Chapter II

to the steps taken to raise a third line battalion under Major E. H. Stillwell on the departure of the 2/4th Battalion for Malta. This new Battalion, the 3/4th London Regiment, secured recruits rapidly, and, like its predecessor, very quickly outgrew the limits of Headquarters at Hoxton. It was therefore moved early in January to Littlegrove and Beech Hill, the two houses at Barnet which had previously been occupied by the battalion raised by Col. Dunfee. A slight stiffening of the ranks was supplied by a few members of the overseas battalions who had received a good deal of training with them but had been found medically unfit to accompany them abroad; but the vast majority of the officers, non-commissioned officers and men had but recently joined, most of them without any previous experience of soldiering. No member of the new Battalion, moreover, had seen service in the War, and the magnitude of the task imposed on the officers and warrant officers of instilling the rudiments of discipline into so unwieldy a mass of men was no light one. The enthusiasm of the early days of the War, had, however, by no means subsided, and all ranks worked with a will; and before long the Battalion, now about 600 strong, began to find its feet.

On the 8th February 1915 Capt. P. S. Cookson (late Royal Sussex Regiment) was appointed to command the Battalion with the temporary rank of Lieut.-Col. with Major W. H. Hamilton as second in command, and Major E. V. Wellby as Adjutant. The company commanders were Capts. A. A. N. Hayne, S. W. J. Limpenny, E. D. Wilson and A. E. Wood.

The training facilities which had been extended to the 2/4th Battalion by local residents at Barnet were accorded to the 3/4th Battalion also, and the training of recruits under company arrangements proceeded as rapidly as possible and as efficiently as the circumstances permitted. No time indeed was to be lost for the 1/4th Londons were now in France, and as already described began to suffer battle casualties early in March 1915; so that it was clear that the 3/4th Battalion might at any time be called upon to make up its deficiencies. Towards the end of April it was in fact called on to supply the first reinforcement, and accordingly despatched 2 officers and 50 other ranks who, as referred to in