'A' Squadron. No 1 Troop, 3rd County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), en route to Egypt, 1941

Photograph by Major Wilfred Herbert James Sale, 3rd/4th County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), 1941.

Group portrait on board RMS Orion, en route to North Africa. Individuals named are: third row: W Phillis, M Bailey, P Hartland, G Jetley, A MacAllen, I M Davies; second row: White, H L Glassbrow, T A C Boothby, 2nd Lieutenant Lindsey, D R E Lloyd, C Stocking, R Preston; front row: P H Budgen, A A Vokes, T W Elkins, F G Dressel, R A L Leggett.

According to the Sharpshooters' war diary, 40 officers and 603 other ranks of the 3rd County of London Yeomanry embarked on the Orion at Avonmouth on 14 August 1941. The troopship sailed for the Middle East the next day. British forces travelling to Egypt avoided the Mediterranean Sea because of the threat from German and Italian forces. The Sharpshooters' route included stops at Freetown in Sierra Leone and Cape Town in South Africa, then on to Aden and then up to Egypt.

Trooper Frederick George Dressel was killed in action in North Africa on 5 June 1942. Lance Sergeant Philip Budgen would not survive the War. He died, aged 35, of wounds received while fighting in Sicily, on 14 July 1943.

From a photograph album containing 84 group photographs compiled by Major W H J Sale, MC, 3rd/4th County of London Yeomanry (Sharpshooters), 1941.