New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade

New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade
New Zealand Army Mounted Rifles marching through Cairo, Egypt in December 1914.
Active	August 1914 - June 1919
Country	New Zealand
Allegiance	British Empire
Branch	New Zealand Army
Type	Mounted Infantry
Size	Brigade
Part of	New Zealand Expeditionary Force New Zealand and Australian Division ANZAC Mounted Division
Nickname(s)	"The Mounteds"[1]
Engagements	First World War Gallipoli Campaign Sinai and Palestine Campaign Egyptian Revolution of 1919
Commanders
Notable commanders	Colonel Andrew Russell (1914 - 1915) Major General Edward Chaytor (1915 - 1917) Brigadier General William Meldrum (1917 - 1919)
Insignia
Unit colour patch
Abbreviation	NZMRB

The New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade was a brigade of the New Zealand Army during the First World War. Raised in 1914 as part of the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, it was one of the first New Zealand units to sail for service overseas.

The brigade was formed from three regiments – the Auckland Mounted Rifles, the Canterbury Mounted Rifles, the Wellington Mounted Rifles – and smaller support units. Altogether the brigade had an establishment of 1,940 men and 2,032 horses and by the end of the war over 17,700 men had served in the brigade. However, the entire brigade's dismounted rifle strength was the equivalent of only a battalion of infantry.

By the end of 1914, the brigade had arrived in British Egypt and was assigned to the New Zealand and Australian Division. Its first active service was, in a dismounted role, during the Gallipoli Campaign, where they fought against the forces of the Ottoman Turkish Empire.^{[nb 1]} Seven months later, after the evacuation from Gallipoli, the brigade returned to Egypt, and in 1916, became part of the ANZAC Mounted Division. The brigade was then used in defence of the Suez Canal. Then following an abortive Turkish attack in the Sinai Desert, it took part in clearing the invaders from Egypt. Then in the next two years, it forced the Turkish forces out of Palestine, collectively known as the Sinai and Palestine Campaign. Following its successful conclusion in 1918, the brigade played a small part in the Egyptian Revolution of 1919, before being disbanded in June 1919.

As of 2022 one mounted rifles unit (Queen Alexandra's Mounted Rifles) is retained in the modern New Zealand Army.

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