Argyll Fans !

[Lachlan09]

An interesting thing about WW1. I’m not sure if you’re aware, but there is a rule of thumb for working out which division a brigade belonged to. Divide by 3 and the resulting number gives you the middle brigade of the division. For example, 153 Bde, divided by 3 gives you 51st Division. As middle brigade, the other brigades are 152 and 154. It works a treat, but not so much in WW2, where brigades were sometimes re-assigned to other divisions eg 227 Highland Bde went to 15th Scottish Div in 1943, whereas the 15th’s original brigades were 44, 45, 46.

But even for WW1, this system gives a logic flaw. If you accept consecutive brigades grouped in threes into divisions, then 1,2,3 Bdes should be 1st Div, 4,5,6 Bdes are 2nd Div which means the last brigade is the multiplier, so 51st Div should be 151, 152 and 153. Where’s the glitch ?

I pondered this many times until I researched WW1 divisions brigade by brigade at various points in the war. The odd man out which throws off this multiplier system is 19 Bde. The original BEF of August 1914 had 6 regular infantry divisions formed pre-war. Their brigades were numbers 1 – 18 as you would logically expect. The BEF’s LOC battalions, including the 2nd Batt A&SH, were not grouped into a numbered sub-formation, but were collectively referred to as LOC Troops. However, at Le Cateau on 27th August, the LOC battalions formed a valuable rearguard. They were afterward formed officially into 19 Brigade, unattached.

As further regular units started to be recalled from the Empire and were about to form 7th and 8th Divisions, 19 Bde in France became attached to 6th Div, which now had 4 brigades instead of the usual 3. That meant that 7th Division’s brigades would now be numbered 20, 21 and 22, the middle brigade defining the divisional number.