IOR/L/MIL/5/795

Memoranda issued by General Officer Commanding/General Headquarters, Mesopotamia (all duplicated to Commander-in-Chief, India), to the War Office, listing the detailed corrections to be inserted into the Order of Battle of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force, covering the period 9 October 1920-29 November 1921.

Note: there is one memorandum from General Headquarters, Baghdad, to the War Office, dated 10 August 1920. From 17 October 1921 onwards memoranda are from General Headquarters, Iraq, to the War Office.

File also contains, three printed official Order of Battle booklets:

• ‘Order of Battle of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force. Corrected to 7th January, 1919’, dated 7 January 1919
• ‘Order of Battle of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force. 1st October 1919', dated 1 October 1919. Heavily annotated with manuscript corrections and updates in black ink
• ‘Order of Battle of the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force. 1st March 1920’ (in manuscript) ‘Corrected up to 11th June 1920’, dated 29 February 1920. Heavily annotated with manuscript corrections and updates in black and red ink and pencil and one typescript page inserted at the front listing British and Indian troops with the Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force on 1 March 1920.

Order of Battle booklets cover, with some variations, General Headquarters and troop organisation; organisation in detail (Army troops, Cavalry, Indian Army Corps); Divisions and Brigades; Lines of Communication – defences and administrative units (including river areas); distribution of artillery; index to Army Corps, divisions and brigades; and index to units (including medical units, ordnance, veterinary services, supply and transport, engineers, signal service, air service, artillery, machine gun corps, infantry).

The file documents detail the complete military establishment, movements and organizstion in Mesopotamia and developments over the period January 1919-November 1921.