Royal West African Frontier Force

The West African Frontier Force (WAFF) was a multi-battalion field force, formed by the British Colonial Office in 1900 to garrison the West African colonies of Nigeria, Gold Coast, Sierra Leone and Gambia. In 1928, it received royal recognition, becoming the Royal West African Frontier Force (RWAFF).

The War Office was considering the creation of a military force from the West African colonies prior to 1897, but the Benin Expedition of 1897 and similar tension around Nigeria allowed them to create a much more substantial military force. By July 1897, the War Office had successfully completed the reorganisation of the Egyptian army and thought a similar process would be wise in West Africa. The Secretary of State for War, the Marquess of Lansdowne, advised the Colonial Office that it was possible at no additional cost to create a "homogeneous Imperial force available for any emergency" in West Africa.

The decision to raise this force was taken in 1897 because of British concern at French colonial expansion in territories bordering on Northern Nigeria. The first troops were from that area and thought of by the British as "Hausas" - to the end of colonial rule, the Hausa language was a lingua franca in a very multi-tribal force, especially in Nigeria. The task of raising the new locally recruited force was entrusted to Colonel Frederick Lugard, who arrived in Nigeria in 1898. The following year, an interdepartmental committee recommended the amalgamation of all existing British colonial military forces in West Africa under the designation of the West African Field Force. Rivalry between Britain and France for control of the trade on the River Niger led to the occupation of areas by the French, for instance at Illo, and the stationing of the Frontier Force at Yashikera and elsewhere in the region.

On formation in 1900, the WAFF comprised:

By 1908, the WAFF in Northern Nigeria comprised two battalions of infantry, two batteries of artillery and one company of engineers. The infantry battalions at that time had an establishment of 1,200 men, the artillery batteries had 175 men and there were 46 engineers. There were 217 British officers, non-commissioned officers and specialists. Mounted infantry detachments were subsequently raised. The standard weapon was the .303 Martini-Enfield carbine, and the force had 30 QF 2.95 inch mountain guns (quick-firing, man-portable pack howitzers) for the artillery.

The West African Frontier Force first saw action during the occupation of the German Kamerun (now Cameroon and part of present-day Nigeria). The experience gained in this campaign during 1914–16, in difficult terrain against stubborn resistance, made the WAFF a valuable reinforcement to the British Empire forces operating against the German Schutztruppe (colonial troops) in East Africa led by General Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck. One battalion of the Gold Coast Regiment arrived in German East Africa in 1916, and was soon joined by four battalions of the Nigeria Regiment. All remained active in this theatre of war until 1918.

By the end of the First World War, regimental strengths were as follows:^{[citation needed]}

The following battle honours were awarded separately to the constituent regiments of the WAFF during the First World War:^{[citation needed]}