British Army 1942
Strength and Organisation of the Armies of the British Empire in the Middle East and Europe

From late 1941 until the summer of 1942, the British 8th Army in North Africa fought a series of engagements which revealed serious deficiencies in its preparedness for desert warfare when compared with the German units. The fighting during the 'Crusader' battles in November 1941, for example, had convinced General Auchinleck that the British Armoured Division was an unbalanced formation containing too much armour and too little infantry. He therefore reorganised the armoured divisions. Auchinleck also reorganised the infantry brigade to achieve a more permanent combination of the constituent arms.
Unfortunately these changes had not been fully implemented when Rommel attacked on 26 May 1942, pushed the 8th Army back and captured Tobruk on 21 June. At Tobruk the Eight Army lost the 2nd South African division together with one Army tank brigade, one British and one Indian Infantry Brigade, which had to surrender.

Picture: Vickers heavy MG about to open fire with the 1th South African Division of the Eight Army.

During the period from November 1941 to August 1942 the British 8th Army had suffered 102,000 battle casualties (of which 49,000 were British) but reinforcements continued to arrive and the Army's strength rose from 88,000 in January 1942 to 126,000 by May. Amongst 149,800 reinforcements that had arrived in the Middle East between January and August were the British 8th Armoured Division, and the 44th and 51st Infantry Divisions.

Tank Strengths and Casualties of Eight Army in July 1942:

Picture: Crusader Mk I (with 2-pounder gun) tanks in North Africa.

For the El Alamein offensive General Montgomery, the new commander of the 8th Army, was able to deploy three corps with 195,000 men:

Equipment of the 8th Army at El Alamein:

Basic British Army units in 1942:

The British and Empire Armies in Great Britain

By the autumn of 1941 there were 27 British, Canadian, and Polish motorised infantry divisions (28 in April 1943) available for the Field Force in Great Britain, each containing a front line strength of approximately 15,500 men. For beach defence eight country divisions had been formed each with a strength of 10,000 officers and men but equipped with only minimal artillery and transport. In addition to the divisional forces there were seven infantry brigades, four motorised brigade groups incorporating artillery, 12 independent battalions, and eight airfield defence battalions. The need to provide flank protection for the Atlantic sea lanes meant that garrisons had also to be maintained in the Faroes, Iceland (24,000 British troops by October 1941), the Azores, St.Helena, the Falkland Islands, and the West Indies.

Picture: Army tank brigade equipped with Valentine tanks lined up in Britain.

A major change in the organisation of the five Armoured Divisions (four in April 1943) occured in May 1942 when one of the armoured brigades in each division was replaced by an infantry brigade. Each of the Armoured Divisions in Britain had now a strength of 201 cruiser and 26 anti-aircraft tanks.
The three existing army tank brigades were henceforth normally assigned to infantry divisions replacing one infantry brigade in each division. The fighting complement of a tank brigade was approximately 1,950 officers and men with 178 tanks of which at least 135 were infantry tanks (Valentine, Matilda, Churchill). The 1st, 3rd, 4th, 43rd and 53rd Infantry Divisions each received an army tank brigade during 1942.