Camel Transport Corps badge

A brass hat badge belonging to the Camel Transport Corps. The badge is in the form of a large leaf with 'CTC' voided in the centre.

From the earliest days of the First World War camels played a role in the logistics chain supplying British field forces in Egypt but this support was initially on an ad hoc basis using local Egyptian camel handlers hired on civilian contracts. The use of camels was placed on a much more formal footing with the formation of the Camel Transport Corps in December 1915. 

This was a regular British Army unit made up of locally recruited Egyptian camel handlers subject to military discipline and under the command of British officers and NCOs. It was organized into companies each of which comprised 2000 camels and some 1,100 Egyptian handlers to manage them. Although the new corps was formed with an initial strength of ten companies more were added as the war went on.

The camel transport companies usually made up the final leg of a logistics chain that saw ammunition and other supplies moved from ship to railway to a forward supply depot out in the desert, at which point the camels would take over and deliver them to the troops in the field. In this capacity the Camel Transport Corps played a vital part in the ultimately successful British campaigns against the Ottoman Turks in both the Sinai and Palestine, however this Corps and its work should not be confused with the Imperial Camel Corps.