Kenya Regiment

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Kenya Regiment was formed in 1937 and served until 1945 in Madagascar and Burma when it was disbanded. The recall of volunteers started again in about 1950 with European settlers making up the main force. At the end of 1950, a call-up of eighteen year olds was introduced as the rumblings from the Mau Mau was making its presence felt. The first recruits were sent to Salisbury in the former Southern Rhodesia for basic military training and then on to operational units.

The Kenya Regiment then operated as a part of combined operations, which included British Regiments, King's African Rifles, Kenya Police and Kenya Police Reserve, and the Royal Air Force. Apart from the Kenya Regiment operating in its own right, they were also instrumental in seconding Officers to the Kings African Rifles. The Kenya Regiment was disbanded in 1964.

[edit] References

• Guy Campbell The Charging Buffalo: A History of the Kenya Regiment 1937-1963 (London: Leo Cooper, 1986)
• Leonard Gill Military Musings (Victoria, BC: Trafford, 2003)
• Leonard Gill More Military Musings (Victoria, BC: Trafford, 2004)
• Leonard Gill Remembering the Regiment (Victoria, BC: Trafford, 2004)

(these three books by Gill are personal anecdotes relating to the Kenya Regiment, but given the relative scarcity of material on the Kenya Regiment they are a useful resource)