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The Grand Fleet wasn't formed until August 1914 - before then, its ships were spread around British stations, with the largest fleet being the Home Fleet under Admiral Sir George Callaghan.

Near the outbreak of war, Churchill and Fisher decided that Callaghan was unsuitable choice to command the newly unified 'Grand Fleet' and decided to give the job to Vice Admiral Jellicoe.

I've been searching for an OOB for the RN before the formation of the Grand Fleet and I'm still looking. :(
 
My thinking was that the largest British fleet would technically be called the Home Fleet for 7 months, then the Grand Fleet for the remaining 6 years of the game - so from a gameplay point of view using the more familiar name would be better. (That's also why I called Beatty's fleet the Battlecruiser Force rather than 1st Battlecruiser Squadron.) Purists can, of course, edit the names themselves at the appropriate times. :)

I'll confess to not knowing the background to Jellicoe's appointment until now: I'm working from a very succinct list of commanders and it rarely gives appointment dates.

From an AI point of view, is it better to disperse ships to their peacetime stations at the start of the game, or concentrate them? I do have a fear that if you start the British fleet out in penny packets, the AI will use them that way and lose them.

From what I can discover about an OOB on 1 January 1914, the dreadnoughts were all in Home Fleet (the "type 1" in 1st Battle Squadron, the "Type 2" in 2nd BS, plus HMS Dreadnought in 4th BS along with three pre-dreadnoughts that I've got listed under the Channel Fleet (Cornwallis, Duncan and Agamemnon). The eight 'Type 0' battleships I've listed under the Grand Fleet made up 3rd BS, Home Fleet. I don't know where these four battle squadrons were based.

As for the battlecruisers, the only difference is that HMS Invincible was with the Mediterranean Fleet in January 1914, returning to the UK in March.

It gets more messy with the smaller fleets - especially since my original OOB had to combine various squadrons together to suit the scale of HOI. Most of the ships I've listed under "Channel Fleet" were with the Second Fleet, split between Portsmouth and The Nore. The others (from Majestic onwards) were with Third Fleet at Devonport and Pembroke. This fleet also included the other, older pre-dreadnoughts that were dispersed around the coast in August 1914 to guard against German invasion forces (which I included in the Harwich and East Coast forces).

At least that's what I think things were like :) - I'm working from Conway's accounts of individual ship deployments here, and it gets confusing...:confused:
 
About three minutes after I'd made that post I simply thought 'ahh sod it, just call it the 'Grand Fleet', it makes things far simpler. :)

I posted a link to a site with plenty of RN officers in the Useful Links section.
 
I need OOBs for British forces in Africa, the Caribbean and America, Middle East, Asia and the Pacífic.

I don't need info on Canada, India, New Zealand, Australia, Burma or Aden.

/Johan
 
You mean the file that I said that no one except N!ghtY and JosipT should download to save my friends bandwidth? :rolleyes: Good job...

I still need the info.

/Johan
 
British Empire OOB as requested!

Imperial garrisons were normally much smaller than a whole division, and organised into separate battalions. I've generally picked one battalion or regiment from those stationed there to give its name to the whole division, and given its strength as a fraction (based on 12 battalions to the division).


Singapore
Leader: Ridout
0.16 infantry division:
Shropshire Light Infantry

Hong Kong
0.5 infantry division:
Middlesex Regiment

North China (in attack range of Qingdao)
Tsingtao Expedition
Leader: Barnardiston
0.25 infantry division:
South Wales Borderers
# Yes, this is the regiment that fought at Rorke's Drift.

Ceylon
0.08 infantry division:
An Indian Army battalion, name unknown

Burma
1.25 infantry divisions:
Burma Division
(give it an attached engineer brigade?)

India

British Army in India
Leader: Duff
0.75 cavalry division, 4 infantry divisions:
1 Indian Cavalry Division
8 Division
27 Division
28 Division
29 Division
# strictly speaking, these forces were not organised into divisions until after the war started

Indian Forces:

Northern Army: 6 inf divisions, 1 cavalry division
Leader: Willcocks
1 (Peshawar) Division
2 (Rawalpindi) Division
3 (Lahore) Division
7 (Meerut) Division
8 (Lucknow) Division
Kohat Brigade (0.33 division)
Bannu Brigade (0.33 division)
Derajat Brigade (0.33 division)
2nd Indian Cavalry Division

Southern Army: 4 inf divisions
Leader: Nixon
4 (Quetta) Division
5 (Mhow) Division
6 (Poona) Division
9 (Secunderabad) Division

Princely Forces:
In total about half a division of cavalry and one division of infantry volunteered to serve the Empire from the Princely States of India. This might be better represented as an event rather than a force in the starting OOB.

Aden
Leader: Bell
0.42 infantry divisions:
Aden Brigade

Egypt
Force in Egypt (or Egyptian Expeditionary Force):
Leader: Byng
0.08 cavalry division
0.33 infantry division

Sudan
Sirdar Egyptian Army
Leader: Wingate
1.5 militia divisions
# These are Egyptians (puppet troops) not British Empire forces

Malta
0.42 infantry division:
London Regiment

Gibraltar
0.16 infantry division:
Cheshire Regiment

Nigeria
0.42 militia division:
Nigeria Regiment

Sierra Leone
0.16 militia division:
West African Frontier Force

Kenya
0.25 infantry division:
King's African Rifles
# excellent war record so rated as infantry not militia

Rhodesia
0.25 militia division:
Rhodesian Regiment

South Africa
Union Defence Forces
Leader: Beyers
0.5 infantry division:
1 East African Division
# Separate battalions not actually organised into a division until 1915. Also, called "East" African not "South" African because that's where it was sent to fight.

Mauritius
0.08 infantry division:
Somerset Light Infantry

Bermuda
0.08 infantry division:
East Yorkshire Regiment
# join the Army and hope you get sent to Bermuda, not the mud of Flanders...

Jamaica
0.08 militia division:
West India Regiment

Newfoundland
0.08 infantry division:
1 Royal Newfoundland Regiment

New Zealand
Samoan Expeditionary Force
0.16 infantry division
New Zealand Expeditionary Force
Leader: Godley
0.33 cavalry division
# formed as soon as war started from militia units and volunteers

Australia
Australian Imperial Force
Leader: Bridges
1 infantry division:
1 (Australian) Division
# formed as soon as war started from militia units and volunteers

Canada
Canadian Expeditionary Force
Leader: Alderson
1 infantry division:
1 (Canadian) Division
# formed as soon as war started from militia units and volunteers


(I know you said you've already got the Dominion armies, but since I had the information to hand I thought I'd post it anyway as a cross-check on your figures :) )
 
British forces in Egypt in 1914 was according to The Last Crusade, a 'small peacetime garrison'.

The commander of forces in Egypt at the time was Major-General Byng.

Therefore, I'd have a division called 'Egypt command' under the said commander.
 
That certainly is a comprehensive list. I like the small percentages of divisions. Probably good to not include everything under a certain size, as these divisions will be filled up quickly, thus giving the British a number of full-strength divisions right away.

Steele
 
Thanks... do you need the same information for the other colonial powers?

Belgium had 0.25 militia division in the Congo: unit name "Force Publique".

Portugal had 0.16 militia division in Angola and the same in Mozambique. Unit name was "Expeditionary Force" in both cases (in Portuguese, of course, which I don't speak :) ).

France will take more time to research - let me know if you need it.

Steele - I agree on leaving out the 0.08 division forces, maybe the 0.16 ones although gameplay would be an issue; for example the force in Sierra Leone was used to occupy German Togoland in the opening months of the war, so it should probably exist in the game.

Incidentally, the "Tsingtao Expedition" unit should be stacked with the Japanese 18th Infantry Division (full strength) and 15th Infantry Division (0.33 strength) under leader Kanio. Maybe it should even be an expeditionary force assigned to Japan? (or just lump it in with the Japanese units and give them two full-strength divisions?)
 
Where have you managed to find such a superb listing of various countries' OOBs in 1914? Either one source or you're a brilliant researcher. :)

I understand that the commander of Japanese forces attacking Tsingtao was Lt-Gen. Mitsuomi Kamio with an 'm'.
 
Mostly the Databook I mentioned in the other thread... also the "World War One Sourcebook" by P J Haythornthwaite (ISBN 1 85409 351 7) which is less detailed. For the navies, Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1906-1921 (the best source) and Jane's Fighting Ships of World War 1.
 
I know that the XIX. French Corps was stationed in Algers with two divisions, but nothing more. It would be really nice if you kept posting those "special" OOBs that are hard to find on the internet. :)

/Johan
 
French colonial OOB
Apparently XIX Corps had 3 divisions, not two.

Algeria

"XIX Corps"
Leader: Moinier
3 infantry divisions:
Division d'Alger
Division de Constantine
Division d'Oran
# Half of this division was a brigade of the Légion Étrangèr

Tunisia
1 infantry division:
Division de Tunis

Morocco
? "Troupes Coloniales de Maroc"
Leader: Lyautey
1.5 militia divisions:
1er Régiment de Marche de Maroc
2e Régiment de Marche de Maroc

Indo-China
"Groupe de l’Indochine"
Leader: Vollenhoven
1 infantry, 1 militia division:
4e Régiment Étrangèr
# Infantry (actually half Foreign Legion, half local troops)
Division du Tonkin
# militia

North China (Tientsin)
0.25 infantry division:
16e Régiment d'Infanterie Coloniale

Senegal (Dakar)
"Groupe de l’Afrique Occidentale"
0.58 militia division
1er Régiment de Tirailleurs Sénégalais

Guinea
0.25 militia division
2e Régiment de Tirailleurs Sénégalais

Côte d’Ivoire
0.25 militia division
3e Régiment de Tirailleurs Sénégalais

Mali (Timbuktu)
0.16 militia division
2e Bataillon de Tirailleurs Sénégalais

Chad (Fort-Lamy)
"Groupe de l’Afrique Équatoriale"
Leader: Merlin
0.25 militia division:
Régiment de Tirailleurs de l'Afrique Équatoriale

Madagascar
North province (Diégo-Suarez)
"Groupe de l'Afrique Orientale"
0.41 militia division:
3e Régiment de Tirailleurs Malgaches

South province (Tananarive)
0.5 militia division:
1er Régiment de Tirailleurs Malgaches
 
for those french colonials would it be easier just to combined them into divs, instead of having masses of regment which can be reenforced by the ai and make them un stoppable in africa
 
It would be easy to do if need be - just combine the four Senegal, Guinea, Cote d'Ivoire and Mali divisions into a single militia division ("Groupe de l’Afrique Occidentale" name = "Tirailleurs Sénégalais") and the two Madagascar ones into one also ("Groupe de l'Afrique Orientale" name = "Tirailleurs Malgaches"). Leave the rest the same.

On the other hand, why is it a problem to have large French forces in Africa? The French did have a big army there, although most of them ended up being transferred to France. The British and Germans will also have many weak divisions in Africa, after all...
 
All the colonial powers will have massive armies in Africa, especially the British, but not just them. I think we should cap these under-strength divisions at .3 strength or something like that. Including every platoon as a .0002 strength division is a little overboard. ;)

Steele

PS: I'm kidding of course... about the platoons...
 
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