VII Corps (United Kingdom)

This article is about the United Kingdom Army unit. For other units of the same name, see VII Corps.

VII Corps
Active	First World War Second World War
Country	United Kingdom
Branch	British Army
Type	Field corps
Part of	British Expeditionary Force (1915-18) GHQ Home Forces (1940, 1944-45)
Engagements	Battle of the Somme German Retreat to the Hindenburg Line Battle of Arras Battle of Cambrai Battle of the Somme (1918)
Commanders
Notable commanders	Lt-Gen Sir Thomas D'Oyly Snow KCB KCMG Lt-Gen Sir Walter Congreve VC KCB MVO

VII Corps was an army corps of the British Army active in the Second World War. In the early part of the Second World War it was part of the defence forces of the United Kingdom, and later acted as a shadow formation for deception purposes.

Prior to the First World War

In 1876 a Mobilisation Scheme was published for the forces in Great Britain and Ireland, including eight army corps of the 'Active Army'. The '7th Corps' was to be headquartered at York, formed from Irish and English militia. In 1880 its order of battle was as follows:

• 1st Division (York)
  • 1st Brigade (York)
    • 5th West York Militia (Knaresborough), 6th West York Militia (Halifax), Leicester Militia (Leicester)
  • 2nd Brigade (York)
    • North Down Militia (Newtownards), South Down Militia (Downpatrick), Dublin County (Dublin)
  • Divisional Troops
    • 106th Foot (Preston), Yorkshire Yeomanry (York)
  • Artillery
    • N/2nd Brigade Royal Artillery (Coventry)
• 2nd Division (Northampton)
  • 1st Brigade (Northampton)
    • Northampton and Rutland Militia (Northampton), 1st Norfolk Militia (Norwich), 2nd Norfolk Militia (Yarmouth)
  • 2nd Brigade (Northampton)
    • Cambridge Militia (Ely), West Suffolk Militia (Bury St. Edmunds), West Essex Militia (Chelmsford)
  • Divisional Troops
    • 76th Foot (Sheffield), Southern Nottinghamshire Yeomanry (Nottingham), Nottinghamshire Yeomanry (Worksop)
• 3rd Division (Darlington)
  • 1st Brigade (Darlington)
    • North Lincoln Militia (Lincoln), South Lincoln Militia (Grantham), Nottingham Militia (Newark)
  • 2nd Brigade (Newcastle)
    • Hertford Militia (Hertford), Bedford Militia (Bedford), Huntingdon Militia (Huntingdon)
  • Divisional Troops
    • 36th Foot (Fleetwood), 2nd West York Yeomanry (Halifax)
• Cavalry Brigade (Doncaster)
  • 6th Dragoons (Edinburgh), 21st Hussars (Leeds), 4th Dragoon Guards (York), 1st West York Yeomanry (Doncaster)

This scheme had been dropped by 1881.

First World War

VII Corps formed in France on 14 July 1915 under the command of Lt-General Thomas D'Oyly Snow (previously commander of 27th Division) as part of Sir Charles Monro's Third Army on the Western Front.

Order of Battle of VII Corps 14 July 1915
General Officer Commanding (GOC): Lt-Gen Sir Thomas D'O. Snow

• 4th Division
• 37th Division
• 48th (South Midland) Division

1916

In 1916 VII Corps remained in Third Army, now commanded by Sir Edmund Allenby. The Corps' first serious action was in the Somme Offensive of 1916, on the first day of which it carried out a disastrous diversionary attack at Gommecourt, in which 46th Division suffered 2455 casualties, and 56th Division 4313, for no permanent gain.

Order of Battle of VII Corps 1 July 1916
GOC: Lt-Gen Sir Thomas D'O. Snow
GOC, Royal Artillery: Brig-Gen C.M. Ross-Johnson
GOC, Heavy Artillery: Brig-Gen C.R. Buckle
Chief Engineer: Brig-Gen J.A. Tanner

• 46th (North Midland) Division
• 56th (1/1st London) Division
• 37th Division (in reserve)

1917

When the German Army retreated to the Hindenburg Line in March 1917, VII Corps was the only part of Third Army required to follow up, south of the new line's pivot at Vimy Ridge.

Order of Battle of VII Corps 14 March-5 April 1917

• 14th (Light) Division
• 21st Division
• 39th Division
• 56th (1/1st London) Division

During the Arras Offensive of April and May 1917, VII Corps was engaged in all three Battles of the Scarpe. During the First Battle of the Scarpe, 9–14 April, it had the same divisions under command, with the addition of 50th (Northumbrian) Division, which captured the Wancourt Ridge. VII Corps then had 30th, 50th and 33rd Division engaged in the Second Battle of the Scarpe, 23–24 April. During the Third Battle of the Scarpe, 3–4 May, it operated with 14th (Light), 14th (Eastern) and 21st Divisions. Finally, for the subsequent actions on the Hindenburg Line, 20 May-16 June, VII Corps had 21st and 33rd Divisions under command.

Later in 1917 the corps fought in the Battle of Cambrai.

1918

In 1918 the command was taken over by Lt-Gen Sir Walter Congreve, VC, KCB, MVO. and the corps fought in the First Battle of the Somme (1918) and the subsequent victorious British advance that ended the war.

Second World War

VII Corps was reformed in the United Kingdom during mid-1940 to control field forces deployed to counter the German invasion threat of that year. On 17 July that year it comprised 1st Canadian Infantry Division, 1st Armoured Division, and 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force (UK), a somewhat oversized brigade based on the second NZ echelon of troops which had been diverted to the United Kingdom from Egypt. The Corps was placed under the command of Major-General Andrew McNaughton, a Canadian Army officer. At the time its allotted task was to 'counter-attack and destroy any enemy force invading the counties of Surrey-Kent-Sussex-Hampshire which was not destroyed by the troops of the Eastern and Southern Commands'. On 25 December 1940 VII Corps was renamed the Canadian Corps at a time when the threat of German invasion had somewhat dissipated and as the growing number of Canadian troops in the United Kingdom made the formation of a larger Canadian formation advisable.

Later in the war it was notionally reactivated for deception purposes as a formation of the British Fourth Army as part of Operation Fortitude North, the threat to invade Norway at the time of the Normandy landings, with headquarters at Dundee. It was composed of the genuine British 52nd Infantry Division at Dundee, the notional U.S. 55th Division in Iceland, a Norwegian brigade, and three notional U.S. Army Ranger battalions in Iceland, plus corps troops. It moved south with Fourth Army for Fortitude South II, the continuation of the threat to the Pas de Calais, with headquarters at Folkestone in Kent and consisting of the British 61st and 80th divisions and 5th Armoured Division, the latter two notional and the 61st a genuine but low-establishment formation. It notionally moved to East Anglia in September, to Yorkshire in December, and was notionally disbanded in January 1945. Its insignia was a scallop shell on a blue ground.

General Officers Commanding

Commanders included:

• Jul 1915-Jan 1918 Lieutenant-General Thomas Snow
• Jan 1918-Apr 1918 Lieutenant-General Walter Congreve
• Jul 1940- Dec 1940 Lieutenant-General Andrew McNaughton

References

• Paddy Griffith, Battle Tactics of the Western Front: The British Army's Art of Attack 1916-18, New Haven & London: Yale University Press, 1994 (ISBN 0-300-05910-8).
• W.G. McClymont, To Greece: Official History of New Zealand in the Second World War 1939-45, War History Branch, Department of Internal Affairs (New Zealand), Wellington, New Zealand, 1959.
• Martin Middlebrook, The First Day on the Somme, London: Allen Lane, 1971/Fontana 1975.
• Official History:
  • Brig-Gen Sir James E. Edmonds, Military Operations, France and Belgium, 1915, Volume II, Battle of Aubers Ridge, Festubert, and Loos, London: Macmillan, 1928.
  • Brig-Gen Sir James E. Edmonds, Military Operations, France and Belgium, 1916, Volume I, Sir Douglas Haig's Command to the 1st July; Battle of the Somme, London: Macmillan, 1932/Woking: Shearer Publications, 1986 (ISBN 0-94699802-7).

External links

• The Long Long Trail