12th Lancers

The 12th Lancers was a Cavalry Regiment that would have had an MG Section as part of its Regimental Headquarters.

Prior to the start of the Great War, Lieutenant BG Nicholas of the regiment was one of the first members of the British Army to attend, and qualify from, a Vickers Gun course run – the 53rd Qualifying Machine Gun Course – by the School of Musketry at Hythe between 29 January and 20 February 1914.

Great War

As a unit of the 5th Cavalry Brigade, 2nd Cavalry Division, it will have taken part in the following battles and engagements.

1914
12 to 15 September	BATTLE OF THE AISNE
12 October to 02 November	Battle of Messine [Cav. Corps].
BATTLES OF YPRES
30 and 31 October	Battle of Gheluvelt (3rd Cav. Bde. and part of 4th and 5th Cav. Bdes.) [I. Corps].
1915
10 to 12 March	Battle of Neuve Chappelle (5th Cav. Bde.) [In Reserve to First Army].
BATTLES OF YPRES
26 April to 03 May	Battle of St. Julien [Plumer’s Force, Second Army].
24 and 25 May	Battle of Bellewaarde Ridge [V. Corps, Second Army].

The MG Section was brigaded into the 5th Cavalry MG Squadron on 26 February 1916.

Inter-War Period

In 1922, the Machine Gun Corps was disbanded and the guns returned to the Cavalry Regiment as a Machine Gun Platoon and then formed as a Machine Gun Company in the early 1930s.

This remained until the formation of Divisional Machine Gun Battalions in 1936 where guns were brigaded once again. As Cavalry regiments were largely mechanised, their use would have been as per the Royal Armoured Corps and Tank Regiment.

After mechanisation, tradesmen of the 12th Lancers wore an Armoured Car badge as skill-at-arms insignia.