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 A colourful regiment with a distinguished history the Liverpool Scottish
were raised from amongst Scots in the Liverpool area on 30th April 1900 and
entitled 8th (Scottish) Volunteer Battalion, The King’s Liverpool Regiment.
In 1901 they became entitled to wear Highland dress and they chose the
Forbes tartan in honour of their first Commanding Officer, Christopher
Forbes Bell. A detachment served in South Africa during the Boer War.
In 1908 they were retitled 10th (Scottish) Battalion The King’s (Liverpool)
Regiment, Territorial Force and shortly before the First World War they were
affiliated to The Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders. Their Drill Hall was in
Fraser Street in Liverpool.
Two battalions of The Liverpool Scottish served in WW1. The 1/10th were
mobilised in 1914 and were sent thereafter to the defences on the River
Forth. On 1st November 1914 they embarked for France and spent the winter in
the Ypres area. On 16th June 1915 in a successful attack at Hooge they lost
402 casualties killed, wounded and missing, 74% of the battalion strength.
Reconstituted with new recruits the 1/10th again lost heavily in the battle
for Guillemont on the Somme in August 1916 during which battle the
Battalion’s Medical Officer Captain Noel Chavasse won the Victoria Cross. A
year later he was to win, posthumously, a Bar to his VC. Further action
followed during the 3rd Battle of Ypres in July 1917, at Epehy near Cambrai,
in November 1917, at Givenchy in March and April 1918 and at La Bassee
during the final Allied offensive in 1918.
The 2/10th Battalion were raised in 1914 and after home service went to
France in 1917. Losses in the 1/10th resulted in 1/10th and 2/10th being
amalgamated in April 1918. In 1922 The Liverpool Scottish became part of The
Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders.
During the Second World War two battalions of the Liverpool Scottish
existed. The 1st Liverpool Scottish were employed on the Home Front and an
Independent Company of volunteers served in the campaign in Norway in 1940.
Large numbers of men went from the Liverpool Scottish as reinforcements to
The Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders. The Battalion was disbanded in 1947.
The 2nd Battalion were also on home defence and then in 1942 they were
converted into 89th Anti-Tank Regiment, Royal Artillery. This regiment was
disbanded in 1946.
A year later in 1947 when the Territorial Army was reformed the 1st
Battalion Liverpool Scottish came into existence again and twenty years on,
in 1967, the Battalion was reduced to become V (Liverpool Scottish) Company,
51st Highland Volunteers and R (King’s/Liverpool Scottish) Battery, West
Lancashire Regiment, Royal Artillery, TA. In 1992 V (Liverpool Scottish)
Company) was transferred to 5th/8th Battalion, The King’s Regiment. This
Company has now been reduced to 2 (Liverpool Scottish) Platoon King’s and
Cheshire Regiment. |
Liverpool
Scottish