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Naval Brigade
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A Naval Brigade is a large temporary detachment of Royal Marines and of seamen from the Royal Navy formed to undertake operations on shore, particularly during the mid- to late-19th century. Seamen were specifically trained in land-based warfare at the gunnery school at HMS Excellent in Portsmouth.
The Royal Navy did not fight any ship-to-ship actions in the period from 1850 to 1914, so, for much of that period, its only active service was on shore, through Naval Brigades formed from the men aboard its vessels. Naval Brigades were used in engagements including:
- the Burma Wars (1824-85)
- the Crimean War (1854-6)
- the Second Opium War (1856-60)
- the Indian Mutiny (1857-9)
- the Maori Wars (1860-4)
- the Bombardment of Kagoshima and the Battle of Shimonoseki (1863-64)
- the Abyssinian expedition (1867-8)
- the Second Ashanti War (1873-4)
- the Zulu War (1879)
- the Transvaal War (1881)
- the 1882 Anglo-Egyptian War
- the Anglo-Sudanese War (1884-5)
- the Boer War (1899-1900)
- the Boxer Rebellion in China (1900)
The field gun competition commemorates the participation of a Naval Brigade in the relief of Ladysmith during the Boer War, when 12-pounder guns from HMS Terrible and HMS Powerful were dragged across almost 200 miles of rough terrain from Durban in October 1899.
A Royal Naval Division, later designated the 63rd (Royal Naval) Division, was formed in the First World War, to make use of surplus reserves of the Royal Navy who were not required at sea. It included two Naval Brigades and a brigade of Royal Marines, and fought in the defence of Antwerp in 1914, the Battle of Gallipoli in 1915, and the Battle of the Somme in 1916. Few naval personnel remained in the Division by July 1916, and it was redesignated as the 63rd Division. The division was demobilised in April 1919.