The Royal Tank Regiment
British Army

Including

Armoured Car Section

The Machine Gun Corps

Motor Machine Gun Service

Royal Tank Corps

The Tank Corps

Machine Gun Corps (Heavy Branch)

Machine Gun Corps (Heavy Section)

Please link profiles of those who served in The Royal Tank Regiment,(including those in the "included" list above), to this project regardless of rank, conflict or nationality. People of note can be individually listed in Alphabetical Order below.

See

Regiments and Corps of the British Army

Armoured Corps

The RTC is the oldest tank unit in the world. Today is is the armoured regiment of the British Army's 1st Armoured Infantry Brigade. Formerly known as the Tank Corps and the Royal Tank Corps, it is part of the Royal Armoured Corps.

The Initial predecessor to The Royal Tank Regiment (RTR) was formed in Feb 1916 during WW1 following the invention of the tank. It was set up as a secret tank detachment and formally designated an Armoured Car Section, Motor Machine Gun Service, Machine Gun Corps in March 1916.

Tanks were first used at the Battle of Flers–Courcelette in September 1916 during the Battle of the Somme in WW1. At that time the six tank companies were grouped as the Heavy Section of the Machine Gun Corps (MGC). In November 1916 the eight companies then in existence were each expanded to form battalions (still identified by the letters A to H) and designated the Heavy Branch MGC; another seven battalions, I to O, were formed by January 1918, when all the battalions were changed to numbered units. On 28 July 1917 the Heavy Branch was separated from the rest of the Corps by Royal Warrant and given official status as the Tank Corps. The formation of new battalions continued and by December 1918, 26 had been created though there were only 25 battalions equipped with tanks, as the 17th had converted to armoured cars in April 1918. The first commander of the Tank Corps was Lieutenant General Sir Hugh Jamieson Elles. The Corps saw much action at the Battle of Cambrai in November 1917.

The Machine Gun Corps (MGC) was formed in October 1915 in response to the need for more effective use of machine guns on the Western Front in the First World War. The Heavy Branch of the MGC was the first to use tanks in combat and was subsequently turned into the Tank Corps, later called the Royal Tank Regiment. The MGC remained in existence after the war until it was disbanded in 1922.
The Royal Tank Corps started life as an off-shoot of an infantry organisation (The Machine Gun Corps).

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Royal Tank Regiment

Motto - Fear Naught

Uniform -

Corps March -

• Quick: My Boy Willie You Tube
  
• Slow: The Royal Tank Regiment Slow March
  

Nick-names - The Armoured Chavalry, Tankies

At the outbreak of war in August 1914 the tactical use of machine guns was unappreciated by the British Military. Consequently, the Army went to war with its infantry battalions and cavalry regiments each having a machine gun section of only two guns each. This was added to in November by the forming of the Motor Machine Gun Service, administered by the Royal Artillery, consisting of motor cycle mounted machine gun batteries. A machine gun school was also opened in France.

You Tube - BBC Regimental Stories - RTR Insight into the history of the Regiment.

Ancestry

Feb 1916 - Armoured Car Section, Motor Machine Gun Service, Machine Gun Corps
May 1916 - Re-designated Machine Gun Corps (Heavy Branch) (originally Heavy Section)
July 1917 - Re-designated The Tank Corps
1923 - "Royal prefix" and "Fear Naught" motto award
1924a - New badge issued Royal Tank Corps
1924b - Tank orientation changed so that it didn't look as if it was retreating
1939 Transferred to RAC, renamed The Royal Tank Regiment
1952 Queen's Crown badge issued.

2/19165/191619171924a1924b1955

1st Battalion Royal Tank Regiment (1 RTR)

1st (Light) Battalion, Royal Tank Corps in 1934. Amalgamated with 4 RTR (1993).

2nd Battalion Royal Tank regiment (2 RTR)

Formed 28th July 1917 from Heavy Branch, Machine Gun Corps.
B Battalion, the Heavy Branch. Machine Gun Corps (MGC) 1917. Amalgamated with 3 RTR (1992)

Colonels-Commandant

(Chronological order)

• Major General Sir John Capper KCB KCVO 1917–1923
• Major General Sir Ernest Swinton KBE CB DSO 19
• Field Marshal Sir Archibald Montgomery-Massingberd GCB KCMG LLD ADC
• Lieutenant General Sir Hugh Jamieson Elles
• Major General G M Lindsay CB CMG DSO 1
• Lieutenant General Sir Charles Broad KCB DSO
• Field Marshal The Viscount Montgomery of Alamein KG GCB DSO DL
• Major General Sir Percy Hobart KBE CB DSO MC
• General Sir John Crocker GCB KBE DSO MC
• Major General N W Duncan CB CBE DSO
• Major General H R B Foote VC CB DSO
• Lieutenant General Sir Harold Pyman KCB CBE DSO
• Major General H M Liardet CB CBE DSO DL
• Major General Sir Alan Jolly CB CBE DSO
• General Sir Michael Carver GCB CBE DSO MC ADC
• Major General P R C Hobart CB DSO OBE MC
• General Sir Richard Ward CB DSO MC
• Lieutenant General Sir Allan Taylor KBE MC
• Major General J G R Allen CB
• Major General R L C Dixon CB MC
• Lieutenant General Sir Richard Lawson KCB DSO MC
• Major General I H Baker CBE
• Major General R M Jerram MBE
• General Sir Antony Walker KCB
• Major General Sir Laurence New CB CBE 1
• General Sir Jeremy Blacker KCB

Deputy Colonel Commandant

(Chronological order)

• Major General R W M McAfee CB
• Brigadier A C I Gadsby
• Lieutenant General A P Ridgway CB CBE 1
• Lieutenant General A D Leakey CMG CBE
• Major General P Gilchrist CB
• Major General C M Deverell MBE
• Brigadier S Caraffi MBE ADC
• Brigadier P J Allison

Notable Personnel

Names with Bold links are to Geni profiles. Other links take you to external biographical web pages.

A

B

C

D

• Frank Dove (1897-1957)

E

F

G

H

• Major General, Sir Percy Cleghorn Stanley Hobart, KBE, CB, DSO, MC (1885-1957)

I

J

K

L

M

N

O

P

Q

R

S

T

U

V

W

Battle honours

The battle honours are:

The Great War

Somme 1916 '18, Arras 1917 '18, Messines 1917, Ypres 1917, Cambrai 1917, St. Quentin 1918, Villers Bretonneux, Amiens, Bapaume 1918, Hindenburg Line, Épéhy, Selle, France and Flanders 1916–18, Gaza

The Second World War

North-West Europe 1940

Arras Counter Attack, Calais 1940, St. Omer-La Bassée, Somme

North Africa 1940–43

Sidi Barrani, Beda Fomm, Sidi Suleiman, Tobruk 1941, Sidi Rezegh 1941, Belhamed, Gazala, Cauldron, Knightsbridge, Defence of Alamein Line, Alam el Halfa, El Alamein, Mareth, Akarit, Fondouk, El Kourzia, Medjez Plain, Tunis

Sicily 1943

Primosole Bridge, Gerbini, Adrano

Italy 1943-45

Sangro, Salerno, Volturno Crossing, Garigliano Crossing, Anzio, Advance to Florence, Gothic Line, Coriano, Lamone Crossing, Rimini Line, Argenta Gap

North-West Europe 1944-45

Odon, Caen, Bourguébus Ridge, Mont Pincon, Falaise, Nederrijn, Scheldt, Venlo Pocket, Rhineland, Rhine, Bremen

Abyssinia 1940, Greece 1941, Burma 1942

Post-war years

• Korea 1951–53
• Al Basrah, Iraq 2003

References, Sources and Further Reading

• Machine Gun Corps Research Database
  
• MGC - Old Comrades Association
  

this project is in History Link