The Island of Cape Breton was given the task of raising a Battalion, to be known as the 185th and to be under the command of Lieut.-Col. F. P. Day (then Major Day) of the 85th Battalion. Though Cape Breton had already given men to the colors, in numbers far in excess of her due proportion, nevertheless, the prospect of seeing active service with a Unit distinctly and entirely Cape Breton, so fired the imagination of the young men of the Island that in three weeks the Battalion was recruited to full strength. The system of recruiting employed was well calculated to obtain the best results. First, the officers were selected. Some of them were Cape Bretoners, serving with the 85th Battalion, a few came from the Officers’ Training Corps of the Colleges, but the majority were drawn from the 94th, the Cape Breton Militia Unit. These officers were sent out into their own native districts to recruit men for their own Companies or Platoons, and the assurance was given that men from the same locality would be placed together in the same Company, Platoon, or Section as the case might be, and under an officer from that locality. That assurance was kept sacredly. The motto selected for the Battalion was the same as that of the 85th—“Siol Na Fear Fearail”—“Seed of Manly Men.” That motto was highly appropriate, for the ranks of the Battalion were in large part filled by descendants of Highlanders—those manly men who peopled Cape Breton in late 18th and early 19th centuries. To the Highland element in the population of Cape Breton the 185th made its greatest appeal, for the promise had been given that the Battalion should wear Highland garb, and the prospect of joining a Unit which should be clad in that picturesque and historic dress undoubtedly touched the Highland imagination. But the other races did not lag behind. The French, Irish and English elements were well represented, and there were not a few recruits of Italian and Russian extraction. “A” Company of the 185th came from the counties of Inverness, Victoria and Richmond; “B” Company from Glace Bay and New Waterford; “C” Company from North Sydney and Sydney Mines; and “D” Company from Sydney. Broughton, eighteen miles from Sydney, was chosen as a mobilization centre, and there the Battalion assembled during the first week of April, 1916. At Broughton, three bands, Pipe, Brass and Bugle were organized. The citizens of Glace Bay, the Royal Cape Breton Yacht Club, the “Green Feather” Societies of North Sydney and Sydney Mines, and Mr. Thomas Cantley, of New Glasgow, each presented four pipes and three drums to the Battalion. Money for the purchase of instruments for the Brass Band was subscribed by the citizens of Sydney. For the Regimental March, the stirring Highland air, “A Hundred Pipers,” was chosen.