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Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers

The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers was a Irish infantry regiment of the British Army formed in 1881 by the amalgamation of the 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Foot and the 108th Regiment of Foot (Madras Infantry).It saw service in the South African War, the First World War and the Second World War, before being amalgamated into theRoyal Irish Rangers in 1968.

History

1881 – 1914

On 1 July 1881 the 27th and 108th were redesignated as the 1st and 2nd Battalions, The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers respectively.The regimental district comprised the counties of Donegal, Londonderry, Tyrone and Fermanagh inIreland, with its garrison depot located at Omagh.The local militia regiments also became part of the new regiment, becoming the 3rd to 5th (Militia) Battalions.Militarily, the whole of Ireland was administered as a separate command within the United Kingdom with Command Headquarters at Parkgate (Phoenix Park) Dublin, directly under the War Office in London.

Under the Childers system, one regular battalion of each regiment was to be at a “home” station, while the other was abroad. Every few years, there was to be an exchange of battalions. In the period from the regiment’s formation to the outbreak of the Second Boer War the two regular battalions were stationed as follows:

Second Boer War

In October 1899 war broke out between the United Kingdom and the Boer Republics. The 1st Battalion landed atDurban, where they became part of the 5th (Irish) Brigade.The battalion was involved in a series of military reverses at the hands of the Boers that became known as the “Black Week“, culminating in defeat at the Battle of Colenso.The unit subsequently took part in the Tugela Campaign before helping relive Ladysmith in early 1900. The regiment lent its name to “Inniskilling Hill”, which was taken by the 5th brigade on 24/25 February 1900.

The 2nd Battalion only arrived in South Africa from India in the late stages of the war and saw little action.

Following the war in South Africa, the system of rotating battalions between home and foreign stations resumed as follows:

First World War

In 1914 the Great War broke out and the 2nd Battalion was first to see action in the Battle of Le Cateau. The 1st Battalion participated in the Landing at Cape Helles on the Gallipoli peninsula in April 1915 with the 29th Division. There were also nine New Army battalions raised seeing service with the 36th (Ulster) Division and the 16th (Irish) Division on theWestern Front and at Gallipoli, the Macedonian Campaign and Palestine.

1916 Easter Rising

The 12th battalionfought against Irish rebels who were fighting to end British rule in Ireland and to establish the Irish Republic during the Easter Rising of 1916 in Dublin. Two of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers were killed and seven more wounded.

Inter War

After the war, the Childers system was resumed, with the 1st Battalion moving to India for foreign service, and the 2nd Battalion based on Salisbury Plain for home service. With the independence of the Irish Free State in 1922 six British army regiments were disbanded. The 2nd Battalion of the Inniskillings was also disbanded, and they formed a two-battalion “corps” with the 1st Battalion Royal Irish Fusiliers, sharing the Omagh depot.

The 1st Inniskillings moved from India to Iraq in 1922, returning to Shorncliffe, England in 1925. They were stationed in Northern Ireland from 1927 to 1933, before moving to Aldershot. They resumed foreign service in 1934, moving toShanghai and then Singapore two years later.

In 1937 there was an expansion of the army, and the 2nd Battalion was reraised at Omagh, moving to Catterick in the following year. The 2nd Battalion of the Royal Irish Fusiliers was also reformed, and the arrangement of 1922 ended.The 1st Inniskillings moved to Wellington, Madras in 1938. The two battalions were in these locations when the Second World War broke out in 1939.

Second World War

In addition to the 1st and 2nd battalions, the regiment raised three battalions (5th, 6th and 70th) to fight in the war.

The 2nd Battalion, as part of the BEF, was among those that were evacuated from Dunkirk after desperate fighting as the rear guard to the retreating BEF. In 1942 the 1st Battalion was flown to Burma to help stem the Japanese advance and in 1943 took part in the operations in the Arakan peninsula. After re-fitting, the 2nd Battalion, as part of Fifth Division, left England in 1942 for the East Indies. Before they could join the rest of the division, the second battalion was recalled for duties in North Africa maintaining POW camps. Their journey was to take them to Syria, Persia, India and Madagascar, and eventually they arrived in the Mediterranean in time to take part in the invasion of Sicily followed by that of Italy.

During the Italian Campaign, the 6th Battalion would serve in the same theatre as the 2nd but with the 38th (Irish) Infantry Brigade. The 6th Battalion fought in the Tunisian Campaign in North Africa and the 2nd Battalion took part in the landings on Sicily and then Italy. Some units of the 2nd Battalion took part at Monte Cassino.

Post War

After the war, the First Battalion returned to India from Burma and after a stay in Hong Kong was engaged for many months hunting insurgents in the jungles of Malaya. In 1948 both regular battalions were amalgamated as the 1st Battalion, the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers.In 1949, after a brief spell at home, the battalion went to the West Indies, returning to the United Kingdom in April 1951. In 1952 it was presented with the Freedom of Enniskillen, the town of its founding. Later that year it went abroad to the Suez Canal Zone and afterwards to Kenya, where it helped to suppress the Mau Mau uprising; while in the latter country, it received the Freedom of Nairobi in perpetuity, the first and so far only time that a British regiment has been so honoured by a colonial city. For a short time, from April 1952, the 2nd Battalion was reformed and saw service in Egypt and Cyprus, where it was in action against EOKA insurgents. The battalion had also deployed 400 men to help the civil authorities during severe flooding in the Thames estuary. In 1956 the battalion was again disbanded.

The First Battalion returned to England in 1955 and after two years at the School of Infantry went to Germany, being stationed in Berlin and Wuppertal. In 1960 half of the battalion was back in Kenya with a detachment in Bahrein. In 1961 the battalion flew into Kuwait when the sheikdom was threatened by Iraq. The battalion returned to England in 1962, stationed at Gravesend.

In April 1968 the 1st Battalion had its final operational deployment when Tactical Headquarters and B Company were ordered at short notice to Bermuda with trouble brewing on the island due to a tense political situation  Following a peaceful election the detachment returned to Worcester in preparation, along with the remainder of the battalion, for the final regimental chapter; at midnight on 30 June 1968, following a nostalgic ceremony, the regimental flag was lowered for the last time.

Amalgamation

On 1 July 1968, the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, the Royal Ulster Rifles and the Royal Irish Fusiliers became the Royal Irish Rangers (27th Inniskilling, 83rd and 87th). The date of 1 July was chosen as it marked the fifty second anniversary of the first day of the Battle of the Somme, in which battalions of all three merging fought.The Royal Irish Rangers was later to amalgamate with the Ulster Defence Regiment and on the 1st July 1992 became the Royal Irish Regiment.