Pioneers in The British Army
Historically, British infantry regiments maintained small units of pioneers for heavy work and engineering, especially for clearing paths through forests and for leading assaults on fortifications. These units evolved into assault pioneers. They also inspired the creation of the Royal Pioneer Corps.
The Royal Pioneer Corps was a British Army combatant corps used for light engineering tasks. The Royal Pioneer Corps was raised on 17 October 1939 as the Auxiliary Military Pioneer Corps. It was renamed the Pioneer Corps on 22 November 1940. It was renamed the Royal Pioneer Corps on 28 November 1946. On 5 April 1993, the Royal Pioneer Corps united with other units to form the Royal Logistics Corps.
There are currently 3 specialist pioneer units in the Royal Logistics Corps.
- 23 Pioneer Regiment based at Bicester, Oxfordshire
- The ARRC Support Battalion based at Imjin Barracks, Innsworth (previously at Rheindahlen Military Complex, Germany until June 2010)
- 168 Pioneer Regiment a specialist pioneer regiment in the Territorial Army, formed in 1995 with headquarters at Grantham.
All British infantry regiments still maintain assault pioneer units.
Read more about this topic: Pioneer (military)
Famous quotes containing the words pioneers, british and/or army:
“We are the pioneers of the world; the advance-guard, sent on through the wilderness of untried things, to break a new path in the New World that is ours.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“Anthropology is the science which tells us that people are the same the whole world over—except when they are different.”
—Nancy Banks-Smith, British columnist. Quoted in Guardian (London, July 21, 1988)
“These semi-traitors [Union generals who were not hostile to slavery] must be watched.—Let us be careful who become army leaders in the reorganized army at the end of this Rebellion. The man who thinks that the perpetuity of slavery is essential to the existence of the Union, is unfit to be trusted. The deadliest enemy the Union has is slavery—in fact, its only enemy.”
—Rutherford Birchard Hayes (1822–1893)