Cap badge, Assam Valley Light Horse, 1901-1947 (metal)

Cap badge, Assam Valley Light Horse, 1901-1947. Bi-metal badge consisting of an eight-pointed star with ‘AVLH’ unit monogram surmounted by King’s Crown, with scroll bearing the unit’s motto, ‘Semper Paratus’, meaning ‘Always Ready’. The Assam Valley Light Horse was formed as a volunteer corps and auxiliary regiment based in Assam. The majority of those in the regiment were tea planters from the Assam Valley. The unit was founded on 25 September 1896 when the regiment’s name was changed from the Assam Valley Mounted Rifles (an amalgamation of the Lakhimpur Mounted Rifles, Sibsagar Mounted Infantry, Sibsagar Mounted Rifles, Darrang Mounted Rifles, Nowgong Mounted Rifles, and Gauhati Rifles). Volunteers from the unit served with Lumsden’s Horse during the Boer War (1899-1902). In 1911 the unit sent a detachment, comprising one officer and 12 men operating a maxim gun, to fight against the Abors in Assam on the North-Eastern Frontier. It was here that the detachment received the nickname ‘Lumsden’s Lambs’ because they were often up against it but ‘never bleated’. From the Field Marshal Sir John Chapple Indian Army Collection.