Assam Valley Light Horse
The Assam Valley Light Horse were a volunteer corps and auxiliary regiment based in Assam.
Chronology
- 1891 raised as the Assam Valley Mounted Rifles on 6th November when the Lakhimpur Mounted Rifles, Sibsagar Mounted Rifles, Darrang Mounted Rifles, Nowgong Mounted Rifles and Gauhati Rifles amalgamated[1]
- 1896 renamed Assam Valley Light Horse on 25th September[2]
- 1906 absorbed the Shillong Volunteer Rifles on 1st May[1]
Details
- Motto - "Semper Paratus"
In 1901:[2]
- Uniform - Khaki drill with steel shoulder chains
- Mess uniform - Blue with white facings
- Headquarters - Dibrugarh
Detachments at:
- Doom Dooma
- Panitola
- Margherita
- Moran
- Sonari
- Sibsagar
- Jorhat
- Panbarrz
- Numalighur
- North Lakhimpur
- Salonah
- Gauhati
- Tezpur
- Bishnath
- Mangaldai
By 1940:[1]
- Uniform - Blue
- Facings - White
- Badge - A.V.L.H.
Notes
British Library holdings
- APAC Catalogue entry Mss Eur Photo Eur 225 'Recollections of a varied life': copy of memoir by Maj Ronald Herbert Cronin (b 1897), including details of his career with the Assam Frontier Tea Company in Assam and Ranchi 1922-1941 and 1946-1958, and of his service with the Assam Valley Light Horse from 1922, and the Assam Regiment during the second world war.
External Links
- Assam Valley Light Horse from Koi-hai.com including many photos from various era.
- Photograph AVLH 1930’s from Lokantra.com
- Col Sir Charles Thorp Jessop CIE, VD from “Ancestors of David Robarts”. He was a tea planter in Assam where he joined the Sibsagar Mounted Rifles in December 1886 In 1891 he served as a volunteer in a frontier expedition into the nearby Naga Hills. The next year he transferred to the Assam Valley Mounted Rifles which subsequently became the Assam Valley Light Horse in which he served for more than 20 years; the last ten years as Commandant
Historical books online
- The history of Lumsden's Horse; a complete record of the corps from its formation to its disbandment by Henry H. S Pearse , page 4 advises that Lt Colonel Dugald Mactavish Lumsden, commander of Lumsden's Horse in South Africa in 1900, was appointed Captain in the Durrung Mounted Rifles on its formation in 1887 and later became commandant of the Assam Valley Light Horse, until he left India in 1893.
- In Abor Jungles, page 123 by Angus Hamilton, gives details of the Assam Valley Light Horse’s participation in the 1911-1912 expedition against the Abors. They were known as Lumsden’s Lambs.
- History of Upper Assam, Upper Burmah and North-Eastern Frontier, page 121 by Leslie Waterfield Shakespear also gives details of the Assam Valley Light Horse’s participation in the 1911-1912 expedition against the Abors.