Hon JW Fortescue
According to the dedication The Regiment was raised in 1759 in honour of General Wolfe who, in that same year, had died in the moment of victory over the French of wounds received at Quebec on the Plains of Abraham. This history takes the story of the 17th Lancers from 1759 to 1894. Originally designated 18th Light Dragoons the number was changed to 17th in 1763, to 3rd three years later and back to 17th three years after that. Finally, in 1822 the designation ’Light Dragoons’ was changed to ’Lancers.’For the first fifteen or so years of its existence the Regiment served at home, six years of that time in Ireland from where, in 1775, they embarked for Boston, the first cavalry regiment selected for service in America and where it first saw action in the War of Independence. Eight years later, 1783, the Regiment returned to Ireland. There followed a short spell (two years) in the West Indies and in 1806/7 the Regiment took part in the ill-fated expedition to S America.They had hardly got back from S America (January 1808) when they were sent off to India (February 1808) where they served for the next fifteen years during which time they saw action in the Pindari War which lasted some two years. During its time in India the 17th, which arrived in Calcutta in 1808 790 strong, lost 26 officers and 796 men from disease and climatic conditions alone while it had received 929 officers and men in the same period. The next major campaign was the Crimea in which the Regiment took part in the famous charge of the Light Brigade; three VCs were awarded for gallantry during the campaign. The Regiment arrived back in Ireland in May 1856 and in November the following year it sailed for India among the reinforcements sent out in response to the crisis caused by the Indian Mutiny; another VC was won. Apart from the descriptions of the Regiment in action there is a good deal of domestic interest such as rates of pay, clothing scales, ration scales and two excellent appendices to close the record: one is a complete list of officers shown on a year by year basis from 1759 to 1894, the other is the itinerary of the Regiment from 1759.
