Colonel David Maitland Titterton, Chairman of The Combined Irish Regiments Association pictured with members of The Royal Munster Fusiliers Association on his recent visit to Cork
The Royal Munster Fusiliers was a regular infantry regiment of the British Army. One of eight Irish regiments raised largely in Ireland, it had its home depot in Tralee. It was originally formed in 1881 by the amalgamation of two regiments of the former East India Company. It served in India and in the Great War. Following establishment of the independent Irish Free State in 1922, the five regiments that had their traditional recruiting grounds in the counties of the new state were disbanded. The regiment won three Victoria Crosses in the Great War.
Its historic background goes back as far as 1652, before it was reformed as part of a reorganisation of the army in 1881, from the 101st Regiment of Foot (Royal Bengal Fusiliers) and 104th Regiment of Foot (Bengal Fusiliers) and the Militia of Munster. Both the fusilier regiments had originated as “European” regiments of the East India Company (also known as “John Company”) and transferred to the British Army in 1861 when the British Crown took control of the company’s private army after the Indian Rebellion of 1857. There followed the localisation of recruiting districts in England between 1873 and 1874 under the Cardwell Reforms. Five of the European infantry battalions were given Irish territorial titles under the Childers Reforms of 1881. The first and second Royal Munster Fusiliers battalions were the former Bengal Fusilier regiments, the higher number battalions were the militia units. The Reforms linked regiments to recruiting areas – in this case the counties of Clare, Cork, Kerry, and Limerick. Militarily, the whole of Ireland was administered as a separate command with Command Headquarters at Parkgate (Phoenix Park) Dublin, directly under the War Office in London. The regimental/HQ depot was located at Tralee, co. Kerry.