Cap badge of the Royal Armoured Corps, 1942-1943.
NAM. 1984-08-83-1Introduction
The Royal Armoured Corps (RAC) was formed on 4 April 1939, just months before the outbreak of the Second World War, making it one of the younger corps in the British Army. However, it is also unique among the corps, since it was not formed by amalgamating existing corps into a single overarching unit.
Instead, it is the umbrella for a large number of existing regiments, each of which also retained its individual regimental identity. These regiments were mainly former cavalry regiments, but also included the battalions of the Royal Tank Regiment, which was known as the Royal Tank Corps before the RAC’s formation.
Since then the Royal Armoured Corps has acted as the overall corps for all mechanised cavalry units and now includes ten regular and four territorial regiments, operating both as main armour and reconnaissance. The Reconnaissance Corps also became a part of the Royal Armoured Corps from 1944 until the Reconnaissance Corps’s disbandment in 1946.
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