Though the "Old Sixteenth" has a few battles on its colour-bearing only the names of "Blenheim," "Ramillies," "Oudenarde," and "Malplaquet"- it was created as far back as 1688 by James 2nd. Raised in Middlesex, it was quartered by William 3rd in Bucks, being given the title of the "Buckinghamshire Regiment" in 1782, which was altered in 1809 to that of the "Bedfordshire."
From 1689 to 1712 it saw much active service on the Continent, being present at Walcourt, Steenkirk, Landen, and Namur; at the sieges of Kaiserswerth, Venloo, Ruremonde, Stevenswaert, Liege, Huy, and Limburg; and at Schellenberg, Helixem, and Neer-Hepsen, Ramillies, and Oudenarde; at the sieges of Lisle (where sergeant Littler "swam across the river with a hatchet, and cut the fastenings which held up a drawbridge, to enable a party to pass the stream, for which act of gallantry he was rewarded with a commission in the Buffs"), Touray, Mons, Pont-a-Vendin, Douay, Bethune, Aire, St. Venant, Arleux, Bouchain, and Quesney, as well as at the battle of Malplaquet.
In 1740 it served as marines, but saw no active service; and a year after a detachment was present at Carthagena, and was decimated by disease; while another was compelled to surrender at Barton Bridge in 1779, when attacked with overwhelming odds by a force under the Spanish governor of Louisiana but other detachments successfully defended Savannah and Pensacola in the same campaign, and saw much severe fighting until 1782, when they returned home.
The regiment next done duty in the Maroon War of 1795, and in 1804 at Surinam, where at Barbadoes it lost during its stay 27 officers and 500 men. A 2nd battalion, formed while the regiment was in the West Indies, served in Paris during the occupation in 1815, and was disbanded or amalgamated soon after; the present 2nd battalion was raised in 1858.
The facings, originally white, were yellow in 1751, and so remained until the present territorial designations were adopted, when, as an English regiment, it reverted to white. The badge is the united red and white rose; but formerly it appears to have worn "the Grand Cross of the Bath." A hart crossing a ford (the device of the Hertford Militia) is worn (on a Maltese Cross over an eight-pointed star) on the button, helmet-plate, and waist-plate; the hart alone on the tunic collar and forage-cap. The Militia battalions are the 1st Bedford (1763), which had for its motto "Proaris et focis," and at one time wore the "bugle" as a Light Infantry force; and 4th Hertford (1759). The volunteer battalions are the 1st Hertfordshire, Hertford (grey and scarlet), the 2nd Hertfordshire, Little Gaddesden (grey and grey), and the 1st Bedfordshire, Bedford (scarlet and white). The earliest nickname was "The Old Bucks" since allusion to its ill luck in having to do its duty of late years in part of the world where campaigns were not raging, it has been called the "Peace-makers" (no names having been on the colours until the territorial system was introduced) and the "Feather-beds," from having "seen no service since Malplaquet." Not to see active service is the misfortune, not the crime, of the regiment. The depot was at Bedford.
