Waikato Mounted Rifles

Waikato Mounted Rifles
Cap badge of the Waikato Mounted Rifles
Active	1869–present
Country	New Zealand
Allegiance	Queen Elizabeth II
Branch	New Zealand Army Reserve
Type	Mounted Rifles
Role	Mounted Reconnaissance
Size	One Squadron
Garrison/HQ	Rostrevor Street, Hamilton
Motto(s)	Libertas et Natale Solum – Liberty and Homeland
Colors	Maroon, Yellow and Black
March	D'ye ken John Peel
Anniversaries	24 July – Regimental Birthday 20 November – RNZAC Corps Day/Cambrai Day

24 July – Regimental Birthday

The Waikato Mounted Rifles (WMR) is the New Zealand Army’s only Territorial Force (Army Reserve) squadron of the Royal New Zealand Armoured Corps (RNZAC). The Squadron's origins can be traced back to 1869 when the first mounted unit was raised in the Waikato. Today the Squadron is part of Queen Alexandra's Mounted Rifles (QAMR) where it forms the regiment's reserve squadron. WMR's role is mounted reconnaissance and surveillance.

WMR’s lineage extends back to the New Zealand Wars (1843–72) and the formation of the Cambridge Mounted Rangers Volunteers. This unit was accepted for service on 24 July 1869, and today this date is recognised as WMR's ‘birthday’ and commemorated by the Squadron each year. Although the Cambridge Mounted Rangers Volunteers were disbanded in 1870, they were effectively re-formed shortly afterwards as the Cambridge Cavalry Volunteers.

The formation of the Cambridge Cavalry Volunteers, together with the nearby Te Awamutu Cavalry Volunteers (1871) and the Hamilton Cavalry Volunteers (1880) led directly to the creation of the Waikato Mounted Rifle Volunteers (1897), and then to the 4th (Waikato) Mounted Rifles when New Zealand’s Volunteer Force was superseded by the Territorial Force (TF) in 1911.

In 1885 all of New Zealand’s Volunteer Force cavalry units were turned into mounted rifles units. This was more than just a change of title, as the New Zealand Volunteer Manual makes clear: “It cannot be too frequently impressed upon all ranks of mounted rifles that they are in no sense cavalry. They are only intended to fight on foot; their horses enabling them to make longer and more rapid movements than the infantry soldier.”

Mounted riflemen had the same mobility as cavalry, but because they dismounted out of direct fire range, they were much less vulnerable. New Zealand’s mounted troops still required, “all the élan, dash and spirit of cavalry, but train to fight dismounted”.

The historian of the New Zealand Mounted Rifles in the First World War, Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) Terry Kinloch, however draws an important distinction between mounted rifles and mounted infantry. “A mounted rifleman was a horseman who was trained to fight on foot, but also to carry out some of the other cavalry functions, such as reconnaissance and screening. A mounted infantryman was no horseman. He rode a horse when he had to, but he fought on foot, and did not undertake reconnaissance or any other cavalry role. Mounted riflemen thus fitted in between cavalry and mounted infantry, performing some of the secondary roles of cavalry, but fighting on foot.”