The Royal Dragoon Guards, formed in 1992 from the 4th/7th Royal Dragoon Guards and 5th Royal Inniskilling Dragoon Guards, has a proud history dating back to 1685: the Earl of Arran’s Regiment of Cuirassiers, the antecedents of the 4th (Royal Irish) Dragoon Guards and the Duke of Shrewsbury’s Regiment of Horse (5th Dragoon Guards) were raised during the Monmouth Rebellion. Along with Sir Albert Cunningham’s Regiment of Horse (latterly the 6th Inniskilling Dragoons) they fought together at the Battle of the Boyne.

These are regiments that have been present at some of the great battles and campaigns of history: Dettingen, Fontenoy, the Peninsula and Waterloo, where Inniskillings charged as part of the Union Brigade and are rumoured to have captured a French Eagle. At Balaklava, the Inniskillings and 4th Dragoon Guards took part in the far more successful, but less celebrated, ‘Charge of the Heavy Brigade’. All four regiments served during the Second Boer War, and it was the 4th Dragoon Guards that became the first members of the British Expeditionary Force to make contact with German troops in August 1914.

In this book, Anthony Dawson draws on archival material from the Regimental Collection, as well as diaries and letters, to give a vivid, personal account of this famous regiment.