9th Queen's Royal Lancers - Between The Wars

Between The Wars

The Lancers were involved in little action between the wars. They were stationed in Ireland during the Irish War of Independence and employed in a counter-insurgency role in counties Longford and Roscommon. A number died in small-scale actions such as the Scramogue Ambush of March 1921. In addition to the lack of conflicts, their relative inactivity was also due to the military high command struggling to decide what role cavalry regiments could perform in modern warfare. Eventually it was decided that the best use of cavalry regiments was to mechanise them, i.e. to replace their horses with tanks.

In spring 1936 the Lancers received a new commander, Major-General C. W. Norman, and conversion to tanks commenced. Existing NCOs received armoured training first and then passed on their knowledge to new recruits. Horses were either sold or transferred to other regiments, an event that obviously caused great sadness to a cavalry regiment. To soften the blow the officers were allowed to keep their horses for a period during which they continued to compete in horse trials and polo.

Initial training in 1936 used worn out weaponless Carden Lloyd carriers whose overheating engines scalded the occupants with super-heated steam and broke down with alarming regularity in the plains surrounding Tidworth.

In 1937 these were replaced with ancient light tanks which had been returned as unserviceable from Egypt and still contained desert sand. These actually carried both machine guns and radios and the Lancers almost began to feel like a functioning regiment again. The radios were primitive and it was said that "the tail of a column half a mile away could hear what the Commanding Officer was saying over the air, but not over the ether!". This was a source of great frustration and the War Office was obliged on one occasion to send the Lancers a letter complaining that civilians were complaining about the language which they were picking up on their receivers in their homes.

In 1938 it was decided that the Lancers had "had their share" of the training vehicles and most were transferred to other regiments. Trucks were used in their place and the Lancers continued their training "pretending to be tanks". No heavy gunnery training could be practiced, however machine gunnery and radio practice continued.

In the spring of 1938 the 1st Mobile Division, later to become the 1st Armoured Division, was formed. It was composed of the 1st Armoured Brigade at Aldershot and the 2nd Armoured Brigade at Tidworth. The 2nd Armoured Brigade was made up of the 9th Queen's Royal Lancers, Queen's Bays and 10th Hussars and remained unchanged throughout the war.

In October 1938 Christopher Peto took command of the Lancers. Training continued until the outbreak of war in 1939.