In the previous year the Regimental Officers’ Team won the Inter-Regimental Bayonet Fighting Cup, beating the R.M.A., with its large complement of officers to select from, in the final. This was the only occasion on which the Cup was wrested from the Regulars or Navy.
The Light-Weight Tug-of-War Team in 1904 became the permanent possessors of the R.M.T. Cup, which they had won three times in four years.
“Daily Telegraph” Cup.
In 1902 the Corps secured an honour for which it had striven for many years, and which, although as a rule honourably placed in the strenuous competition, it had never yet succeeded in obtaining. This was the Daily Telegraph Cup for marching and shooting, competed for at the Home District Rifle Meeting by teams from most of the battalions of regulars and volunteers in the district. And now, under the leadership of Captain F. J. Brett, supported by Sergeant W. H. D. Clarke, it was won four years in succession, a feat never performed by any other battalion.
1904.
In 1904, Colonel Tytheridge resigned and the Earl of Arran, late Captain, Royal Horse Guards, was appointed Commanding Officer. Captain and Hon. Major E. Merrick and Captain R. G. Hayes were promoted Field Officers.
At the end of 1906 the Field Army Brigades were abolished, as preparations were then being made for a much greater call upon volunteers than that entailed by the existing scheme of Home Defence.
Troubled by the incessant cry for economy in military expenditure from their supporters on one side and the imminence of a European war with insufficient military strength on the other, the Government turned again to the Volunteer Force for aid.
The Territorial and Reserve Forces Act, 1907.
The Territorial and Reserve Forces Act was passed in 1907, by which the Force might at once become an integral part of the Army on a threat of war.