FOOTNOTES:
[2] The standard at that time, when men were quickly used up, was five feet two with us.
CHAPTER IX.
The North Mayo militiaman—Chances of warfare—Marshal Beresford—Eight hundred for nothing—Moneymaking.
Whilst we lay near Cork we were joined by one Richard Pullen, amongst others; he had exchanged from the English militia into the Irish, and volunteered to us Rifles from the North Mayo. He brought with him little else to boast of but his wife and his two children, Charles and Susan. Charles was a mischievous boy of about twelve, and Susan was a pretty little lass, of about fourteen years of age. I remember they all went with us to Copenhagen, and got through that expedition pretty well. That affair suited a man of Pullen's description, for he didn't like too much service; and we soon found he was rather a shy cock. "None of your North Mayho, here, Master Pullen!" used to be constantly flung in his teeth, when he was lagging behind on the march. In 1808 he was again wanted, when our four companies went to Portugal; but Pullen begged off, on account of the wife and the two children, Charles and Susan. Often had he to endure the taunt again, "None of your North Mayho here, Master Pullen!" till we were fairly away from Hythe.
After we had knocked the frogs out of Portugal, marching on Sahagun, we fell in with the army under Sir John Moore, and, amongst the Rifles that came with them fresh from England, we found Pullen and his wife, with their two children, Charles and Susan. I remember that the meeting with Pullen caused no small fun amongst us; and North Mayho was again the bye-word for a few days. Nothing, I thought at that time, could tame down the high spirits and thoughtlessness of the British soldier. Alas! I lived to see that I was mistaken; and, indeed, saw them pretty well tamed before many days more were over our heads! I remember remarking that Pullen (even on the first day of the retreat to Corunna) looked very chap-fallen and seedy; and he was beginning even then to complain that he could not stand much more. The wife and children, too, were dropping behind. They all thought, poor souls! that when night came on they were, of course, to be billeted; but the open world was now their only refuge; and no allowance to stop or lie down, even on the bare heath, at that time. I saw Pullen again on the third or fourth day; neither the wife nor children were then with him, nor could he tell where they were; he could only answer for himself, and expected to drop dead, he said, every step. That's all I saw of Pullen, and his wife and children, on the retreat, or even thought of them; for I had enough to do to keep my own strength up. When we landed at Portsmouth, both myself and others (to our no small surprise), saw Pullen once more; and much we wondered at the sight of him, when so many better and stronger soldiers had died before half of that retreat was accomplished. We had not even then spirits enough left to jeer him about North Mayho; and, to add to the dejection of poor Pullen, we found that he had left behind him, and knew nothing of the fate of either his wife or his children, Charles and Susan. As the men continued to disembark, however, there was Pullen inquiring anxiously of every one for some tidings of them. None, however, could he get. At last he saw his wife coming up the beach, and hobbled off to meet her, each at the same moment inquiring for the children, Charles and Susan. He trusted they were with the wife; and she hoped they were with the husband; and both sat down upon the beach, and cried in concert. All our men thought it useless of them to continue their inquiries; but they never failed to ask after their offspring of every fresh face they fell in with, who had been in that retreat. In about a fortnight's time, not satisfied, they advertised Charles and Susan in the public newspapers; and we all laughed at the very idea of their ever finding them again, and told them they might have spared the money. To our no small surprise, however, the artillery at Plymouth answered their advertisement, stating that a little girl had been heard screaming upon the mountains in Spain by them in the night, and that they had taken care of her as well as they could, and had her then with them. The description answering, the girl was forwarded to Hythe; and Pullen and his wife once more embraced their daughter Susan.
Meanwhile, no tidings came of the boy; and Pullen died at Walcheren, with many a gallant soldier for his fellow-victim in that dreadful country. The wife had confessed long before that the child she had given birth to after the retreat, she had every reason to believe, was a Frenchman by the father's side; for she related her adventures to many of us at that time, and told, amongst other things, that she and other women, having taken refuge in a barn, were there overtaken by the French in the night, and treated by those gentlemen in a very unceremonious manner.
It is easy to suppose that Mrs. Pullen had no great wish to go on service again, and much did she endeavour to persuade Pullen to evade it too; but, the whole regiment being under orders for Walcheren, Pullen could not escape the chance. At last, however, he tried to excuse himself by tampering with his eyes, which he made sore by putting snuff in them. He was, however, detected, disgraced, and, sailing with the expedition, died, as I before said, at Walcheren.
After his death, Mrs. Pullen and her daughter were sent to their parish, which was in Warwickshire; and, after she had left us some time, a letter arrived from her son, Charles, who was a prisoner in France. There was, I think, not a man in the regiment who recollected the North Mayho recruit but myself. War, and pestilence, and discharge, had taken all away. The bugle-major opened the letter; and, on inquiry, found that I alone knew the parents of the writer; but no answer, that I ever heard of, was sent to poor Charles. The captain of Pullen's company (Crampton) was dead, and the company was almost entirely new. I myself was then almost in a dying state, and the matter was soon altogether forgotten. So that, whether Mrs. Pullen ever again saw her son, I cannot take upon me to say.
It was during the heat of the day of Vimiero. We were rather hotly pressed by the enemy, after having advanced somewhat too near their force. Give and take is all fair enough; but we were getting more kicks than halfpence, as the saying is; and their balls stung us so sharply that the officers gave the word to "fire and retire".[3] Doubtless, many got a leaden messenger as they did so, which saved them the unpleasant necessity of retracing their ground altogether. Jock Gillespie and myself wheeled about, and obeyed the order. Just as we had done so, I saw Gillespie limp along as though some one had bestowed a violent kick upon his person. However, he didn't give up at first, but continued to load, and fire, and make off with the other skirmishers, till we halted, and made another stand; for we never went further from them when once engaged, than we could possibly help.
Gillespie loaded, and fired very sharply, I recollect; seemingly quite affronted at the treatment he had received; but he got weaker and more lame as he did so, and at last was quite unable to continue the game any longer; and, when we advanced again, he was floored from loss of blood. I had asked him once or twice where he was hit, but he seemed unwilling to say, till at last he confessed; and the confession gave him apparently as much pain as the wound.
After the battle was over, I observed him endeavouring to get about, and limping as badly as if one leg was a foot shorter than the other, whilst our men, who had got hold of the story, kept calling after, and making all sorts of fun about his wound; till poor Gillespie (who was a very sensitive man) sat down and cried like a child with vexation. I never saw him after that night; and I rather think his wound had completely disabled him, and that eventually he got a discharge.
I remember a great many of the leaders and heroes of the wars of my own time. Alas! they have been cleared off of late pretty handsomely! A few years more, and the world will be without another living remembrancer of either them or their deeds. The ranks are getting thin, too, amongst those who, like myself, were the tools with which the great men of former days won their renown. I don't know a single living man now who was a comrade during the time I served. Very nearly fifteen years back, I remember, however, meeting with Robert Liston; and that meeting brings Marshal Beresford to my mind. Robert Liston was a corporal in the second battalion of the Rifles, when we lay for a few days in the passages of a convent in Portugal. We were then making for the frontiers of Spain, when we were swept into that disastrous retreat to Corunna. There was a punishment parade in the square of this convent. A soldier of the Ninety-second or Seventy-ninth was the culprit, and the kilts were formed to witness the performance. Some of the Rifles were looking from the windows of the convent at the punishment of the Highlander, when a brickbat was hurled from one of the casements, and fell at the very toe of the lieutenant-colonel, who was standing in the midst, and in command of the regiment. The lieutenant-colonel (whose name I never knew,) was of course indignant at such an act; he gazed up at the window from which the brick had been thrown, and caused an inquiry instantly to be made. It was between the lights when this happened, and it was impossible to discover who had done it; however, two or three men of the Rifles were confined on suspicion. A man named Baker flatly accused Corporal Liston of the act; upon which Liston was marched a prisoner to Salamanca (a distance, I should think, of some hundred miles); and often did he complain of his hard fate in being a prisoner so long. When we got to Salamanca we halted there for eight days; and Liston, being tried by general court-martial, was sentenced to receive eight hundred lashes. The whole brigade turned out on the occasion; and I remember that the drummers of the Ninth regiment were the inflictors of the lash. Liston received the whole sentence without a murmur. He had, indeed, been a good soldier, and we were all truly sorry for him; in fact, he always declared solemnly that he had no more to do with the brickbat than Marshal Beresford who commanded the brigade. Whoever committed the act, in my opinion, well deserved what Liston got. Marshal Beresford was in command of the brigade at this time; and I well remember what a fine-looking soldier he was. He was equal to his business, too, I should say; and he, amongst others of our generals, often made me think that the French army had nothing to shew in the shape of officers who could at all compare with ours. There was a noble bearing in our leaders, which they, on the French side (as far as I was capable of observing) had not; and I am convinced that the English soldier is even better pleased to be commanded by some man of rank in his own country, than by one who has risen from his own station.
They are a strange set, the English! and so determined and unconquerable, that they will have their way if they can. Indeed, it requires one who has authority in his face, as well as at his back, to make them respect and obey him. They see too often, in the instance of serjeant-majors, that command does not suit ignorant and coarse-minded men; and that tyranny is too much used even in the brief authority which they have. A soldier, I am convinced, is driven often to insubordination by being worried by these little-minded men for the veriest trifles, about which the gentleman never thinks of tormenting him. The moment the severity of the discipline of our army is relaxed, in my opinion, farewell to its efficiency; but for our men to be tormented about trifles (as I have seen at times) is often very injurious to a whole corps.
I never saw Liston after that punishment whilst in Spain; and I suppose he remained behind, and got on in the best manner he was able in the rear; but, about ten years afterwards, as I was passing down Sloane Street, Chelsea, I observed a watchman calling the hour. It struck me that I knew his face, and, turning back, I stopped him, asking if he was not Robert Liston, formerly a corporal in the Ninty-fifth Rifles? After answering in the affirmative, the first words he spoke were, "Oh! Harris! do you remember what happened to me at Salamanca?"
"I do well," I said.
"I was never guilty," he continued. "There is no occasion for me to deny it now; but I tell you that I was never guilty of the crime for which I suffered. Baker was a villain, and I believe that he was himself the culprit."
I recollect Marshal Beresford making a speech on the subject of the buttons of our great-coats; and, however such a subject may appear trifling for a general officer to speak on, I can tell you, it was a discourse which our men (some of them) much needed; for they had been in the habit of tearing off the buttons from their coats, and after hammering them flat, passing them as English coin, in exchange for the good wines of Spain. So that, at last, the Spaniards, finding they got nothing by the exchange but trumpery bits of battered lead, and the children in that country not being in the habit of playing at dumps as ours are, they made complaints to the Marshal. Halting the brigade, therefore, one day, he gave them a speech upon this fraud, and ended by promising a handsome flogging to the first man he found thereafter, whose great-coat would not keep buttoned in windy weather.