British West Indies Regiment India W. Indian Shoulder Title

Guaranteed original. Complete & intact. This is an original West India Regiment shoulder title badge for sale. In good condition. Please see our other items for more original WW1, WW2 & post war British military shoulder titles for sale including other West Indian Regiment shoulder titles.

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The West India Regiment (WIR) was an infantry unit of the British Army recruited from and normally stationed in the British colonies of the Caribbean between 1795 and 1927. On the outbreak of war in August 1914, the 1st Battalion of the WIR was stationed in Freetown where it had been based for two and a half years. A detachment of the Regiment’s signallers saw service in the German Cameroons, where Private L. Jordon earned a DCM and several other men were mentioned in dispatches. The 1st Battalion returned to the West Indies in 1916. The 2nd Battalion was sent from Kingston to West Africa in the second half of 1915. They took part in the capture of Yaound in January 1916. The Regiment was subsequently awarded the battle honour “Cameroons 1914-16”. The 2nd Battalion, which had been divided into detachments, was brought together in Freetown in April 1916 and sent to Mombassa in Kenya, to take part in the East African campaign against German colonial forces based in German East Africa. The five hundred and fifteen officers and men of the 2nd Battalion formed part of a column that took Dar es Salaam on 4 September 1916. After garrison duty, the battalion subsequently played a distinguished part in the Battle of Nyangao (German East Africa) in October 1917. For their service in East Africa the WIR earned eight Distinguished Conduct Medals, as well as the battle honour “East Africa 1914-18”. Following their active service in German Africa the 2nd Battalion of the West India Regiment was shipped to Suez in September 1918. It was then transferred to Lydda in Palestine where it spent the two remaining months of the War.

Two battalions of a newly raised regiment also recruited from black Caribbean soldiers: the similarly named British West Indies Regiment (see below), saw front line service against the Turkish Army during the Palestine Campaign. General Allenby sent the following telegram to the Governor of Jamaica: “I have great pleasure in informing you of the gallant conduct of the machine-gun section of the 1st British West Indies Regiment during two successful raids on the Turkish trenches. All ranks behaved with great gallantry under heavy rifle and shell fire and contributed in no small measure to the success of the operations”. After the war, the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the West India Regiment were amalgamated into a single 1st Battalion in 1920. This was disbanded in 1927. The reasons for disbandment were primarily economic. The West Indies had long been a peaceful military backwater with limited defence requirements and the substitute role under which the WIR had provided a single battalion as part of the garrison in Britain’s West African possessions had become redundant as local forces were raised and expanded there.

Please see our other items for more original WW1, WW2 & post war British military shoulder titles for sale including other West India Regiment cap badges.