The Territorial and Reserve Forces Act 1907 (7 Edw. 7. c. 9) was an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that reformed the auxiliary forces of the British Army by transferring existing Volunteer and Yeomanry units into a new Territorial Force (TF); and disbanding the Militia to form a new Special Reserve of the Regular Army. This reorganisation formed a major part of the Haldane Reforms, named after the creator of the act, Richard Haldane.
The lessons learned during the South African War of 1899-1902 had reinforced the idea that the Regular Army was not capable of fighting a prolonged full-scale war without significant assistance; almost all regular units in the United Kingdom had been deployed overseas within four months of the outbreak of hostilities. Furthermore, by the end of the first year of fighting, the Regular Reserve and the Militia Reserve had been entirely exhausted. (Regular reservists were members of the Regular Army who had retired from the active-duty portion of their service but remained available for the callout. The Militia Reserve was a pool of individuals within the Militia, who accepted an overseas service liability).Dunlop. P 51 and 79 There had been no thought before the war about the wider use of auxiliary forces overseas; in the event, volunteers had been used on an ad-hoc basis, and a new auxiliary arm (the Imperial Yeomanry) was formed to provide specialist troops, but it was clear that a more effective system was required in future. A number of attempts at reform under the Conservative government of 1901-1905 had failed to make any lasting changes to the system and left the auxiliary forces disorganised and demoralised.
With the Liberal victory in December 1905, Haldane was appointed as Secretary of State for War, and immediately set about reforming the Army to best prepare it for an intervention in a European war. He decided on a regular Expeditionary Force and planned an auxiliary "Territorial Force", to provide a second line, together with an expanded reserve for the Regular Army. He put forward a draft bill in the winter of 1906, and ensured it would be in the government's legislative program for the coming year. He outlined his vision in a series of speeches culminating in his address on the Army Estimates in February 1907.Simkins P 12 In order to ensure his bill would pass without difficulty, he consulted privately with senior Army officers and the King, as well as the leader of the Opposition, to gain their support for the principles of the legislation.
Despite his efforts, several groups vocally opposed his approach: first, the National Service League, led by Field Marshal Lord Roberts, and backed by retired senior officers and some Conservative MPs. They argued that auxiliary forces would be ineffective against Continental armies, even, at one point, enlisting the support of the king.Dennis, P 26 At the same time, the Labour Party members generally opposed any increase in military strength.Simkins, P 14 Further opposition came from protagonists of the existing system, especially the militia. In the face of all these forces, Haldane made a series of last-minute changes to the bill when he presented it in March 1907, including restricting compulsory service to Home defence only.Dennis, P 13,14Campbell, P 277 Nevertheless, the structure remained much larger than was likely to be necessary for home defence and included all the supporting arms and services for the planned fourteen full divisionsCampbell, P 254 and he commented that 'they could go abroad if they wish.' The bill was put before the Commons on 4 March, then debated in late March and throughout April, where it received prolific but disorganised opposition, mainly from partisans of the existing system. It had its third reading in June, passing with a comfortable majority, and received royal assent in August; the act became effective immediately, though the bulk of its reforms were scheduled to begin on 1 April 1908.
The act was divided into three main sections; the first created "County Associations", which would be the local bodies which would administer and support the Territorial units - they would, however, have no military control over them when called out for service. The second section reformed the existing Volunteers and Yeomanry into the newly created Territorial Force, whilst the third dissolved the Militia and in its place created the Special Reserve, to be composed of men who had not previously served in the Regular Army.
Background and the need for reform
In 1899, with the outbreak of the South African War, the British Army was committed to its first large-scale overseas deployment since the 1850s. The intervening period had seen extensive redevelopments of the Regular Army.Dunlop, p. 3 The Cardwell Reforms of 1868–1872 had abolished the purchase of commissions, professionalising the officer corps, and reformed the system of enlistment so that recruits now served for six years with the colours and then a further six years liable for reserve service.Sheppard, p. 217 The new reserve system had been tested in the 1882 Anglo-Egyptian War (when reservists fought overseas for the first time) and during the Pendjeh Crisis, when the reserves of one cavalry regiment and fifteen infantry regiments, totalling 4,681 men, were mobilised.Dunlop, p. 7
The administrative structure of the Army had been further reinforced by the creation of regimental districts, where regular infantry regiments were paired together to share a depot and linked to the local militia and volunteer units. In the early 1880s, the next step was taken by the Childers Reforms, which formally amalgamated the regiments into a single two-battalion unit along with the militia and volunteers. This meant that, in general, one battalion of each infantry regiment was based at home with its depot and one was based overseas, which meant that roughly half the Regular Army was available in the United Kingdom for responding to any new overseas commitments.Sheppard, p. 218 It was estimated, by the "Stanhope Memorandum" of 1891, that a mobilisation of the whole Army would provide two full Army Corps of regular troops—with units reinforced individually by reservists—and a third composed partly of Regulars and partly of Militia, with the remaining auxiliary forces used for garrisons in fixed defences at the ports and around London.Dunlop, p.14
Status of the auxiliary forces in 1899 The regular units were supported by their own reserves, discussed above, and three "auxiliary forces"—the Militia, the Yeomanry, and the Volunteers. In the Militia, which was administered by the Regular Army, recruits drilled for six weeks on joining, and for one month a year thereafter, a period of time which was suited well to casual labourers or agricultural workers but was impractical for urban workers or skilled tradesmen.Dunlop, p. 44–5 Thirty to forty percent of recruits were young men who passed into the Regular Army, and only twenty percent served their full six-year service.Dunlop, p.48 All militiamen over 19 could join the Militia Reserve, accepting the liability to serve overseas with the regular army in case of war if called on to do so: in 1898, this reserve exceeded its establishment of 30,000 by 1,049 men.Dunlop, p.51 The force came to 123 battalions of infantry, 32 brigades of coastal artillery, and little else; there was a small group of fortress engineers and a medical staff of about 600 men, but no service arms.Dunlop, p.43 If the members of a battalion volunteered for overseas service it could be sent overseas as a unit—several had done during the Crimean War, serving as colonial garrisons—but the Militia as a whole was effectively little more than a collection of independent units and not a serviceable home defence force.Dunlop, p.52
The second element of the auxiliary forces was the Yeomanry, 38 regiments of volunteer cavalry which had historically been used as a form of internal security police, deployed to suppress local riots and provide a show of force to support the authorities. Recruits to the force were usually personally wealthy, providing their own horses and uniforms, and units were often heavily bankrolled by their senior officers. Training requirements were low, with an annual eight-day camp.Dunlop, p.52–5 The regiments were liable to be called out for defence against an invasion or an insurrection,Dunlop, p. 52–3 and were not prepared for effective mobilisation; the units possessed no transport resources, or even a designated quartermaster.Dunlop, p.55
The third arm was the Volunteers, mainly drawn from small businessmen, artisans, and professionals; they were predominantly urban middle-class units, training at weekends and with no annual camp.Dunlop, p.62 There were 213 rifle corps and 66 corps of artillery, though the latter were mostly coastal artillery or static "position batteries" equipped with unwieldy 40-pounder guns, and they did not constitute an organised field force.Dunlop, p.64 There were some engineer and medical units, but no service corps. The status of the volunteer units was further complicated by their origins as private societies; they received some central funding, but were mostly supported by local subscriptions and the generosity of their commanders.Dunlop, p.65
Effects of the South African War
The reforms had ensured that a sizable force of regular troops was based in the United Kingdom for service as an expeditionary force, over and above the troops already stationed overseas. However, once the decision was taken to send a corps-size field force to fight in the South African War, the system began to show a strain. Three divisions were earmarked for deployment in October 1899, and 25,000 men were mobilised from the reserve to reinforce them; however, regulations of the time held that men under twenty should not be sent overseas, so the reservists had to replace underage or otherwise ineffective soldiers as well as filling the existing gaps. In some units, this meant reservists made up over 50% of the battalion strength; throughout the force, 36.5% of men were listed as unfit for foreign service. When the force sailed, 20,000 of the 47,000 men were reservistsDunlop, p.73 The field force, augmented by an additional brigade of infantry at the last minute, totalled three divisions; a fourth was organised in early November, and a fifth at the end of the month. A sixth was mobilised on 14 December, which completed the two corps originally planned as an expeditionary force,Dunlop, p.74 and after a brief panic in mid-December a seventh was dispatched at the end of January, leaving the country virtually empty of regular troops.Dunlop, p.76
This was the end of the planned mobilisation; no thought had been given pre-war to mobilising the Militia, Yeomanry or Volunteers as formed units for foreign service.Dunlop, p. 71 43,000 reservists had been sent overseas with the regular forces—out of a total of 80,000—with the remainder sent overseas as reinforcements and replacements over the first year of the war. The conventional system of posting reservists to their own regiment worked until April 1900, after which it became sometimes necessary to post reservists to different regiments due to heavy losses, and by September 1900 this system had broken down entirely, with the reserves entirely exhausted of men.Dunlop, p.79