The regiment was raised in Menorca (then called Minorca) by Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Stuart from German-speaking prisoners of war of Swiss regiments in Spanish service on 12 December 1798.[2]
The regiment embarked for Gibraltar in October 1800 and then sailed on to Abu Qir in Egypt in January 1801 to take part in the Egyptian Campaign.[2] At the Battle of Alexandria in March 1801, Private Antoine Lutz of the regiment distinguished himself by seizing the colour of the 21st Demi Brigade Legère. The colour had initially been captured by Sergeant Sinclair of the 42nd Regiment of Foot but after Sinclair fell in battle, a French officer recovered the colour for his country. Private Lutz shot the French officer holding the colour and took possession of the colour before being ridden over by French cavalry. As two dragoons charged towards him, Lutz claimed to have shot the horse from under one, whose life he spared. He returned to the British lines with both the colour and the captured dragoon.[3] The regiment sailed for home in autumn 1801.[2] It was renamed The Queen's Own German Regiment in 1802[2] and 97th (Queen's Own Germans) Regiment of Foot in January 1805.[2]
The regiment was reformed (and subsequently confirmed as the successor of the predecessor formation with full continuity of battle honours),[a] in response to the threat posed by the French intervention in Spain, in January 1824.[5] The regiment embarked for Halifax, Nova Scotia in summer 1824, transferred to Bermuda in 1825 and then returned to Halifax in 1828 before embarking for home in 1835.[5] Between December 1839 and August 1841, it provided detachments for convict ships sailing to New South Wales, Van Diemen's Land, South Australia and Western Australia.[6]
In 1843, amid tensions in New Zealand between British settlers and Māoris related to breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi, a detachment from the regiment was dispatched to the North Island of New Zealand.[7] Four members of the regiment were killed in action at the flagstaff blockhouse when captured by a large Māori force during the Battle of Kororāreka in the Bay of Islands on 11 March 1845; the blockhouse crew were forced to withdraw to the lower blockhouse.[7]
The regiment embarked for India in 1849 and, after returning to England in 1855, sailed for Gibraltar in 1856.[5] It embarked for Canada in February 1862 to help suppress attacks by Fenians. One of the transport ships had to seek refuge in the Azores for a week in the face of extremely poor weather.[6] The regiment spent only a brief time in Canada, the crisis having subsided, and returned to England in April 1862.[6] The regiment deployed to the Cape of Good Hope in 1863 and then travelled on to India in 1865 before returning home in 1875.[5]
^ abcdefg"96th Regiment of Foot". regiments.org. Archived from the original on 19 April 2007. Retrieved 19 July 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
^ abc"96th Regiment". Tameside Borough Council. Retrieved 21 March 2017.
