Derbyshire Yeomanry

The Derbyshire Yeomanry’s first oversees posting was to Egypt, they arrived in Alexandria in April 1915 and spent the next few months at Cairo and Suez. In August 1915 two Squadrons were temporarily converted to infantry battalions and sent to Gallipoli. In October one squadron left Gallipoli for Salonika with the 10th Irish Division, where they took part in the battle of Kosturino and the retreat back to Salonika. The other squadron returned to Alexandria in November, before the whole regiment was reunited in Salonika in February 1916. The Derbyshire Yeomanry were immediately employed on patrol out towards Dorain and in the Struma valley, where they began to come into contact with German and Bulgarian patrols.

Image - a yeomanry patrol passes through a village in the Struma valley

The 1916 army reorganisation led to the Yeomanry units being removed from the divisions and attached to Corps, the Derbys joining XVI Corps in the Struma Valley. The Struma valley formed a wide no man’s land with the British main defensive lines in the foothills on the western edge and the Bulgarian lines on the eastern edge, at places the valley is seven miles wide. The Derbyshire Yeomanry worked tirelessly through 1916, 1917 and into 1918, supporting infantry actions to take strategic villages in the valley, patrolling the out-post line and keeping the villages clear, frequently running into enemy patrols and harassed by snipers and artillery fire. In September of 1918 the Derbys received orders to move to the Doiran sector of the line. When the Bulgarians began to withdraw after the second battle of Doiran the Derbys were ordered to pursue. The Derbys harassed the retreating Bulgarians back through the Kosturino pass and were pursuing them down the Strumica valley when the armistice with Bulgaria was signed.