E Battery Royal Horse Artillery

E Battery Royal Horse Artillery are a Close Support Battery of 1st Regiment Royal Horse Artillery It is currently based in Assaye Barracks in Tidworth Camp

Current Role

E Battery are currently a Close Support Battery and use the AS-90 Self-propelled artillery Guns.

History

Formation

• 1794 - E Battery Royal Horse Artillery was formed as E Troop on 1 November 1794.

19th century

• 1811 - E Troop saw action in the Peninsular War and also at the Battle of Waterloo. Between 1815 and 1856, the Troop saw service in England, Ireland and the Crimea. By this time E Troop had been renamed D Troop.
• 1877 - D Troop was re-designated as E Battery RHA.
• 1878 - E Battery deployed to the Second Afghan War followed by India

World War I

The 13-pounder gun that fired the first British artillery round on the Western front leaves the Imperial War Museum to take part in the unveiling of the Royal Artillery Memorial in October 1925

• 1914 - E Battery was sent to France as part of the BEF, equipped with QF 13-pounder guns.
• 1914 – At 0930 22 August northeast of Harmignies in Belgium, No. 4 gun of E Battery fired the first British artillery rounds on the Western Front in World War I,^[1] and E Battery went on to fight in nearly all the battles on the Western Front.
• 1926 – E Battery deployed to India

World War II

• 1938 – E Battery merged with the A Battery to form A/E Battery prior to the formation of 1 RHA
• 1939 – E Battery fought in Belgium and France, being evacuated from St Valery in June 1940.
• 1940 - E Battery deployed to the Western Desert. 1 RHA was reorganised as A Battery, B Battery and E Battery. The Battery saw action in every battle of the campaigns in the Western Desert and Italy up to 1945

Cold War

• 1946 - E Battery deployed to Egypt
• 1947 to 1946 – The Battery went to Palestine
• 1952 to 1965 - E Battery was stationed in Germany.
• 1965 – E Battery deployed to the Aden Protectorate

Recent and Current Conflicts

Persian Gulf War

• 1990 – The Battery provided soldiers for a combined A/B/E Battery and fought in the Gulf War
• 1992 - E Battery moved to Assaye Barracks in Tidworth Camp and converted to AS-90

Balkan Wars

• Late 1990s - E Battery deployed on three Balkan tours.
• 2001 –E Battery assisted the MAFF during the outbreak of Foot and Mouth Disease
• 2002 - While Gardiners Troop deployed to Northern Ireland with 1 RGJ, while other soldiers deployed to Kosovo with A Battery or B Battery to Bosnia.

Operation TELIC in Iraq

• 2004 – E Battery deployed on Operation Telic 4 to Basra, Iraq to train the Iraqi Border Police

Cyprus

• 2005 - E Battery deployed to Cyprus with UNFICYP

Afghanistan

2009 - E Battery deployed as part of OP Herrick 11

Future

Under the Army 2020 plan, it will re-role from a light gun battery to an AS-90 battery.^[2]

See also

• British Army
• Royal Artillery
• Royal Horse Artillery
• List of Royal Artillery Batteries

Notes and references

Bibliography

• Clarke, W.G. (1993). Horse Gunners: The Royal Horse Artillery, 200 Years of Panache and Professionalism. Woolwich: The Royal Artillery Institution. ISBN 09520762-0-9. 
• Farndale, General Sir Martin (1986). Western Front 1914-18. History of the Royal Regiment of Artillery. Woolwich: The Royal Artillery Institution. ISBN 1-870114-00-0. 

External links

• "1st Regiment Royal Horse Artillery". Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom). Retrieved 18 November 2015.