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Cyprus Regiment

The Cyprus Regiment was a military unit of the British Army . Created by the British Government during World War II , it was made up of volunteers from the Greek Cypriot , Turki...

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The Cyprus Regiment was a military unit of the British Army. Created by the British Government during World War II, it was made up of volunteers from the Greek Cypriot, Turkish Cypriot, Armenian, Maronite and Latin inhabitants of Cyprus, but also included other Commonwealth nationalities.

The badge of the Cyprus Regiment was a shield charged with two lions passant guardant in pale and ensigned with the Imperial Crown and below the shield was a scroll bearing the title of the regiment.

Service history

The Cyprus Regiment was founded on 12 April 1940. It included Infantry, Mechanical, Transport and Pack Transport Companies. Cypriot mule drivers were the first colonial troops sent to the Western Front.[1] They served in France, Ethiopia, Palestine, and Italy carrying equipment to areas inaccessible to vehicles. They were used to supply and support other troops at Monte Cassino.

On a brief visit to Cyprus in 1943, Winston Churchill praised the "soldiers of the Cyprus Regiment who have served honourably on many fields from Libya to Dunkirk."[2]

About 30,000 Cypriots served in the Cyprus Regiment. The regiment was involved in action from the very start and served in the Battle of France, in the Greek Campaign (the Battle of Greece, in which about 600 soldiers were captured at Kalamata, in 1941), North Africa (Operation Compass), France, the Middle East and Italy. Many soldiers were taken prisoner especially at the beginning of the war and were interned in various POW camps, including Stalag VIII-B Lamsdorf, Stalag IV-C at Wistritz near Teplitz (now in the Czech Republic), and Stalag IV-B near Dresden. The soldiers captured in Kalamata were transported by train to prisoner of war camps.

In the post-war years the regiment served in Cyprus and the Middle East, including Palestine during the 1945-1948 period. The regiment was disbanded on 31 March 1950.

References

  1. ↑"Cypriots among the forgotten troops of Dunkirk". Cyprus Mail. Retrieved 22 November 2018.
  2. ↑Morley, Nathan (6 September 2009). "'Brave call to a brave people'". Cyprus Mail. Retrieved 19 September 2025.

Sources

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  • 50.º aniversario del Regimiento de Chipre, 1939-1945 . Nicosia  : Oficina de Prensa e Información de la República de Chipre, 1990.
  • London Gazette  : Operaciones en Oriente Medio desde agosto de 1939 hasta noviembre de 1940 (Fecha de publicación: 11 de junio de 1946 Suplemento: 37609 Página: 2997 )
  • Jackson, Ashley. El Imperio Británico y la Segunda Guerra Mundial.
  • La Comisión de Tumbas de Guerra de la Commonwealth
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  • Asociación de Veteranos de Chipre. Archivado el 15 de junio de 2020 en Wayback Machine.
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  • La participación de los chipriotas en la Segunda Guerra Mundial
  • Los turcochipriotas en la Segunda Guerra Mundial
  • Operación Brújula (1940-1941): Órdenes de batalla
  • Proyecto de Recuerdos de Guerra - Campo de Prisioneros de Guerra Stalag IV-B
  • Comisión de Tumbas de Guerra de la Commonwealth  : Regimiento de Chipre
  • Nuevas medallas para un veterano de la Segunda Guerra Mundial que perdió las originales en 1974. Archivado el 13 de marzo de 2016 en Wayback Machine.
  • Diario de Robert Menzies de 1941  : La campaña griega. Archivado el 11 de mayo de 2013 en Wayback Machine.
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  • Guerra Popular de la Segunda Guerra Mundial  : Artillero Bellas, prisionero de guerra.
  • Batalla de Creta, suboficial Bill Knox