23rd (County of London) Battalion, London Regiment

The invasion scare of 1859 led to the creation of the Volunteer Force and huge enthusiasm for joining Rifle Volunteer Corps (RVCs).[3][4][5] Among the RVCs raised in the county of Surrey at this time was the 7th Surrey or Southwark Rifle Volunteers recruited from Southwark in South London. It was formed on 30 November under the command of Captain Francis Marcus Beresford.[1][6][7][8][9][10][11] The new corps obtained permission to use Bermondsey Grammar School as its depot, and to carry out live firing practice on Plumstead Marshes.[1] By February 1860 it had six companies, and Captain-Commandant Beresford was promoted to Major-Commandant.[8][12]

A second RVC was raised in Southwark on 9 March 1861, by George Cruikshank the cartoonist and vice-president of the National Temperance League. Numbered 24th it was known as 'Havelock's Own' after the hero of the Indian Mutiny Maj-Gen Sir Henry Havelock, a noted leader of the Temperance movement. Cruikshank intended his unit to be formed solely from sober artisans, but sufficient numbers were not forthcoming and he received little support from the Earl of Lovelace, the Lord Lieutenant of Surrey. When he sent a recruiting party into neighbouring Deptford, Cruikshank not only ran into opposition from the Peace Society, but he was rebuked by the Lord Lieutenant of Kent for recruiting across the Surrey border. There were moves to merge the weak unit into the 7th Surreys, with whom relations were not good. Cruikshank gave up in disgust, disbanded his corps in March 1862 and moved his efforts to Middlesex, where he succeeded in forming the 48th Middlesex (Havelock's Temperance Volunteers).[6][8][10][13]

The Earl of Lovelace, himself a Militia officer, was reluctant to support the volunteers, and insisted that only ex-Regular officers should be appointed to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. Nevertheless, Beresford was promoted to Lt-Col of the 7th Surrey RVC on 19 November 1864.[2][14][15]

Under the 'Localisation of the Forces' scheme introduced by the Cardwell Reforms of 1872, Volunteers were grouped into county brigades with their local Regular and Militia battalions – Sub-District No 47 (County of Surrey) for the 7th Surrey RVC, grouped with the 31st (Huntingdonshire) and 70th (Surrey) Regiments of Foot.[1][2][9][16][17]

By the 1870s some of the enthusiasm for volunteering had waned, and numbers fell. The 7th Surrey RVC lost the lease of its drill ground, and a number of officers resigned. Lieutenant-Col Beresford, by now Member of Parliament for Southwark, retired from the command and was appointed the unit's first Honorary Colonel on 25 January 1873.[1][2] The last new Surrey RVC to be formed was the 26th at Shaftesbury Park, Lavender Hill, Clapham, on 28 April 1875. It soon had four companies enrolled.[6][7][8]

Volunteer corps were consolidated into larger units in 1880, when the 26th Surreys was absorbed into the 7th Surreys, giving the battalion 10 companies (six at Southwark and four at Clapham).[1][6][7][8][9][10]

The Childers Reforms of 1881 took Cardwell's reforms further, and the Volunteers were formally affiliated to their local Regular regiment, the 7th Surrey RVC becoming a Volunteer Battalion of the new East Surrey Regiment, formed from the old 31st and 70th Foot. The 7th Surrey RVC changed its designation to '4th Volunteer Battalion, East Surrey Regiment; on 1 December 1887. Right Half Battalion was based in spacious premises at 71 Upper Kennington Lane, Left Half Battalion in poor accommodation on St John's Hill in Clapham Junction.[1][7][8][9][10]

While the sub-districts were later referred to as 'brigades', they were purely administrative organisations and the Volunteers were excluded from the 'mobilisation' part of the Cardwell system. The Stanhope Memorandum of December 1888 proposed a more comprehensive Mobilisation Scheme for Volunteer units, which would assemble in their own brigades at key points in case of war. In peacetime these brigades provided a structure for collective training.[18][19][20] Under this scheme the Volunteer Battalions of the Queen's Royal Regiment (West Surrey) and the East Surreys formed the Surrey Brigade. The brigade initially shared the Kennington headquarters of the 4th VB, East Surreys, and its assembly point was at Caterham Barracks, the Brigade of Guards' depot conveniently situated for the London Defence Positions along the North Downs.[2]

St John's Hill Drill Hall, built for the 4th VB East Surreys, today RHQ of the London Guards.

On 25 May 1889 the Rev Edward Talbot was appointed the battalion's Chaplain; while holding the position he became Bishop of Rochester and later Bishop of Southwark.[2] The 4th VB's CO, Lt-Col Arthur Bowen, was closely associated with the cadet movement in South London, and the 1st Cadet Battalion, East Surrey Regiment, of four companies existed at 71 Kennington Lane between 1890 and 1896.[8][21] By 1901 the battalion had moved to a new HQ Drill Hall at 27 St John's Hill, Clapham Junction, on land provided by the Hon Colonel, Lord Wandsworth.[1][2][22] Saturday afternoon drills were held on Wimbledon Common, although the crowds of spectators made it difficult to carry out even simple manoeuvres.[1]

Under the Haldane Reforms of 1908 the Volunteers were subsumed into the new Territorial Force (TF), administered by county Territorial Associations.[25][26][27] The volunteers in rural Surrey came under the Surrey Territorial Association; however, because many of the North Surrey suburban parishes had been included in the new County of London since 1889, the battalions recruited in South London were included in a new all-TF London Regiment under the County of London TA. Consequently the 4th VB East Surreys became 23rd (County of London) Battalion, London Regiment.[1][7][8][9][10][28][29][30][31]

The four former Surrey battalions of the London Regiment (now 21st–24th Londons) comprised the 6th London Brigade in the TF's 2nd London Division.[32][33][34][35]

The St Thomas's (Wandsworth) Cadet Corps was affiliated to the battalion.[2]

The 23rd Londons remained in training between the outbreak of the World War I until on 15 March it landed at Le Havre as part of 6th London Brigade, 2nd London Division]], which that May was renumbered 142nd Brigade in 47th (2nd London) Division. As such it fought in the Battle of Loos and Battle of the Somme before spending the last three months of 1916 on the Ypres Salient. In 1917 the battalion was involved in the battles of Messines Ridge and the Bourlon Wood. It also faced the German Spring Offensive of 1918 as well as taking part in the Hundred Days Offensive and the liberation of Lille, before ending the war at Frasnes.[32][33][34][35]

When the London Regiment was dissolved in 1938, the battalion became the 42nd Royal Tank Regiment.[7][10]

42nd Royal Tank Regiment and its wartime duplicate, 48th Royal Tank Regiment, fought in North Africa, including the Battle of Alamein, and in Italy and North West Europe.

Following the re-establishment of the Territorial Army in 1947 the Regiment remained as 42nd Royal Tank Regiment until 1956, when a reduction in Territorial Army armoured regiments meant the regiment became the 23rd London again. Further reductions in the size of the Territorial Army in 1961 saw the unit merged to become a Territorial battalion of the newly formed Queen's Royal Surrey Regiment.[7][10]