The RNAS Armoured Car Expeditionary Force on the Eastern Front, 1915-17

Wednesday 28th October 2020 [POSTPONED]

St John’s Place, Lower Road, Bemerton, SP2 9NP

7.30-9.30pm

In 1914, the Royal Naval Air Service created their Armoured Car Section to provide line of communications security and to pick up aircrew who had been forced to land in hostile territory. By 1915, trench warfare meant there was little use for armoured cars on the Western Front and most of the RNAS’s armoured car squadrons were disbanded by the Admiralty. However under the command of Ulster MP Oliver Locker-Lampson three squadrons of armoured cars were assembled and sent by ship to Archangel as the Armoured Car Expeditionary Force (ACEF), also known as the Russian Armoured Car Division and until the Revolution they would see hard fighting alongside their Allies in Galicia, Romania and the Caucasus. This is their story.

Entrance for members is included in your annual subscription. For non-members, entrance is £10 (cash only) at the door.

Alan Wakefield is Head of First World War & Early 20th Century Conflict at the Imperial War Museum where he is charged with responsibility for all historical and collections output at the museum relating to the period 1900–29. He is widely published on the First World War and is currently working on a book about First World War campaign in Mesopotamia.