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The first Commander of The Ulster Defence Regiment was Brigadier Logan Scott-Bowden, a career Army Officer who had a distinguished war record. Logan Scott-Bowden was born at Whitehaven, Cumberland, on 21 February 1920 and died aged 93 on 9 February 2014. He was educated at Malvern and the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, where he was an accomplished athlete and swimmer. He was commissioned into the Corps of Royal Engineers on 3 July 1939 and served with 162 Independent Company in the Norwegian Campaign.
Three weeks after the initial landings in Italy on 3 September 1943, the 2nd Battalion The London Irish Rifles (2 LIR), as part of 38 (Irish) Brigade in General Montgomery's Eighth Army, crossed from Messina, Sicily and landed at Taranto in southern Italy on 24 September 1943.
The London Irish Rifles, as left forward battalion of the left forward brigade of the 4th Division, attacked High Wood. Tanks accompanied them but made no headway over the broken tree stumps and deeply pitted ground where they became stuck. After a desperate struggle and some casualties, the Battalion eventually cleared the enemy from the wood.
The 1st Battalion The London Irish Rifles took part in the fighting that occurred in January 1944 in the area of the River Garigliano.
During the First World War, The London Irish Rifles formed three battalions with one based at home providing drafts of trained recruits to the 1st and the 2nd Battalion serving at the front. The 1st Battalion fought throughout the war on the Western Front and was near Tournai at the war's end. The 2nd Battalion served on the Western Front, Salonika and Palestine and was disbanded in the Jordan Valley before war's end in May 1917. The London Irish killed in action amounted to almost 1,100 dead and the Battalions were awarded the following Battle Honours:
Following the Garigliano Crossing, the 1st Battalion The London Irish Rifles was withdrawn at short notice from the battle for Castleforte, which still raged on Monte Damiano, and sent to Anzio. The Allies had begun landing the VI (US) Corps on 22 January 1944 at Anzio on Italy's west coast to the north of and behind the Gustav Line.
As a result of French operations in Italy and war against Austria in 1859, an invasion panic broke out in England. In 1859 a Royal Commission warned that England's coastal defences would be inadequate to protect against French invasion in the event of the Royal Navy being lured elswhere. As a result of this threat the Volunteer Movement started.
Two days after the renewed German onslaught against the Allied positions at Anzio on 16 February 1944, the 1st Battalion The London Irish Rifles returned to the front where its task was to relieve the 7th Battalion The Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry - reported to be cut off and surrounded.
The London Irish advanced through difficult wadi country and suffered heavy losses from enemy artillery and mortar fire. Finding the remnants of the Ox and Bucks was not easy as they were surrounded by an enemy holding strong positions.
The following is the text from Army Form W.3121 describing the date, place and action for which 7014577 Rifleman Jeremia Long was recommended for an award by the Commanding Officer of the 2nd battalion The Royal Ulster Rifles, Lieutenant Colonel I C Harris, in June 1944 and forwarded through the chain of command for approval.
Lance Corporal Robert Crozier, Private Paul Blakely and Private Sydney Hamilton were killed in a 2,000lb bomb attack on the 2nd Battalion The Ulster Defence Regiment's Glennane Base in County Armagh. The bomb was one of the largest detonated during the 'Troubles' and was heard sixty miles away. Ten other soldiers and four civilians were also injured in the attack.
