page_title: Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps
section_title: Second World War
hierarchical_section_title: Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps / Second World War
caption_attribution_description: English: The plaque commemorating the Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps (BVRC), original occupants of the Armoury Building, located at 37 Reid Street, in the City of Hamilton, in Pembroke Parish, Bermuda. The BVRC, raised in 1894, was reduced to a skeleton staff in 1946, following the Second World War. It was brought up to strength again in 1951, and re-titled the Bermuda Rifles. Although it remained a part-time Territorial Army (TA) unit, conscription (which had previously only existed during the duration of the Second World War) was reintroduced to make up a shortfall of volunteers. It would be amalgamated with the Bermuda Militia Artillery to form the Bermuda Regiment in 1965. The Armoury Building, and the other drill halls of the BVRC were removed from use. The withdrawal of the last Regular Army component of the Bermuda Garrison in 1957, A Company of the First Battalion of the Duke of Cornwall's Light Infantry, left a great deal of vacant baselands, and the TA permanently occupied Warwick Camp formerly the rifle ranges and a field training area for utilisation of the entire garrison. The old Armoury Building currently houses a mixture of clothing boutiques, restaurants, and office space. The Plaque, fixed to the wall inside the main door, is the only obvious indication of its original purpose.
context_page_description: The Bermuda Volunteer Rifle Corps was created in 1894 as an all-white, racially segregated reserve for the Regular Army infantry component of the Bermuda Garrison. Renamed the Bermuda Rifles in 1951, it was amalgamated into the Bermuda Regiment in 1965.
context_section_description: The BVRC began mobilisation on 3 September 1939, even before news was received of the declaration of war, when Britain issued Germany with an ultimatum to withdraw from Poland. As in the previous war, it took up positions guarding the coastlines, but its duties soon grew more numerous. Members of the Territorials were called up for the duration, and conscription was introduced to increase their strengths in October, 1940. Another infantry unit, the Bermuda Militia Infantry, had been raised in October, 1939, recruiting blacks, and linked administratively with the BMA. The infantry duties of the Garrison were split between these two Territorials, and the detachment from the 2nd Battalion, King's Shropshire Light Infantry (KSLI) at Prospect Camp.
  Also as in the previous war, a Contingent was soon detached, composed of volunteers for service at sharper ends of the War. A few members of the BVE and the BMA travelled with this contingent to England (departing Bermuda in June, 1940), where the BVRC members were re-enlisted into the Lincolnshire Regiment. This Contingent included two officers, Robert Brownlow-Tucker and Anthony 'Toby' Smith, who became Company Commanders in the Lincolns before the War's end. They were among four Bermudians who would reach the rank of Major with the Lincolns (although one, future Major-General Glyn Charles Anglim Gilbert, MC, never served in the BVRC, and the last, Major Patrick Lynn Purcell, had left Bermuda as a BMA Lieutenant attached to the 1940 BVRC Contingent. After coastal artillery service in Sierra Leone, he had transferred from the Royal Artillery to the Lincolnshire Regiment).
  Due to fears of stripping the Garrison, a moratorium was placed on further drafts being sent overseas from Bermudian units. This moratorium was not lifted until 1943, when both the BVRC and the Bermuda Militia (the BMI and BMA together) detached contingents to send overseas. The two contingents trained together at Prospect Camp, before going their separate ways. The BVRC left Bermuda in May, 1944, to join the Lincolns in England. The contingent members were rebadged as Lincolns, and most joined 2 Lincolns in Belgium, as the Allies advanced into North-West Europe. They had travelled as part of a Company of reinforcements under the command of Bermudian Major AF 'Toby' Smith, who was killed-in-action shortly after, along with three other Bermudians. While in England, eleven of second contingent had volunteered to join the Airborne Division, training as parachutists.
caption: Plaque at Hamilton Armoury commemorating BVRC service from 1894 to 1946, when it was reduced to a skeleton staff (expanded to a full unit again in 1951, retitled the Bermuda Rifles).
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