The Denbighshire Hussars was a Welsh Yeomanry regiment of the British Army formed in 1794. It saw service in the First World War before being converted into a unit of the Royal Artillery. The lineage has been continued by 398 (Flint & Denbighshire Yeomanry) Squadron, Royal Logistic Corps.
French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars
After Britain was drawn into the French Revolutionary Wars, the government of Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger proposed on 14 March 1794 that the counties should form Corps of Yeomanry Cavalry that could be called on by the King to defend the country against invasion or by the Lord Lieutenant to subdue any civil disorder within the county. A Troop of Gentlemen and Yeoman of Wrexham, also known as the Wrexham Troop, was formed on 23 May 1795 at Wrexham, a rapidly growing industrial town in Denbighshire, North Wales. Another troop of Denbigh Cavalry under the command of Captain Richard Lloyd was raised at the town of Denbigh on 4 July 1799. In 1803, when the short-lived Peace of Amiens broke down and the Napoleonic Wars began, two more troops were raised at Wrexham and the force there became a regiment as the Wrexham Yeomanry Cavalry on 29 July 1803, under Major-Commandant Sir Foster Cunliffe, 3rd Baronet.
19th century
By 26 January 1820, when the regiment became the Denbighshire Yeomanry Cavalry, there were five troops under Colonel-Commandant Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn, 5th Baronet. Although the Yeomanry generally declined in importance and numbers after the end of the French wars, the Denbigh regiment was sometimes called out to suppress riots in the 1820s and 1830s. When Government support for the Yeomanry was withdrawn in 1828 the regiment carried on without pay until 1831 when pay for drills and periods of service was restored.
The regiment was used to quell a disturbance by colliery workers in Rhosllannerchrugog in 1830: the miners were angered by the truck shop system that forced them to spend their wages in shops owned by their employers and planned to destroy a truck shop owned by the British Ironworks Company. The regiment was ordered out on patrol under Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn to 'terrify the mob'. Their presence quieted matters and Williams Wynn and the civil officers persuaded the demonstrators to disperse. On their return march the Yeomanry passed Cinder Hill, a pile of blast furnace waste from which thousands of people were watching. A youth threw a piece of cinder, which hit one of the horses, whose rider and another man fired their pistols – luckily hitting no-one. Williams-Wynn and his officers immediately stopped their men from reacting further, but the 'Battle of Cinder Hill', became notorious. In 1831 the Denbighshire miners were still dissatisfied, and marched on Shrewsbury, being turned back by the Shropshire Yeomanry. Later they gathered at Acrefair and again the Denbighshire Yeomanry were called out under Williams-Wynn, who advised the masters and workers to negotiate.
When Col Sir Watkin Williams Wynn retired, he was succeeded on 1 March 1838 as Major-Commandant by Sir William Lloyd, a former major in the Honourable East India Company's army, who had seen action at the Battle of Seetabuldee and Siege of Nagpore. Lloyd joined the regiment after his return to Wales and as a captain in December 1830 had played a prominent role in defusing the difficult situation at 'Cinder Hill'. In 1850 the regiment consisted of three troops of 44 men each, with Regimental Headquarters (RHQ) at Wrexham.
Sir William Lloyd died on 16 May 1857 and Lieutenant-Colonel Charles John Tottenham of Plas Berwyn (late of the 2nd Life Guards and High Sheriff of Denbighshire) was appointed to the command on 12 June 1857. He was simultaneously CO of the Royal Merioneth Militia. In the 1860s, most of the regiment's officers were former officers in the 1st or 2nd Life Guards. Tottenham held the Yeomanry command until he retired and became the regiment's Honorary Colonel on 30 May 1874. He was succeeded as CO by Lt-Col Tom Naylor-Leyland of Nantclwyd Hall, Ruthin (also late of the 2nd LG). The regimental headquarters was at Llangollen, moving to Ruthin in the 1870s. The Regiment became the Denbighshire (Hussars) Yeomanry Cavalry in 1876.