History lesson on the SADF Engineers

I have researched the history of the SADF Engineer's unit and it's passage through time, our regiment was based on the British Royal Engineer Corps.

In 1066, William the Conqueror invaded Britain he brought his own version of engineers known as "Ingeniators" which meant a person skilled in the art of defence construction. Also known as a gifted person, genius or "Genie" by the French which brought about the Afrikaans name Genie. So our regiment has quite a pedigree in the pages of history. Further interesting note, the term Sapper derived from the word SAP or to SAP, which means to work in the open face of a trench or to work in a tunnel. Also back in the day only officers were members of the Corps of Engineers.

The first South African Engineers made their appearance in 1859 during the Colonial Regime and the Governor of the Cape Colony established the Cape Engineers, the title was then changed to the Cape Volunteer Engineer Corps.

To skip through time a bit - Post WW2 Engineers.

As the role of a Sapper was defined in both great wars, the post WW2 Sapper's functions evolved into ensuring the mobility of fighting units both in the advance or retreat, to make sure life was secure and as comfortable as possible. To achieve this, the modern Sapper had to use initiative, skill and experience and was tasked with denying these above necessities to the enemy. As such the motto came about of First In and Last Out.

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