Liverpool Rifles
| Liverpool Rifles | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Active | From 1859 |
| Country |
 United Kingdom
|
| Branch |
 British Army
|
| Role | Infantry, searchlight, artillery |
| Part of | King's Regiment (Liverpool) |
| Garrison/HQ | Liverpool |
| Engagements |
Western Front (World War I) The Blitz |
| Battle honours | South Africa 1900–01 |
The Liverpool Rifles was a unit of the Territorial Army, part of the British Army, formed in Lancashire as a 'Rifle Volunteer Corps' (RVC) in 1859, becoming a battalion of the King's Regiment (Liverpool) in 1881. It saw action on the Western Front in World War I and later became a searchlight unit of the Royal Artillery in World War II.
The Liverpool Rifles was raised as the 5th Lancashire Rifle Volunteer Corps by Adam Steuart Gladstone (1814–63) in 1859, during a French invasion scare. Gladstone was a wealthy East India merchant and first cousin of William Ewart Gladstone, the future Prime Minister. He convened a meeting at Liverpool Session House on 20 May 1859 that became unruly when Robert John Tilney (founder of the Liverpool stockbroking firm RJ Tilney & Co) and his associates smashed up the ballot-boxes 'by the use of which the founders had hoped to exclude undesirables from membership'. Despite this altercation, when the first commissions to the 5th Lancashire RVC were issued on 19 August that year, Gladstone and Tilney were listed as the captains of its two companies.
Gladstone was a leading figure in the Volunteer Movement at that time, serving on the War Office committee that drew up rules for RVCs in August 1859, and on the founding committee of the National Rifle Association of the United Kingdom in October that year. In 1860 he leased land from Lord Sefton to create the Altcar Rifle Range. Gladstone died in 1863.
As the number of RVCs grew rapidly during 1860, the smaller company-sized units were grouped into Administrative Battalions. The 5th Lancashire RVC was the senior unit included in the Liverpool-based 2nd Administrative Battalion Lancashire Rifle Volunteers when it was formed in May 1860 (dates are of first commissions issued):
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