1st Infantry Regiment
Modern Era, United States, Infantry
The 1st Infantry Regiment is one of the oldest units in the Regular Army. Its lineage begins on 3 March 1791, when Congress constituted the 2d Infantry to strengthen the small post-Revolutionary Army for frontier service. That early force suffered badly in St. Clair's 1791 campaign in the Old Northwest, but the regiment's lineage survived the Army's reorganization into Anthony Wayne's Legion of the United States. As part of the 2d Sub-Legion, it helped win the campaign that ended in the victory at Fallen Timbers in 1794, one of the formative actions of the early regular army.
After the Legion was broken back into regiments, the unit resumed the designation 2d Infantry. It served in the War of 1812, including the New Orleans campaign, and in 1815 it was consolidated with the 3d, 7th, and 44th Infantry to form the 1st Infantry Regiment. Through the antebellum decades the regiment campaigned on the expanding American frontier, earning credit in the Black Hawk War and the Seminole War while building the hard-service reputation that later became part of its identity.
The regiment fought in the Mexican War under officers associated with the old frontier army, including Zachary Taylor. It saw hard urban fighting at Monterrey and then joined Winfield Scott's campaign at Vera Cruz and inland toward Mexico City. Afterward the 1st returned to frontier duty in Texas and the West, a pattern typical of Regular Army regiments of the period. During the Civil War it escaped Confederate pressure in Texas, fought at Wilson's Creek, served in the Mississippi Valley, and took part in the Vicksburg campaign.
Service on the western frontier resumed after 1865. In 1869 the regiment was consolidated with the 43d Infantry, Veteran Reserve Corps, and continued operations in the long Indian Wars, including campaigns against the Sioux, Comanche, Seminole, Apache, and other Native opponents listed in its official lineage. By the end of the nineteenth century the 1st Infantry had also served in the War with Spain at Santiago. In that 1898 campaign it fought as a Regular Army regiment in the expedition to Cuba rather than as part of a permanent numbered division, since the Army's later divisional system had not yet taken its modern form.
In the early twentieth century the regiment served in the Philippine-American War from 1900 to 1902 and again from 1906 to 1908. Like its service in Cuba, that duty was performed as a separate Regular Army regiment in the islands rather than as part of a permanent numbered division. In World War I the regiment was finally brought into the divisional system when it was assigned to the 13th Division on 11 September 1918, but the division never deployed overseas before the Armistice and the regiment was relieved from the 13th Division in March 1919.
The regiment then shifted fully into modern divisional warfare. It was assigned to the 2d Division in 1921 and transferred to the 6th Division in 1939. In World War II it fought primarily as part of the 6th Infantry Division in the Pacific, earning campaign credit for New Guinea and Luzon with arrowheads for assault landings. During the Luzon fighting the regiment was briefly attached to the 38th Infantry Division and later to XI Corps before returning to 6th Infantry Division control. After the war it served with the 6th Infantry Division in the occupation of Korea until inactivation there in January 1949.
When the Korean War began, the regiment was reactivated at Fort Ord on 4 October 1950 and remained assigned to the 6th Infantry Division, but it served as a training regiment in the United States rather than deploying to Korea as a combat unit. In 1956 it was relieved from the 6th Infantry Division and assigned to the United States Military Academy before later reorganization under the Combat Arms Regimental System and, eventually, the U.S. Army Regimental System.
The Vietnam War added another major chapter to the regiment's story. The 2d Battalion deployed in 1966 with the 196th Light Infantry Brigade, while the 3d Battalion deployed in 1967 with the 11th Infantry Brigade; once in Vietnam, both battalions served as elements of the Americal Division. The regiment's official campaign participation credit includes the long sequence of Vietnam campaigns from Counteroffensive Phase II through the Cease-Fire. The regiment also holds a Presidential Unit Citation for Maffin Bay, a Valorous Unit Award for Quang Tin Province, and a Philippine Presidential Unit Citation, marks of distinguished combat service carried forward in its colors and traditions.
Today the regiment's lineage continues through active battalions rather than as a maneuver regiment in the old nineteenth-century sense. The 1st Battalion supports the United States Military Academy at West Point, while the 2d Battalion has served as an infantry battalion in the Pacific Northwest. The motto Semper Primus, "Always First," reflects both the regiment's antiquity and its long record of adaptation, from the frontier army of the 1790s to the professional force of the modern United States Army.
Battalion Page
A dedicated battalion subpage now collects the regiment's known battalion icons and short sketches for the 1st, 2d, and 3d Battalions. Open the 1st Infantry Regiment Battalions page.