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List of Royal Artillery Divisions 1882–1902

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A number of 'Divisions' were organised on a territorial basis by Britain's Royal Artillery (RA) in 1882 in an attempt to improve the administration and recruitment of garrison artillery units. These also provided for the first time a higher organisation for the part-time Artillery Militia and Artillery Volunteers. In 1889 these divisions were reorganised into fewer, larger organisations. The RA was split into two distinct branches in 1899, with the Royal Garrison Artillery (RGA) taking over all the units in these divisions, which were scrapped in 1902.

1882–89

Since 1877 the regular batteries of the Royal Artillery had been organised as 11 'brigades' of which 7th–11th Brigades were garrison artillery. Under General Order 72 of 4 April 1882 these five brigades were broken up and the garrison batteries of the regular Royal Artillery and all the part-time Artillery Militia units in the UK were organised into 11 territorial 'divisions'. Shortly afterwards, the Artillery Volunteers were added to the divisions.

Within each division, the 1st Brigade comprised the regular batteries, assigned arbitrarily from the previous brigades and redesignated sequentially as '1st Battery, 1st Brigade, Northern Division' etc. The 2nd and subsequent brigades were the artillery militia units (who temporarily lost their county designations), which already consisted of multiple batteries and had sometime sbeen referred to as 'regiments'. Artillery Volunteer Corps (AVCs) had been independent units comprising a variable number of batteries, sometimes grouped into administrative brigades, but since 1881 these had been consolidated into larger AVCs. They mostly retained their county titles. Although the militia and volunteers organised by county were affiliated to an appropriate territorial division, for the Regular RA the divisions simply represented recruiting districts – batteries could be serving anywhere in the British Empire and their only allegiance to brigade headquarters (HQ) was for the supply of drafts and recruits. The amount of militia artillery in each division had no relation to the coast defences that needed to be manned, but solely to the numbers that could be recruited within its boundaries. For example there were too few in Southern England where the principal coast fortress lay – there were none in London – and too many in Ireland. The Volunteer Force did not exist in Ireland. The organisation in 1882 was as follows:

1. Northern Division

2. Lancashire Division

3. Eastern Division

4. Cinque Ports Division

5. London Division

6. Southern Division

7. Western Division

8. Scottish Division

9. Welsh Division

10. North Irish Division

11. South Irish Division

1889–1902

On 1 July 1889 the garrison artillery was reorganised again into three large territorial divisions of garrison artillery and one of mountain artillery. The names of the territorial divisions seemed arbitrary, with the Scottish units being grouped in the South Division, for example, but this related to where the need for coastal artillery was greatest, rather than where the units recruited. The artillery militia units regained their county designations, as did those volunteer units that had adopted brigade titles. After 1889 all were intended to include '(----ern Division, Royal Artillery)' after their title, but many of the volunteers did not use them. From 1 August 1891 garrison artillery batteries were termed companies (unless they were equipped with specific guns, such as mountain batteries or position batteries), and some were grouped into double companies at this time before reverting to their previous numbers in March 1894.

Eastern Division

  • HQ at Dover

Regulars

  • 1st–32nd Companies, Depot and Sub-depot

Militia

Volunteers

1st and 2nd Sussex; 1st Norfolk; 1st, 2nd and 3rd Kent; 1st Essex; 1st and 2nd Cinque Ports; 2nd and 3rd Middlesex; 1st London; 1st Suffolk & Harwich

Southern Division

  • HQ at Portsmouth

Regulars

  • 1st–42nd Companies, Depot and two Sub-depots

Militia

Volunteers

1st and 2nd Hampshire; 1st Edinburgh; 1st Midlothian; 1st Banffshire; 1st Forfarshire; 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th Lancashire; 1st Renfrew & Dumbarton; 1st and 2nd Dorsetshire; 1st Fife; 1st Haddington; 1st Lanarkshire; 1st Ayrshire & Galloway; 1st Argyll & Bute; 1st Cheshire & Carnarvonshire; 1st Caithness; 1st Aberdeenshire; 1st Berwickshire; 1st Inverness-shire; 1st Cumberland; 1st Orkney; 1st Shropshire & Staffordshire; 1st Worcestershire

Western Division

  • HQ at Plymouth

Regulars

  • 1st–31st Companies, Depot and two Sub-depots

Militia

Volunteers

Tynemouth; 1st and 2nd Northumberland; 1st and 2nd Devonshire; 1st Cornwall; 1st and 2nd Glamorganshire; 1st and 2nd Yorkshire (East Riding); 1st Gloucestershire; 1st Yorkshire (North Riding); 1st Lincolnshire; 1st Berwick-on-Tweed; 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th Durham; 1st, 2nd and 4th Yorkshire (West Riding); 1st Newcastle upon Tyne; 1st Monmouthshire

Mountain Division

When the territorial divisions were reorganised on 1 July 1889, one field battery in South Africa and nine garrison artillery batteries – one in Monmouthshire, the remainder in India – were converted into mountain batteries to constitute a new mountain artillery division. On 1 June 1899 this was redesignated the Mountain Division, RGA, and the batteries became '1st Mountain Bty, RGA', etc.

  • 1st–10th Mountain Btys

Reorganisation

In 1899 the Royal Artillery was divided into two distinct branches, field and garrison. The field branch included the Royal Horse Artillery (RHA) and the newly-named Royal Field Artillery (RFA). The garrison branch was named the Royal Garrison Artillery (RGA) and included coast defence, position, heavy, siege and mountain artillery. The RGA retained the divisions until they were scrapped on 1 January 1902, at which point the Regular RGA companies were numbered in a single sequence and the militia and volunteer units were designated '--- shire RGA (M)' or '(V)' as appropriate.

Footnotes

  1. In RA terminology, a 'brigade' was a group of independent batteries grouped together for administrative rather than tactical purposes, the officer in command being usually a lieutenant-colonel rather than a brigadier-general or major-general, the ranks usually associated with command of an infantry or cavalry brigade.
  2. As with the brigades the RA used the term 'division' for an administrative group rather than a field formation.

Notes

  1. ^ Frederick, pp. 562–6, 985.
  2. Frederick, pp. 567–73.
  3. ^ Maurice-Jones, pp. 150–1.
  4. Hart's Army List, 1883.
  5. ^ Lawes, Vol II, Index.
  6. ^ Litchfield, Militia Artillery, pp. 4–6; Appendix 5.
  7. ^ Litchfield & Westlake, pp. pp. 4–6.
  8. ^ Maurice-Jones, pp. 162–3.
  9. ^ Monthly Army Lists.
  10. Frederick, pp. 574–9.
  11. ^ Frederick, pp. 891–2.
  12. Hart's Army List, 1890.
  13. Frederick. pp. 580–95.

References

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