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Royal Highlander

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Royal Highlander
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Author(s): James Anton
Date Published: 05/2007
Page Count: 216
Softcover ISBN-13: 978-1-84677-211-5
Hardcover ISBN-13: 978-1-84677-223-8

James Anton was a Scottish highlander whose taste for adventure led him to join the militia and then the regular infantry—as a soldier of the 42nd—The Royal Highlanders. The Peninsular War had been raging for years before Anton landed in northern Spain to see action at Nivelle as the war turned from the Iberian Peninsula to the campaign in southern France. After hard campaigning and more battles, the First Restoration seemed to bring an end to Napoleon’s wars. Anton left the Continent for garrison duty in Ireland—but Napoleon had not yet done with Europe, and shortly Anton and his kilted comrades were embarked once again and on their way to the battlefields of Quatre Bras and Waterloo, where they would take part in events that would be indelibly engraved in the history of warfare.

At this time the clothing of the army at large, but the Highland brigade in particular, was in a very tattered state. The clothing of the 91st regiment had been two years in wear; the men were thus under the necessity of repairing their old garments in the best manner they could: some had the elbows of the coats mended with grey cloth, others had the one half of the sleeve of a different colour from the body; and their trousers were in equally as bad a condition as their coats.
The 42nd, which was the only corps in the brigade that wore the kilt, was beginning to lose it by degrees; men falling sick and left in the rear frequently got the kilt made into trousers, and on joining the regiment again no plaid could be furnished to supply the loss; thus a great want of uniformity prevailed; but this was of minor importance when compared to the want of shoes. As our march con≠tinued daily, no time was to be found to repair them, until completely worn out; this left a number to march with bare feet, or, as we termed it, to pad the hoof. These men being occasionally permitted to straggle out of the ranks to select the soft part of the roads or fields adjoining, others who had not the same reason to offer for this indulgence followed the example, until each regiment marched regardless of keeping in rank, and sometimes mixed with other corps in front and rear. To put a stop to this irregularity, the men without shoes were formed by themselves, and marched, under the command of offi≠cers and non-commissioned officers, in rear of the brigade.
It is impossible to describe the painful state that some of those shoeless men were in, crippling along the way, their feet cut or torn by sharp stones or brambles.
To remedy the want of shoes, the raw hides of the newly-slaughtered bullocks were given to cut up, on purpose to form a sort of buskins for the barefooted soldiers. This served as a substitute for shoes, and enabled the wearers to march in the ranks of their respective com≠panies.
Our knapsacks were also by this time beginning to dis≠play, from their torn ends, their worthless contents; and as our line of march was in an opposite direction from our expected supplies, our exterior appearance was daily get≠ting worse; but the real spirit of the soldier was improv≠ing, and I make little doubt but we would have followed our leaders to the extremity of Europe without grum≠bling.Our colonel was a brave man, but there are moments when a well-timed manoeuvre is of more advantage than courage. The regiment stood on the road with its front exactly to the enemy, and if the left wing had been or≠dered forward, it could have sprung up the bank in line and dashed forward on the enemy at once. Instead of this, the colonel faced the right wing to its right, counter≠marched in rear of the left, and when the leading rank cleared the left flank it was made to file up the bank, and as soon as it made its appearance the shot, shell, and musketry poured in with deadly destruction; and in this exposed position we had to make a second counter march, on purpose to bring our front to the enemy.
These movements consumed much time, and by this unnecessary exposure exasperated the men to madness. The word ìForwardódouble quick.íî dispelled the gloom, and forward we drove, in the face of apparent destruction. The field had been lately rough ploughed or under fallow, and when a man fell he tripped the one behind, thus the ranks were opening as we approached the point whence all this hostile vengeance proceeded; but the rush forward had received an impulse from desperation, the spring of the menís patience had been strained until ready to snap, and when left to the freedom of its own extension, ceased not to act until the point to which it was directed was at≠tained. In a minute every obstacle was surmounted; the enemy fled as we leaped over the trenches and mounds like a pack of noisy hounds in pursuit, frightening them more by our wild hurrahs than actually hurting them by ball or bayonet.
The redoubt, thus obtained, consisted of an old country farm-cottage, the lower part of its walls stone, the upper part mud or clay. It stood in the corner of what had been a garden, having one door to a road or broad lane and another to the garden; the whole forming a square which had been lately fortified on three sides by a deep but dry trench, from which the earth had been cast in≠wards, and formed a considerable bank, sloping inwards, but presenting a perpendicular face of layers of green turf outwards. The cottage served as a temporary magazine, and the mound or embankment as a cover to the enemy from the fire of our troops; and from this place our men had been dreadfully cut down.
It cannot be for an instant supposed that all this could have been effected without very much deranging our ranks, and as the enemy had still a powerful force, and other works commanding this, time would not permit of particularity, and a brisk independent fire was kept up with more noise than good effect by our small groups upon our not yet defeated enemy.
Our muskets were getting useless by the frequent discharges, and several of the men were having recourse to the French pieces that lay scattered about, but they had been as freely used as our own, and were equally unserviceable. Our number of effective hands was also decreasing, and that of the again approaching foe irresistible. Two officers (Captain Campbell and Lieutenant Young) and about sixty of inferior rank were all that now remained without a wound of the right wing of the regiment that entered the field in the morning. The flag was hanging in tatters, and stained with the blood of those who had fallen over it. The standard, cut in two, had been successively placed in the hands of three officers, who fell as we advanced; it was now borne by a sergeant, while the few remaining soldiers who rallied around it, defiled with mire, sweat, smoke, and blood, stood ready to oppose with the bayonet the advancing column, the front files of which were pour≠ing in destructive showers of musketry among our con≠fused ranks.
To have disputed the post with such over≠whelming numbers, would have been hazarding the loss of our colours, and could serve no general interest to our army, as we stood between the front of our advancing support and the enemy; we were therefore ordered to retire. The greater number passed through the cottage, now filled with wounded and dying, and leaped from the door that was over the road into the trench of the redoubt, among the killed and wounded.
We were now between two fires of musketry, the enemy to our left and rear, the 79th and left wing of our own regiment in our front. Fortunately the intermediate space did not exceed a hundred paces, and our safe retreat de≠pended upon the speed with which we could perform it. We rushed along like a crowd of boys pursuing the bounding ball to its distant limit, and in an instant plunged into a trench that had been cut across the road: the balls were whistling amongst us and over us; while those in front were struggling to get out, those behind were holding them fast for assistance, and we became firmly wedged together, until a horse without a rider came plunging down on the heads and bayonets of those in his way; they on whom he fell were drowned or smothered, and the gap thus made gave way for the rest to get out.
The right wing of the regiment, thus broken down and in disorder, was rallied by Captain Campbell (afterwards Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel) and the adjutant (Lieutenant Young) on a narrow road, the steep banks of which served as a cover from the showers of grape that swept over our heads.
In this contest, besides our colonel, who was wounded as he gave the word of command, ìForward,î the regi≠ment lost, in killed and wounded, twenty officers, one sergeant-major, and four hundred and thirty-six of infe≠rior rank.
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