, founder of the Royal 22nd Regiment While the Royal 22e Régiment commemorates the history and traditions of the
Canadian Regiment of Fencible Infantry from the War of 1812 (also carrying resultant battle honours from the War of 1812), the modern ancestor of the regiment was formed in the early days of the
First World War as part of the
British Army, when volunteers from all over
Canada were being massed for training at
Valcartier, Québec, just outside Quebec City. The first contingent of 30,000 volunteers, which became the
1st Canadian Division of the
Canadian Expeditionary Force, were grouped into numbered battalions, regardless of origin. The existing reserve regiments were not mobilized, due to the belief of the
Defence Minister,
Sam Hughes, that a new "efficient" structure was required. Once again the new structure did not contain French-speaking units, such as those that had existed in the reserves. Over 1000 French-Canadian volunteers were scattered into different English-speaking units. This was not an oversight as Ontario (Hughes's political base) was in the process of outlawing both the teaching of French, as well as in the French language in their school system (
Regulation 17) The predictable outrage in French Canada created a lack of support for the war of "King and Country", perceived as a mechanism to entirely annihilate the Francophone community in Canada. The second contingent was more logically based on battalions raised and trained in the various military districts in which they were recruited, but remained using an impersonal numerical basis (with the exception of those with a Highland or Irish identity). Considerable political pressure in Quebec, along with public rallies, demanded the creation of French-speaking units to fight a war many viewed as being right and necessary, despite Regulation 17 in Ontario. communicated with Prime Minister
Robert Borden, leading to the creation of the
Royal 22e Régiment In September 1914, French Canadian pharmaceutical entrepreneur
Arthur Mignault communicated with Prime Minister
Robert Borden, advocating the formation of a solely French Canadian regiment. Mignault offered the government $50,000 to pursue this end. Borden had recently committed Canada to provide half a million soldiers to the
Allied cause, and was just realising how demanding it would be to honour this promise. Borden eagerly accepted Mignault's proposal and accordingly, on 14 October 1914, the
22nd Battalion (French Canadian), CEF, was authorized. Mignault participated in the recruitment campaign, which resulted in a remarkable success; the ranks of the battalion were filled in less than a month. Arthur Mignault is as such considered the founder of the 22nd regiment. The 22nd went to France as part of the 5th Canadian Brigade and the
2nd Canadian Division in September 1915, and fought with distinction in every major Canadian engagement until the end of the war. While other French speaking units were also created, they were all broken up upon arrival in France to provide reinforcements for the 22nd, which suffered close to 4000 wounded and killed in the course of the war. Two members of the 22nd were awarded the
Victoria Cross in that war, Lieutenant
Jean Brillant and Corporal
Joseph Kaeble. Marshal of France, presenting regimental colours to the Royal 22e Régiment on the
Plains of Abraham in Quebec City, 1921. This had been done at the request of Maréchal Foch who had been made honorary colonel of the regiment. in
Ottawa in 1927 After the war, the 22nd Battalion was disbanded on 20 May 1919, sharing the fate of other numbered battalions of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. However, in the post-war reorganizations of the army, public pressure, such as resolutions by the
Legislative Assembly of Quebec as well as the City Council of Quebec City, demanded that a permanent French-language unit be created in the peace-time Regular Force, and accordingly a new regiment was created, made up of veterans of the 22nd Battalion, on 1 April 1920. Initially the regiment, which was given the guard of the
Citadelle of Quebec, was simply the
22nd Regiment, but in June 1921 King
George V approved the renaming of it as
The Royal 22nd Regiment. In 1928, the anomaly of a French-language unit with an English name was resolved, and the regiment became the
Royal 22e Régiment in both languages. While in the Canadian Armed Forces, unit names are generally translated into the language of a text, traditional combat arms regiments are identified only in the single language of their troops, either English or French. However, the English version of the R22eR is still seen occasionally, but strictly speaking it is incorrect; only "Royal 22e Régiment" has been official in either language since 1928. In 1940, the regiment became the first Francophone Canadian unit to mount the
King's Guard in
London and was the first of the three current Regular Force infantry regiments to do so. in front of
Quebec City's City Hall, on 3 July 2006 In the
Second World War, the regiment was part of the 3rd Canadian Infantry Brigade and the
1st Canadian Infantry Division and was involved in intense combat in Italy, (where
Captain Paul Triquet earned the Victoria Cross) and later in the Netherlands and northwest Germany. During the
Korean War, 1951–1953, the regiment expanded to three battalions, each serving in turn as part of the Canadian brigade in the
1st Commonwealth Division. Thus the "Van Doos" represented one-third of Canada's infantry contingent throughout the war. During the
Cold War the regular battalions of the regiment served, in turn, in
West Germany as part of
4 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group, with the 1er Battalion serving permanently from 1967 until the withdrawal in 1993. The regiment also served during the
Oka Crisis. During the life of the
Canadian Airborne Regiment (1968–1995) the 1er Commando was manned as a French-speaking sub-unit by soldiers of the Royal 22nd Regiment. In the 1950s, the
Canadian Army promoted a scheme of administratively associating reserve infantry regiments with a regular one. Although this project did not make much progress in most of the army, three reserve regiments did join the Van Doos, becoming battalions of the Royal 22e Régiment: In the case of
Les Fusiliers du St-Laurent, the battalion designation was in a subsidiary title, but it became nevertheless, administratively, part of the Royal 22e Régiment. However, in 1968, Les Fusiliers du St-Laurent dropped the subsidiary title, and ended their administrative association with the R22eR. ==Operational history==