 The regiment was raised by Colonel Edmund Fielding in March 1719 as Edmund Fielding's Regiment of Foot out of independent companies of invalids and Chelsea out-pensioners - soldiers incapable of normal service through disease, age or injury.For much of its early history the regiment undertook garrison duties at Portsmouth.It was renamed the Royal Invalids in 1741, and it was numbered the 41st Regiment of Foot in 1751.