-January 1965, by the 1/6th Gurkha Rifles, the troopship MV Auby docked on 6 February at Kuching carrying the main body of the 1st Battalion The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. The following day, the Argylls sent the first company by road to Balai Ringin, which then flew forward to relieve D Company. Later that day, D Company moved to Kuching and embarked on the Auby.
This very ornate silver and silver gilt cross belt plate dates from c1850 and is reminiscent of the French Rococo style of the 17th century. It was worn by officers of the 86th Foot.
Rifleman Robert Wallace, Royal Ulster Rifles, was a Prisoner of War (POW) held in a Stammlager (Stalag) designated '357' that was located at Oerbke, east of the town of Fallingbostel in Lower Saxony, north-west Germany.
He illustrated and sent this card to his young son Kenneth who was living in a house on Shaw's Road in Andersonstown, Belfast. He had to post early for Xmas as it was dated 14 November 1944; however the card was processed reasonably quickly by the German Kriegsgefangenenpost as it has a post mark dated 18 November 1944.
The Allied 'Hundred Days Offensive' on the Western Front had begun with the Battle of Amiens on 8 August 1918 and would eventually lead to the end of the First World War. As part of that great offensive, two battalions of the Royal Irish Fusiliers were fighting in the battle to recapture Bailleul. It had been seized by the Germans during the Spring Offensive 1918, or Kaiserschlacht.
On the day after the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Fusiliers’ battle around the villages of Pescia and Ranciano, it suffered a stroke of bad luck. The Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel J W Dunnill DSO, departed his Tactical Headquarters in the command tank to visit his forward companies. He was later reported missing.
During October 1966, B Company, 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Fusiliers, commanded by Major R H Lucas-Clements, departed Swaziland for duties with 24 Infantry Brigade during the Aden Emergency. The detachment was to be for three months during which the Company would be involved in some 25 terrorist incidents. Many terrorists favoured attacks with hand grenades and Corporal Edward Cosgrove was awarded the British Empire Medal (BEM) for gallantry when he used his body to shield another Irish Fusilier during such an attack.
Following the Battle of Le Cateau, the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Fusiliers began marching away from the advancing Germans. The Battalion halted at dawn the following day for a few hours rest, but marched throughout the night of 27/28 August as the withdrawal continued. For the next few days, the same story of methodical rearguard actions, moves by night, worries over missing sub units (only to reappear later) and of ever increasing fatigue repeated itself over and over again.
The 2nd Battalion The London Irish Rifles, with B Company of the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Fusiliers, repulsed the German attack across the Bou Arada Plain, Tunisia on 26 February 1943. When the Germans retreated back across the adjoining Goubellat Plain the London Irish sent out strong fighting patrols each night to harass the enemy.
The threat of Arab nationalism, a resurgent Bolshevik Russia and the international power struggle for control of oil production meant that the British government found it necessary to send troops to areas of vital national interest in the Middle East. The nationalist Arabs had limited arms, mostly acquired during the First World War after the defeat of the Turks. They were now using these against the British and so the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Fusiliers was nominated to carry out a difficult and thankless internal security task in Mesopotamia (now Iraq).
Landing at Port Said on 5 February 1925, the 1st Battalion The Royal Irish Fusiliers moved to Moascar Camp near the Suez Canal town of Ismailia.
