News

News

HRH takes the salute at the formation parade of The Mercian Regiment

31st August 2007

The Prince of Wales praised the valour of service personnel deployed overseas today during a ceremony to merge three historic British Army regiments.

Hundreds of current and former soldiers attended the event at Tamworth Castle in Staffordshire, which marked the formation of the new Mercian Regiment.

In a speech to mark the occasion His Royal Highness, who is a General in the British Army, told soldiers bathed in bright sunshine on the castle's parade ground, that he had no doubt that they would "stand firm and strike hard" in their new unit.

Today's ceremony saw the formal "re-badging" of the Cheshire Regiment, the Staffordshire Regiment, the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters and their associated Territorial Army battalion.

The Prince, the Colonel-in-Chief of the Cheshire Regiment and of the Mercians, said: "This solemn and historic occasion will mark the start of another chapter in the long story of loyal service to the Crown that is the history of the English county regiments.

"I have no doubt that the Mercian Regiment will stand firm and strike hard just as its predecessor regiments did in all four corners of the world."

He added: "The Mercian Regiment is being born in an era when the British Army is displaying daily the very best qualities of bravery, loyalty and dogged perseverance in the most impossible and dangerous circumstances.

"I have nothing but the most profound admiration for the sheer resilience being displayed by all our people on operations, we must never take it for granted."

The Prince also presented service medals and commendations to a number of soldiers during the parade, after which serving soldiers and ex-servicemen paraded through the centre of Tamworth.

The three regular Army units which merging today are: the 22nd (Cheshire) Regiment, which will become 1st Battalion (Cheshires) the Mercian Regiment; the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters Regiment, which will become 2nd Battalion (Worcesters and Foresters) the Mercian Regiment; and the Staffordshire Regiment, which will become 3rd Battalion (Staffords) the Mercian Regiment.

Additionally, the Territorial Army's West Midland Regiment will become 4th Battalion the Mercian Regiment.

One of the units, the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters, also performed a similar ceremony at their base in Lashkar Gar, Afghanistan, earlier today.

The regiments which have been merged first fought alongside each other during the American War of Independence and trace their history back to various units associated with the counties of Cheshire, Derbyshire, Nottinghamshire, Staffordshire and Worcestershire.

Click here to read The Prince's speech.
Click here to find out more about The Prince's role in the Armed Services.
Click here to find out more about The Prince's regiments.