page_title: Royal Horse Guards
section_title: Origins and history
hierarchical_section_title: Royal Horse Guards / Origins and history
caption_attribution_description: English: Portrait of Aubrey de Vere, 20th Earl of Oxford (1627-1703)
context_page_description: The Royal Regiment of Horse Guards was a cavalry regiment of the British Army, part of the Household Cavalry.
  Raised in August 1650 at Newcastle upon Tyne and County Durham by Sir Arthur Haselrigge on the orders of Oliver Cromwell as a Regiment of Horse, the regiment became the Earl of Oxford's Regiment in 1660 upon the Restoration of King Charles II. As, uniquely, the regiment's coat was blue in colour at the time, it was nicknamed "the Oxford Blues", from which was derived the nickname the "Blues." In 1750 the regiment became the Royal Horse Guards Blue and eventually, in 1877, the Royal Horse Guards.
  The regiment served in the French Revolutionary Wars and in the Peninsular War. Two squadrons fought, with distinction, in the Household Brigade at the Battle of Waterloo. In 1918, the regiment served as the 3rd Battalion, Guards Machine Gun Regiment. During the Second World War the regiment was part of the Household Cavalry Composite Regiment. The Royal Horse Guards was amalgamated with the Royal Dragoons to form the Blues and Royals in 1969.
caption: Aubrey de Vere, 20th Earl of Oxford, colonel of the regiment in 1661
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