Glorious Glosters in merger (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Glorious Glosters in merger

THE Glorious Glosters were consigned to history this week following a controversial shake-up of infantry regiments across the country.

Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon confirmed the renowned regiment, which has already been merged several times in the past, will combine with another battalion.

The Gloster element of the Royal Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment (RGBW), which was formed ten years ago, will be absorbed into the Devonshire and Dorset Regiment to form a three-battalion regiment.

In turn, the remaining Berkshire and Wiltshire components will be merged with the Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment within the Queen's Division. RGBW clerk John Shires said: "We are devastated - we didn't expect this at all.

"People do adapt to new things and nobody is against the large regiment system, but our regiment will be disbanded.

"Normally it's an amalgamation where you can keep traditions but we are splitting as far as we are concerned.

Everybody knows everybody in our regiment and when you are fighting or training you want somebody there who you know."

Before Mr Hoon announced the infantry changes in the House of Commons, Lt-Col Nick Welch, commanding officer of 1RGBW, made his feelings on the issue known on the regiment website by encouraging people to write to their local MP and voice their disapproval of the current situation.

He made it absolutely clear he was against the dispersal of RGBW manpower into three different directions, but rather preferred a complete amalgamation with the Devonshire and Dorset Regiment.

He wrote: "Such action would destroy over 300 years of history and provide no future for those serving in the present regiment. It would also sever a long history of close links with the communities of those counties."

Nevertheless, Mr Hoon did offer hope that the regiment's historic back badge, which was won during the Napoleonic Wars, might be saved.

However, all the new multi-battalion regiments will have a single cap badge, seen by commanders as an important unifying factor in achieving a sense of identity for the new regiments.

Mr Hoon said: "These plans will make the army more robust and resilient, able to deploy, support and sustain the enduring expeditionary operations that are essential for a more complex and uncertain world."

However, Cotswold MP Geoffrey Clifton-Brown has vehemently condemned the plans.

He said: "Losing the name of the local regiment after a long history of valiant service is nothing short of a disgrace."

Mr Hoon said the new-look infantry structure would be in place by 2008.

THE Royal Gloucestershire, Berkshire and Wiltshire Regiment was formed in 1994 from the Gloucestershire Regiment and the Duke of Edinburgh's Royal Regiment, whose 300-year history and traditions it inherited.

It has gained 209 battle honours, 16 Victoria Crosses and one George Cross, and in more recent years has completed demanding and successful tours in Northern Ireland, Bosnia and Kosovo.

However, it was during the Korean War of the 1950s that the Gloucestershire Regiment became known as the Glorious Glosters. The first battalion of the regiment landed in Korea as part of a United Nations peacekeeping force in 1950.

The following year the Glosters was instrumental during the Battle of Imjin River, which has gone down in history as a gallant English victory.

They held the might of the Chinese army at bay for days, and the battle was considered to be a turning point in the war. With the Chinese army halted, the United Nations forces were able to regroup.