Reminiscences of Captain Gronow

The spelling in this book is rather creative (including the occasional spelling of ankle as ancle ), and the punctuation is remarkably varied. I have tried to preserve both, except that the spaces between a word and the following colon or semicolon have been removed. There are also many French words and phrases, whose meaning will usually be obvious as soon as you realise they are French. Of course I apologize for any genuine errors in spelling and punctuation that have crept into this file.
Captain Gronow is an entertaining raconteur who brings his own experiences in the Regency period and the wars with France delightfully to life. Gronow published several sets of memoirs. This file covers the first half of what he published. Search the web for Captain Gronow to learn more about this interesting gentleman.
The text is arranged as a series of topics, each with a title in capital letters. Sometimes there is continuity in this arrangement, sometimes there is not. There is no other structure to the text.
I have used the character for pounds (money) in this text: '£'. If the character in single quotes does not look like a pound sign to you, well, at least you know what is intended. The book text uses a lower case 'l' for this purpose, but in computer fonts the 'l', looking just like a '1' when following a string of digits, is confusing.
Many thanks to Pam Wisniewski for proofreading this text.
—Tobias D. Robison, September, 2001 tdr21@columbia.edu
O friends regretted, scenes for ever dear! Remembrance hails you with her warmest tear! Drooping she bends o'er pensive fancy's urn, To trace the hours which never can return.

It has been my lot to have lived through the greater part of one of the most eventful centuries of England's history, and I have been thrown amongst most of the remarkable men of my day; whether soldiers, statesman, men of letters, theatrical people, or those whose birth and fortune—rather, perhaps, than their virtues or talents—have caused them to be conspicuous in society at home or abroad. Nature having endowed me with a strong memory, I can recall with all their original vividness scenes that took place fifty years ago, and distinctly recollect the face, walk, and voice, as well as the dress and general manner, of everyone whom I have known. I have frequently repeated to my friends what I have seen and heard since the year that I joined the Guards (1813), and have been urged to commit to paper my anecdotes and reminiscences.