History of the Home Guard
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The Home Guard was
formed when there was a real risk of invasion. Most men who could fight were
already in the forces, those that were left were either too young, too old, or
in reserved occupations (those jobs vital to the war effort).
The men who
volunteered to join the Home Guard at this time were expected to fight an
invasion of crack German troops with nothing more than a collection of old
shotguns and pieces of gas pipe with bayonets welded on the end!
The government was
expecting 150,000 men to volunteer for the Home Guard. Within the first month,
750,000 men had volunteered, and by the end of June, 1940, the total number of
volunteers was over one million. The number of men in the Home Guard did not
fall below one million until they were stood down in December 1944. The Home Guard was disbanded on
The Home Guard was
formed with the intention of delaying an enemy invasion force for as long as
possible and to give the Government and the regular army time to form a front
line from which the enemy invasion could be repelled. When they were first
formed, the Home Guard were expected to fight highly trained, well armed,
German troops using nothing but shotguns, air rifles, old hunting rifles,
museum pieces, bayonets, knives and pieces of gas pipe
with knives or bayonets welded on the end.
The Home Guard was
eventually issued with more conventional weapons, but these had their problems.
Most weapons were either World War 1 weapons or they
were American or Canadian weapons. The British infantry rifle of WWI, the
.303" SMLE was issued to the Home Guard. American P14 and P17 rifles were
also supplied. The P14 and P17 looked almost identical, the only real
difference being that the P14 took the SMLE .303" ammunition whilst the
P17 took the American .30" (30-06) ammunition. To prevent accidents, the
P17 had a red band painted on it to identify the 30-06 calibre.
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