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The Mercian Regiment

Battalions 1 MERCIAN Cheshire 2 MERCIAN Worcesters and Foresters 3 MERCIAN Staffordshire 4 MERCIAN TA

The Mercian Regiment is comprised of former county Regiments and their past antecedent Regiments. The Regiment was formed from The Cheshire, Worcestershire & Sherwood Foresters, Staffordshire and West Midlands & Kings Cheshire Regiments. The Battalions still aim to recruit soldiers from these traditional recruiting areas meaning that soldiers can live, train and fight beside other soldiers who are from the same cities and towns as they are, while still meeting new soldiers from across the whole Mercia region. The Regiment also has a strong history of volunteers and this continues today with The 4th Battalion Mercian Regiment.

The Cheshire’s had given over 300 years uninterrupted service to the Crown and was England's oldest unmerged county infantry regiment. The 22nd of Foot was raised on the Roodee in Chester (now the Race Course) in 1689 by Henry, Duke of Norfolk. It was initially known by his name, and then the names of successive Colonels until becoming the 22nd of Foot in 1751.

After World War II, infantry regiments were reduced from two regular battalions to one. The 1st was placed in suspended animation and the 2nd took its title and Colours. The Territorials were reduced to two Battalions, the 4th and the 7th. The 6th was disbanded and the 5th placed in suspended animation. With the formation of the Territorial Army Volunteer Reserve, the 4th and 7th were joined to become the 4th/7th Battalion. Even this disappeared in 1971. The Regular Battalion has, since the war, served in Palestine, Egypt, Cyprus, (UN Peace Keeping Force), Malaya, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bahrain, Belize, Berlin (twice), Germany (thrice), Northern Ireland (three residential tours and six roulement tours) and in various barracks in the UK. In 1986-88 it mounted Queen's Guard and other public duties in London, based at Caterham. In late 1988 it returned to The Dale, Chester, to celebrate the tercentenary on the Roodee in 1989. Under threat of amalgamation it exchanged tours with the Staffords to get a last visit to Germany. The ensuing and successful tour in Bosnia under UN auspices positively helped to save the Regiment from amalgamation until 2007.

2 MERCIAN was formed on the 1 September 2007 from the 1st Battalion, The Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment (WFR). Worcesters and Foresters. The first of the regiments to form the WFR was raised in 1694 by Colonel Farrington which later became 29th Regiment of Foot. In time, other midlands regiments would merge to form the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters in 1970.

The history of the Sherwood Foresters Regiment (WFR) in the Great War is very much the story of the men of the counties of Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire. When war was declared, The Sherwood Foresters consisted of eight battalions and a depot in Derby. During the war the Regiment expanded to a maximum of 33 battalions, of which 20 served overseas. Altogether, some 140,000 men, nearly all from Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, served in the Regiment - 11,409 of whom did not return.

3 MERCIAN was formed on 1 September 2007 from the 1st Battalion, The Staffordshire Regiment. The first of the regiments to form the Staffords was raised in 1705 by Colonel Lillingston in Lichfield, which later became the 38th Regiment of Foot. The history of the regiments that formed 3 Mercian is firmly rooted in Staffordshire and the West Midlands. In 1782, to encourage recruiting, regiments were for the first time given territorial titles. The 38th became the 1st Staffordshire and the 64th the 2nd Staffordshire, and they soon started to wear the Stafford Knot. Both Regiments spent much of the 19th century in defence of the ever expanding British Empire. Many of the actions were small, local skirmishes, but others were of greater importance.

In 1871, Lord Cardwell passed 'The Regularisation of the Forces Act (1871)'. Under this Act the country was divided into local regimental districts. This was based on county boundaries and population density. Then single battalion regiments were merged into two battalion regiments sharing depot facilities and associated recruiting areas. The reasoning behind these reforms was that while one battalion was serving overseas, the other battalion would be garrisoned at home for training. The militia of that area would then usually become the third battalion of that particular regiment. The other significant changes of the Act of 1871 were the abolition of selling or buying a commission. The local regiments were reformed as follows; the 38th and the 80th were linked and the 64th and the 98th were also linked. This was followed in 1881 by the 38th and 80th becoming the 1st and 2nd Battalions the South Staffordshire Regiment, while the 64th and the 98th became the 1st and 2nd Battalions the Prince of Wales's (North Staffordshire) Regiment.

Events converted the settlements of the Saxons in Britain from a portion of the Roman empire into seven Saxon monarchies, which have been called the Heptarchy. When the Saxons arrived in this island, they were all pagans and idolaters. It was not until they had been established in their separate states for more than a hundred years that they began to be instructed in the Christian religion. The kingdom of Mercia was bounded on the north by the Humber, by which it was separated from Northumberland: on the west by the Severn, beyond which were the Britons or Welsh: on the south by the Thames, by which it was separated from the kingdoms of Kent, Sussex and Wessex: and on the east by the kingdoms of Essex and East Anglia. Thus Mercia was guarded on three sides, by three large rivers, that ran into the sea, and served for a boundary to all the other kingdoms. Hence the name of Mercia, from the Saxon word Merc, which signifies a bound, and not, as some fancy, from an imaginary river, named Mercia.

The inhabitants of this kingdom are sometimes termed by historians, Mediterranei Angli, or the Midland English; and sometimes South-Humbrians, as being south of the Humber: but the most common name is that of Mercians. The principal cities of Mercia were Lincoln, Nottingham, Warwick, Leicester, Coventry, Lichfield, Northampton, Worcester, Gloucester, Derby, Chester, Shrewsbury, Stafford, Oxford, Bristol.* Of all the kingdoms of the Heptarchy, this was the finest and most considerable. Its length was a hundred and sixty miles, and its greatest breadth about one hundred.

Crida was the first king of Mercia. He was the tenth in descent from Whethelgeat, the third son of Woden. He landed in England in 584, and was crowned in the same or the following year. He was an illustrious prince, and reigned thirty-three years. After the death of Crida, an interregnum took place. Ethelbert, king of Kent, made himself master of Mercia, which he subsequently restored to Wibba the son of Crida, but reserved to himself some rights of sovereignty.—Wibba died in 615. He left a son called Penda, but Ethelbert placed Ceorl or Ceorlus, the cousin or nephew of Wibba, upon the throne. On the death of Ethelbert, Ceorl delivered Mercia from the dominion of the Kentish monarchs. He died in 624, and was succeeded by Penda, the heroic son of Wibba.

Godiva, the grandmother of Editha, appears to have been sister of the first Queen of Ethelred the Unready; both were daughters of Earl Thorold, Sheriff of Lincolnshire, the founder of Spalding Abbey. Leofric was a warlike and powerful chief, who, in 1057, led an army in defence of Ethelred against the Danish King, Sweyn. The great wealth and power of Leofric, and the liberality of both himself and his wife Godiva to the Church, secured them the good repute of the monkish chroniclers. Perhaps the legendary tale of Godiva's ride through the silent streets of Coventry is not altogether a poet's fiction: the manners of the time were still rude and coarse, and a penance of any sort for the good of the Church was considered a worthy act.