 The Boer War provided the first opportunity for the regiment 's volunteer battalions to serve overseas with regular forces , supplying individual detachments and service companies . The militia battalions , numbered the 5th and 6th during the war , contrastingly deployed to South Africa intact late in the conflict . A memorial sculpted by William Goscombe John to commemorate the regiment 's service in Afghanistan , Burma , and South Africa was erected in St John 's Gardens , Liverpool and unveiled by Field Marshal Sir George White on 9 September 1905 . 
