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British army corps shown in military
art prints, Army Service Corps, Royal Corp of Signals, Royal Army Medical
Corps, Pioneer Corps, Army Catering Corps and Royal Corps of Transport
shown in military art prints by Terence Cuneo, David Rowlands, Richard
Simkin and Richard Caton Woodville. |
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The Army Service Corps
The supply of an army in the field was, in the last century,
usually organised solely for the duration of a war, and partook largely of
the civilian element. The first well-considered effort to provide a reliable force for
these important duties was made in the Peninsula, when the “Royal Wagon
Train” was formed. This was
revived in 1854 as the “Land Transport Corps”; but it was not very
successful, and was reorganised after the war as the “Military Train.”
It next appears as the
“control Department,” of which the “Commissariat and Transport,”
and a “Military Store Department,” were sub-branches; but this
machinery proved cumbrous, and it disappeared in 1875, to be followed by
the “Army Transport Corps,” which was finally given its present name.
The disposition of the Transport in an English army is at the rate
of one Transport company to each division, and one for the corps’
head-quarters in the first line, four others being relegated to the second
line, chiefly for hospital needs. Each
company has four sections, one of which carries staff baggage and
provisions for the “details”; one section is told off to assist the
medical department, and the other two convey staff baggage and provisions.
It has shared necessarily in the campaigns in which the army has
taken part; and at Rorke’s Drift, in 1879, Acting-Assistant Commissary
J. L. Dalton won the Cross for Valour.
During the Mutiny, in the pursuit of Koer Singh from Azimghur, the
men did good service as cavalry; and in one of the sharp skirmishes
Michael Murphy and SamuelMorely, of the Military Train, gained the
Victoria Cross. There
are thirty-seven companies in the “Army List,” with one supply and two
remount companies.
The blue uniform has white facings.
The Army Chaplains’ Department
According to Clode, in the year 1662 a chaplain was appointed to
every regiment, and in the Articles of War of that year they were directed
“to preach to them as often as with convenience shall be fought fit.”
The first Chaplain-General was the Rev, J,
Gamble, in 1796, when regimental chaplains were done away with, and their
duty was performed by ordinary parish priests: but for foreign service
there was a little provision, so that in 1806 “Lord Cathart embarked
with a corps of 14,000 men, and only one chaplain,” and throughout the
Peninsular War there were practically few, if any, chaplains employed.
The office of Chaplain-General was abolished in 1829, but was
restored in 1846. Three
heroes of the department may well be mentioned here. The first is the Rev J.W. Adams, who won the Victoria Cross
in Afghanistan for helping the wounded and saving life; another is the Rev
G.N. Gordon, who was mortally wounded at Candahar when attending to the
men under a heavy fire; and the third is the Rev. R. Collins, who crossed
from one square to the other at Hasheen, in the Soudan, to Convey a
message from Major Alston.
In the “Army List” the Presbyterian chaplains have the letter
“P.” before their names,
the Roman Catholic “R.C.”
The black uniform has the usual badges on the collar.
The forage-cap is adorned with black embroidery.
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| 2nd Battalion, Reme by
David Rowlands Operation Agricola, Kosovo, February - September 1999.
Sgt Dowling MM & L. Cpl. F. Evans, REME, February 26th 1992 by David Rowlands
Sgt Dowling and L Cpl Evans with the 16th/5th The
Queen's Royal Lancers. The Rev. W. R. F. Addison
Carries A Wounded Man To The Cover Of A Trench Under Heavy Rifle And
Machine Gun Fire. The Rev. William Robert Fountaine Addison, temporary
Chaplain to the Forces, 4th Class, Army Chaplain Department, carried a
wounded man to the cover of a trench, and assisted several others to the
same cover, after binding up their wounds under heavy rifle and machine
gun fire. In addition to
these unaided efforts, by his splendid example and utter disregard to
personal danger he encountered the stretcher-bearers to go forward under
heavy fire and collect the wounded.
He was deservedly rewarded with the V.C.
Driver
Burberry driving wagons through a town under heavy shellfire.
On several occasions Driver P Burberry of the Army Service
Corps, volunteered to drive convoy wagons through a town under heavy
shellfire. He showed great
coolness and bravery, and was awarded the D.C.M.
A motor wagon, which private
Clements was driving narrowly escaping being blown to bits.
For great coolness and bravery displayed by him while
under fire since the beginning of the war, Private T. R. Clements, of
the Army Service Corps, has gained the D.C.M.
On one occasion he made no less than fourteen journeys with
signal stores through a town, which was in flames and under heavy
shellfire. On two occasions
he narrowly escaped with his life, his car being struck by shells, and
nearly buried in the debris of falling houses.
Private Adams
going to the assistance of the wounded in a motor ambulance which had
run into a shell hole while under fire.
While on its way to the dressing station, a motor ambulance,
which was full of wounded, ran into a shell hole.
Private L. A. Adams, of the Army Service Corps, assisted to
remove the wounded while under shellfire, and when the car had been
hauled out and the wounded replaced, brought them safely to their
destination. For his conspicuous bravery he was awarded the D.C.M.
Driver
Caley towing back, under fire a car, which had broken down.
An ambulance car having broken down at the first line of
the old enemy trenches. Driver
G. E. Caley, of the Army Service Corps (attached Royal Army Medical
Corps) assisted in the taking up another car.
On arriving he helped to load the wounded on his own car, and
then towed the other back to the dressing station.
For his conspicuous gallantry he was awarded the D.C.M.
Provisional Farrier Sergeant
Cussens extricating horses from stables in which a shell had burst.
For conspicuous gallantry and coolness on November 5th
1914, at Ypres in extricating the horses after a shell had burst in the
stables, Provisional Farrier-Sergeant T Cussens, of the army service
corps, was awarded the D.C.M. The
shell killed six men and many horses
Private Holmes driving a motor
ambulance in the reverse for four hundred yards while under fire.
While driving a motor ambulance up to bring in some
wounded near Hulluch on September 26th 1915, Private J Holmes
of the Army Service Corps (attached to the 23rd Field
Ambulance) was fired upon by the enemy.
He drove the car in the reverse for four hundred yards, the man
beside him having been killed, till a bullet struck the carburettor.
He then came up with another car, and safely towed his own away.
His car was hit twenty-two times, and but for his great bravery
and resource, must have been wrecked.
Holmes was awarded the D.C.M. for conspicuous gallantry and
devotion to duty.
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