Armoured car regiment

Armoured Car Regiments were reconnaissance units employed by the British Army during the 20th century. The primary equipment of these units was the armoured car with many different types of armoured cars serving in the regiments during the Second World War and the Cold War. An armoured car regiment typically numbered several hundred men and several tens of armoured cars. By the end of the 20th century, armoured cars as front-line reconnaissance vehicles had been supplanted by tracked vehicles in the British Army and the surviving regiments converted to other organisational forms.

Armoured car regiments were a component of the Royal Armoured Corps. Similarly equipped units of the Reconnaissance Corps were organic parts of infantry divisions during the Second World War.

In the 1940 campaign in France and Flanders, the 12th Royal Lancers was the sole armoured car regiment fielded by the British Expeditionary Force. During the 1940 campaign, the 12th Lancers had an authorized strength of 38 armoured cars and about 380 men organised into a headquarters and three squadrons. This regiment served as the army-level reconnaissance asset of the B. E. F.

In the open spaces of North Africa, armoured reconnaissance was extensively used by both the Axis and the British (and Commonwealth) forces. Changes in doctrine made the armoured car regiment an organic asset of the armoured divisions, in which role the regiments typically fielded between 50 and 60 armoured cars ranging in type from older Rolls-Royce vehicles to more modern Humber types. Less heavily armed scout cars were used as well. During the East African Campaign, the 1st East African, Kenya, and Southern Rhodesian armoured car regiments were employed by the East Africa Command.

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