22nd Dragoons

The 22nd Dragoons was a cavalry regiment of the British Army from 1940 to 1945. Motto - Nec Aspera Terrent.

[edit] History

The regiment was raised 1 December 1940 from a cadre of personnel taken from the 4th/7th Royal Dragoon Guards and 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards, and was assigned to 29th Armoured Brigade of 11th Armoured Division. It was later reassigned to 30th Armoured Brigade of the same division as part of a swap owing to the regimental loyalties of the Brigadiers commanding; this brigade was then transferred to the 42nd Armoured Division in 1942, and to 79th Armoured Division in 1943.

All three regiments of the 30th Armoured Brigade were re-equipped with flail tanks, modified M4 Sherman tanks with a large jib covered in chains attached to the front, intended for clearing a path through minefields at a top speed of one and a half miles per hour whilst flogging a path. Tanks thus equipped were often split up and used in large troop or squadron formations in support of organised set piece attacks rather than as organised formations.

As such, the regiment came ashore in the first wave of the Operation Overlord landings on the morning of 6 June 1944, with A Squadron, reinforced by 2 troops of C Squadron and supported by two troops of the Westminster Dragoons, landing on Sword Beach and B Squadron landing on Juno Beach. Later in the day the final two troops of C Squadron landed on Juno where they remained for several days on beach clearance. The regiment continued to see action sporadically once the beaches were cleared, fighting through Belgium and the Netherlands into Germany, where they were at the end of the war; the regiment was disbanded in Germany on 30 November 1945. The regiment was awarded the 10 maximum battle honours for operations in the North West Europe Theatre.

[edit] Further reading

Useful books include XXII Dragoons 1760-1945: The Story of a Regiment by Raymond Birt, Achtung! Minen! by Ian Hammerton, The Story of 79th Armoured Division by Anon., 79th Armoured Division Hobo's Funnies by Nigel Duncan, Vanguard of Victory - The 79th Armoured Division by David Fletcher, British Tanks in Normandy by Ludovic Fortin.

[edit] References

• 22nd Dragoons at regiments.org