The 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division was an infantry division of the British Army's Territorial Army (TA) that was formed in 1920 and existed through the Second World War, although it did not see combat. The division had originally been raised in 1908 as the West Lancashire Division, part of the British Army's Territorial Force (TF). It fought in the First World War, as the 55th (West Lancashire) Division, and demobilised following the fighting. In 1920, the 55th (West Lancashire) Division started to reform. It was stationed in the county of Lancashire throughout the 1920s and 1930s, and was under-funded and under-staffed. In the late 1930s, the division was reduced from three to two infantry brigades and gave up some artillery and other support units to become a motorised formation, the 55th (West Lancashire) Motor Division. This was part of a British Army doctrine change that was intended to increase battlefield mobility.
Following the German occupation of Czechoslovakia, the division created new units around cadres of its own personnel, a process called "duplicating". The division then used these new formations to create its "duplicate", the 59th (Staffordshire) Motor Division. The 55th remained in the United Kingdom, in a defensive role, after the outbreak of the Second World War. In 1940, following the Battle of France, the motor division concept was abandoned. The division regained its third infantry brigade, and became the 55th (West Lancashire) Infantry Division. It remained within the United Kingdom, training for future operations as well as training replacements for combat units, and assigned to anti-invasion duties. By 1944, the division had been drained of many of its assets. The remnant of the division was used in Operation Fortitude, a deception effort that supported the Allied invasion of France. At the end of the war, the division was demobilised and not reformed.
Background The West Lancashire Division was formed in 1908, following the passing of the Territorial and Reserve Forces Act 1907 that created the Territorial Force (TF). The division was broken up between 1914 and 1915, to provide reinforcements for the British Expeditionary Force that was fighting in France during the First World War. It was reformed as the 55th (West Lancashire) Division in late 1915, deployed to the Western Front and fought during the Battles of the Somme, Passchendaele, and Estaires, and took part in the Hundred Days Offensive. During two years of war, 63,923 men served in the division, over half becoming casualties. Following the end of the war, in 1918, and through 1919, the division was demobilised. In April 1920, the division started the process of reforming in Lancashire, as part of Western Command. In 1921, the TF was reconstituted as the Territorial Army (TA) following the passage of the Territorial Army and Militia Act 1921.
Interwar period The 55th (West Lancashire) Division was headquartered and primarily based in Liverpool, although it had units throughout Lancashire. At various times units were located in Chester, Lancaster, Lichfield, Seaforth, Southport, and Warrington. and The division was reformed with the 164th (North Lancashire), the 165th (Liverpool), and the 166th (South Lancashire and Cheshire) Infantry Brigades. On 19 July 1924, the division was reviewed by George V, during a visit to Liverpool. During the interwar period, TA formations and units were only permitted to recruit up to 60 per cent of their establishment. Due to chronic underfunding, the lack of a pressing national threat, and a diminished level of prestige associated with serving in the TA, it was rare for units to reach even this level of manpower. By the 1930s, this resulted in the TA having limited access to modern equipment, under-trained men, and officers with inadequate experience in command.
Motor division The development of British military doctrine during the interwar period resulted in three types of division by the end of the 1930s: the infantry division; the mobile division (later called the armoured division); and the motor division. Historian David French wrote "the main role of the infantry ... was to break into the enemy's defensive position." This would then be exploited by the mobile division, followed by the motor divisions that would "carry out the rapid consolidation of the ground captured by the mobile divisions" therefore "transform[ing] the 'break-in' into a 'break-through'." French wrote that the motor division had a similar role to the German Army's motorised and light divisions, "but there the similarities ended." German motorised divisions contained three regiments (akin to a British brigade) and were equipped similarly to a regular infantry division, while their smaller light divisions contained a tank battalion. The British motor division, while being fully motorised and capable of transporting all their infantry, was "otherwise much weaker than normal infantry divisions" or their German counterparts as it was made up of only two brigades, had two artillery regiments as opposed to an infantry division's three, and contained no tanks.
In 1938, the army decided to create six motor divisions from TA units. Only three infantry divisions were converted before the war, including the 55th (West Lancashire). This resulted in the removal of infantry and artillery elements from the division. Many of the division's battalions were converted to new roles, and transferred to other branches of the army. For example: the 6th Liverpool Rifles were retrained and transferred to the Royal Engineers (RE), becoming the 38th (The King's Regiment) Anti-Aircraft Battalion, RE; the 5th King's Own Royal Regiment (Lancaster) was converted to artillery, becoming the 56th (King's Own) Anti-Tank Regiment, Royal Artillery; the 7th King's Regiment (Liverpool) became the 40th (The King's) Royal Tank Regiment. The division retained three brigades until March 1939, when the 164th Brigade was disbanded, bringing the division into line with the intention of the new organisation. Now the 55th (West Lancashire) Motor Division, it comprised the 165th (Liverpool) and the 166th (South Lancashire and Cheshire) Infantry Brigades.
Rearmament
During the 1930s, tensions increased between Germany and the United Kingdom and its allies. In late 1937 and throughout 1938, German demands for the annexation of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia led to an international crisis. To avoid war, the British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met with German Chancellor Adolf Hitler in September and brokered the Munich Agreement. The agreement averted a war and allowed Germany to annexe the Sudetenland. Although Chamberlain had intended the agreement to lead to further peaceful resolution of issues, relations between the two countries soon deteriorated. On 15 March 1939, Germany breached the terms of the agreement by invading and occupying the remnants of the Czech state.
On 29 March, British Secretary of State for War Leslie Hore-Belisha announced plans to increase the TA from 130,000 to 340,000 men and double the number of TA divisions. The plan was for existing TA divisions, referred to as the first-line, to recruit over their establishments (aided by an increase in pay for Territorials, the removal of restrictions on promotion which had hindered recruiting, construction of better-quality barracks and an increase in supper rations) and then form a new division, known as the second-line, from cadres around which the new divisions could be expanded. This process was dubbed "duplicating". The 55th (West Lancashire) Motor Division provided cadres to create a second line "duplicate" formation, which became the 59th (Staffordshire) Motor Division. By September, the 55th (West Lancashire) Motor Division had also reformed the 164th Brigade. Despite the intention for the army to grow, the programme was complicated by a lack of central guidance on the expansion and duplication process and a lack of facilities, equipment and instructors. In April 1939, limited conscription was introduced. At that time 34,500 men, all aged 20, were conscripted into the regular army, initially to be trained for six months before being deployed to the forming second line units. It had been envisioned by the War Office that the duplicating process and recruiting the required numbers of men would take no more than six months. The process varied widely between the TA divisions. Some were ready in weeks while others had made little progress by the time the Second World War began on 1 September.
Second World War Home defence
On 4 September, the division established the second line duplicate of the 166th Brigade, the 177th. On 15 September, the 166th Infantry Brigade (renamed the 176th Infantry Brigade) and the 177th Brigade were transferred to the 59th (Staffordshire) Motor Division. This left the 55th (West Lancashire) Motor Division with the 164th and 165th Brigades. The former consisted of the 9th Battalion, King's Regiment (Liverpool), the 1/4th Battalion, the South Lancashire Regiment, and the 2/4th Battalion, South Lancashire Regiment. The 165th Brigade was made up of the 5th Battalion, King's Regiment (Liverpool), and the 1st and the 2nd Battalions, Liverpool Scottish (Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders). Major-General Vivian Majendie was the division's general officer commanding (GOC), and had been in command since 1938.
The division's initial war-time duties included deploying guards to the docks at Birkenhead, the Port of Liverpool, and the naval defences at Crosby, while also assisting the civilian authorities during air raids. On 6 September, the division fired its first shots of the war. Divisional anti-aircraft and machine guns fired on three aircraft flying low over the River Mersey. The shots missed, and the aircraft were later determined to be Royal Air Force Handley Page Hampden bombers.
The war deployment plan for the TA envisioned its divisions being sent overseas, as equipment became available, to reinforce the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) that had already been dispatched to Europe. The TA would join regular army divisions in waves as its divisions completed their training, the final divisions deploying a year after the war began. In October 1939, the Commander-in-Chief, Home Forces, General Walter Kirke, was tasked with drawing up a plan, codenamed Julius Caesar, to defend the United Kingdom from a potential German invasion. As part of this plan, the division was assigned to Home Forces' reserve. It was transferred to Northern Command and moved to Charnwood Forest in Leicestershire. Here the division furthered its training, while also having to be ready to act as a counter-attack force for Julius Caesar in case of a German invasion between the Humber and The Wash. Other duties included the protection of RAF Finningley.