The 4th Londons were assigned the length from Waterloo to Farnborough, Hampshire, and the branch line to Alton and Bordon Camp. The Transport Section remained at Hoxton to complete mobilisation. On the night of 31 August/1 September the 1st London Bde was ordered back to its peacetime headquarters to mobilise for garrison duty overseas. On 4 September the 4th Londons entrained at Waterloo for Southampton, there to embark on HM Transport "Galician" bound for Malta. Four officers and a small number of NCOs and men ruled medically unfit for overseas service were left at Hoxton to begin recruiting a reserve battalion. Shortly afterwards this was designated the 2/4th Londons, after which the parent unit became the 1/4th Battalion. Later the 3/4th and 4/4th Battalions were also raised ("see below"). The battalions of the 1st London Bde were the first TF units to go on service overseas. The 1/4th Londons disembarked in Malta on 14 September and began coastal defence and guard duties as well as training the 250 recruits in its ranks. On 2 January 1915 the 1/4th Bn was relieved by the 2/4th Bn (leaving its obsolete rifles and equipment for the newcomers) and embarked on HMT "Avon" for Marseilles in France. After re-equipping with charger-loading Long Lee-Enfield rifles and 1914 pattern webbing equipment, 1/4th Londons joined GHQ Reserve at Saint-Omer for further training on 25 January. The battalion joined the Ferozepore Brigade of the 3rd (Lahore) Division on 20 February. At the beginning of the Battle of Neuve Chapelle on 10 March the Ferozepore Brigade was in Army Reserve, but it moved up on 12 March, the 1/4th Londons relieving the 41st Dogras of the 7th (Meerut) Division after an exhausting approach march: 'This position was perhaps not an ideal one for the first introduction of a raw battalion to trench warfare'. The planned attack did not materialise, and the 1/4th Londons returned to billets, having suffered 14 wounded. The battalion then entered the round of spells of trench duty alternating with periods in reserve. The Germans launched an attack preceded by poison gas at Ypres on 22 April. On 23 and 24 April the 1/4th Bn force-marched towards the Ypres Salient and went into the firing line on 26 April, digging new assembly trenches on a reverse slope.