, First Commander of the 40th Regiment of Foot
Formation The regiment was raised at
Annapolis Royal in
Nova Scotia by General
Richard Philipps as the '''Richard Philipps's Regiment of Foot''' in August 1717 out of independent companies stationed in North America and the West Indies.
Father Rale's War Prior to
Father Rale's War, the Mi'kmaq responded to the establishment of a British fort at
Canso, Nova Scotia by raiding the settlement's fishing station in 1720. Phillips sent a company of the 40th, under the command of Major
Lawrence Armstrong, to take up garrison of a small fort in Canso built by a group of New England fishermen. The Mi'kmaq continued preying on nearby shipping, forcing the garrison to take action in February 1723. Serving as marines, the troops and local fishermen were able to disperse the attacking indigenous people. The next engagement came in July 1724 when a party of sixty Mi'kmaq attacked
Annapolis Royal. The garrison responded with a poorly calculated sortie from the town's dilapidated fort, resulting in the death of a sergeant and private, the wounding of an officer and three privates, and the repulse of the troops. After some pillaging, the Mi'kmaq departed with a number of civilian prisoners. From 1717 to 1743, Phillips' Regiment, garrisoning Annapolis, Placentia, and Canso, was successful in protecting settlers from Indian attacks, checking French influence in the area, and preserving the British foothold in Atlantic Canada. A flotilla containing 900 French regulars and militia. The four poorly supplied companies of Phillips' Regiment were forced to surrender. The town was destroyed and the prisoners sent to Louisbourg. Once the regiment's officers and men were paroled in September 1744, the regiment was evacuated to Boston where they provided valuable information on the defences of Louisbourg for the British
siege the following year. The
Newfoundland Campaign started during August 1744. Captain Robert Young, of the 44-gun ship
Kinsale, lying in St. John's, Newfoundland, received intelligence that five French ships were in the
port of Fishotte and resolved on despatching an armed prize to attack them. The prize was named the
St. Philip, and was manned by eighty men of the
Kinsales crew, and commanded by one of her lieutenants, and accompanied by three 10-gun colonial privateers. The
St. Philip succeeded, after grounding several times, in reaching the
Moderate, of twelve guns and seventy-five men, which was boarded and carried; then turning the
Moderates guns against the remaining ships, without the assistance of the privateers (who did not get into the harbour in time), compelled the whole to surrender. The
St. Philip had ten killed, and thirty wounded. The loss on board the French ships was more severe. The five vessels, which had on board 18,000 quintals of fish and eighty tons of oil, mounted together sixty-six guns, and carried 342 men. In July 1744, three hundred Indians under command of a French priest named Le Loutre
attacked Annapolis, the only British garrison in Nova Scotia. Only eighty men of Phillips' Regiment were available to meet this threat, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel
Paul Mascarene. Mascarene refused to surrender to Le Loutre. Le Loutre's party eventually burned a number of houses and withdrew. Following this,
George II authorized the reorganization of the regiment which increased to six regiments the garrison at Annapolis, with an authorized complement of 450. Initially only seventy additional men were received. Recruitment efforts continued and Governor Shirley sent 206 recruits in February 1746. Despite the additional manpower the regiment remained under strength. It was at this time that Captain
John Winslow first took command of a Philipp's regiment at Annapolis Royal, after being transferred from Newfoundland. In September the enemy, this time three hundred regulars and militia with Indian support, reappeared outside the dilapidated earthworks of Annapolis Royal. After a four-week siege and lacking a train of artillery, the French withdrew from the defiant garrison. The only other action seen by Phillips' Regiment occurred while serving as marines and seamen. A detachment from the garrison at St. John's, Newfoundland volunteered to serve on a captured twenty-gun ship for an expedition with three privateers to Fishotte Bay. The prize entered Fishotte Bay alone and engaged a number of anchored French ships. After five hours of fighting and the loss of ten killed and thirty wounded, the ship had captured three fourteen-gun and two twelve-gun enemy ships; forty six of their crews were killed and three hundred and thirty two made prisoner. The lagging privateers entered the harbour and assisted in the destruction of French fishing stages and the removal of enemy ships and prisoners.
Father Le Loutre's War ,
Old Burying Ground (Halifax, Nova Scotia) The 40th was also actively engaged in
Father Le Loutre's War. In July 1749, the grenadier company under Captain Handfield were sent to garrison the new settlement of Halifax founded the month earlier by the new Governor of Nova Scotia,
Edward Cornwallis. A surprise attack by local Mi'kmaq in the
Siege of Grand Pré resulted in the capture of a detachment of the company including Lieutenant Hamilton and Handfield's son. The captives were later returned to Halifax. Further engagements occurred with the Indians that year as the troops preserved the line of communication between Halifax and Annapolis Royal. Additional members of the regiment formed the garrison of
Fort Sackville and established themselves at
Fort Edward. Neglected for so many years by its former colonel, Cornwallis set about enhancing the condition of his new regiment. The companies in Newfoundland were rotated and discipline was improved. Desertion was poorly tolerated by Cornwallis. Of six deserters stationed at
Fort Vieux Logis, two were shot and the rest reprieved. Three other deserters were hanged and their bodies suspended in chains as a warning to others. Further changes happened in the 40th with Cornwallis' appointment of Major
Charles Lawrence of the 45th to the regiment's lieutenant colonelcy. Lawrence proved to be an energetic and effective military and administrative leader. After his appointment, Lawrence lead an expedition to the Missaguash River in August 1750 where he routed in the
Battle at Chignecto a superior number of Indians under Le Loutre. That fall he built
Fort Lawrence across the river where the following spring the French would build Fort Beausejour. Also in 1755, under the command of
John Handfield, the 40th were engaged in the
Expulsion of the Acadians from Annapolis Royal. After such a long stay in the colony, a number of the officers had married into the local Acadian population. Therefore, the deportation order forced officers to exile their own relations. Even the commander of the garrison, Major Handfield, had to deport his wife's "sister-in-law, nephews and nieces, uncles, aunts, and cousins." Handfield wrote to another officer performing the same task: "I heartily join with you in wishing that we were both of us got over this most disagreeable and troublesome part of the Service." In 1758, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel John Handfield, the regiment participated in the second siege of Louisbourg. Some companies of the regiment participated in the
Louisbourg Grenadiers on its formation in 1759. The following year, the regiment took part in the successful
three pronged attack against Montréal in September which concluded the war there. The regiment moved to
Barbados in December 1761 and then took part in the
Battle of Havana in June 1762. In June 1763 the regiment rotated out of Havana to Annapolis Royal where it served until 1767 when it was transferred to
Ireland. This would be the first time in its 48-year history that the British regiment would serve on British soil. It was evacuated from Boston in March 1776 and went to
Halifax from where a detachment was sent to
Georgia to gather rice for the army in June 1776. It saw action at the
Battle of Long Island in August 1776, the
Battle of Fort Washington in November 1776 and the
Battle of Princeton in January 1777. It was in combat again at the
Battle of Brandywine in September 1777 and the
Battle of Germantown in October 1777. In November 1778 the regiment embarked for
Barbados and took part in the
Battle of St. Lucia in December 1778. The regiment was then based in
Antigua until June 1781 when it returned to
Staten Island and then took part in the
Battle of Groton Heights in September 1781: Major William Montgomery, commanding the regiment was killed in the assault. In August 1782, the regiment took a county title as the
40th (the 2nd Somersetshire) Regiment of Foot.
Napoleonic Wars In January 1794 the regiment embarked for
Barbados for service in the
French Revolutionary Wars and took part in the capture of
Martinique in March 1794 and the attack on
Guadeloupe in April 1794: some members of the regiment became
prisoners of war and were held on the island for over a year. The rest of the regiment returned home and in June 1794 embarked for
Ostend: the regiment was not significantly engaged and returned home again in April 1795. The regiment returned to the
West Indies in summer 1795 and took part in an attack on the French troops on
Saint Vincent in September 1795. It moved to
Saint-Domingue in July 1797 before returning home in December 1798. The regiment also took part in the
Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland in August 1799 and fought at the
Battle of Bergen in September 1799 and the
Battle of Alkmaar in October 1799 before returning home in November 1799. The regiment also took part in the expedition to the
Mediterranean and fought at the
Battle of Abukir and
Battle of Alexandria in March 1801 and then returned to England in October 1801. The regiment was part of the force assembled for the
invasions of the River Plate in September 1806 and took part in the attack on Battle of Montevideo in February 1807 before returning to England in December 1807. In July 1808 the regiment embarked for
Portugal, as part of
Sir Arthur Wellesley's army, for service in the
Peninsular War. It fought at the
Battle of Roliça in August 1808, the
Battle of Vimeiro later that month and the
Battle of Talavera in July 1809. The regiment also took part in the
Battle of Bussaco in September 1810 and then fell back to the
Lines of Torres Vedras in October 1810. The regiment later took part in the
Siege of Ciudad Rodrigo in January 1812, the
Siege of Badajoz in March 1812 and the
Battle of Salamanca in July 1812 as well as the
Battle of Vitoria in June 1813. It then pursued the French Army into France and fought at the
Battle of the Pyrenees in July 1813, the
Battle of Nivelle in November 1813 and the
Battle of Orthez in February 1814 before also taking part
Battle of Toulouse in April 1814. The regiment returned home in June 1814. In October 1814 the regiment was sent to
New Orleans for service in the
War of 1812 but recalled upon the ending of that conflict in March 1815. In May 1815 the regiment was rushed to join with Wellington's army just before the
Battle of Waterloo commenced. Initially placed in reserve, they were later in the day moved to the centre of his line to a position near
La Haye Sainte. They held firm all day and helped drive off
Napoleon's final massed infantry attack, ultimately losing 170 killed or wounded, including their commanding officer Major Arthur Rowley Heyland. The regiment then formed part of the Army of Occupation until returning to England in April 1817.
The Victorian era In 1823 the regiment was dispatched in small detachments in convict ships to
New South Wales where it served at both
Sydney, and
Van Diemen's Land, where they participated in the
Black War. It was then transferred to
Bombay, with the first units of the 40th leaving Australia in 1828. While in India, the regiment was stationed in
Belgaum and then
Pune before moving to
Bombay. In January 1839 the regiment was sent to the
Sindh and took part in the capture of
Karachi. The regiment camped at
Quetta on their way to
Afghanistan where they experienced one of the worst out breaks of disease of any regiment of the British Army. It arrived in
Kandahar in October 1841 and then fought under General
William Nott at the
Battle of Kabul in August 1842 during the
First Anglo-Afghan War. The regiment returned to India in December 1842 and fought at the Battle of Maharajpore in December 1843 during the
Gwalior campaign. It returned to England in September 1845. The regiment returned to Australia in June 1852 and served in
Victoria where it suppressed the
Eureka Rebellion in December 1854. The regiment arrived home in August 1866 but returned to India in September 1872. As part of the
Cardwell Reforms of the 1870s, where single-battalion regiments were linked together to share a single depot and recruiting district in the United Kingdom, the 40th was linked with the
82nd Regiment of Foot (Prince of Wales's Volunteers), and assigned to district no. 14 at
Peninsula Barracks, Warrington. On 1 July 1881 the
Childers Reforms came into effect and the regiment amalgamated with the 82nd Regiment of Foot (Prince of Wales's Volunteers) to form the
Prince of Wales's Volunteers (South Lancashire Regiment). ==Uniforms==