Invasion Prospects and Home Defence
In 1847 the Duke of Wellington, (then Commander-in-Chief,) addressed to Sir John Burgoyne a letter in which he said he had endeavoured to awaken the attention of different Administrations to the defenceless state of the country. We had, he declared, no defence, or hope of chance of defence, except in our Fleet, and he was especially sensible both of the certainty of failure if we did not, at an early moment, attend to the measures necessary to be taken for our defence and of "the disgrace, the indelible disgrace," of such failure. Then, in words that greatly impressed the country, he added:—
I am bordering upon seventy-seven years of age, passed in honour; I hope that the Almighty may protect me from being the witness of the tragedy which I cannot persuade my contemporaries to take measures to avert.
As the result alike of this pathetic warning; of a "Letter on the Defence of England by Volunteer Corps and Militia" issued in pamphlet form by Sir Charles Napier in 1852; and of the Indian Mutiny in 1857, which event called attention to the defenceless condition of the Empire as a whole, continuous efforts were made to secure the creation of Volunteer Corps for the purposes of defence. For a period of twelve years these efforts met with persistent discouragement, the Government refusing official recognition to certain corps of riflemen tentatively formed; but in 1859 the prospect of an early invasion of this country by France aroused public feeling to such an extent that on May 12 the then Secretary of State for War, General Peel, addressed a circular to the Lord-Lieutenants of counties in Great Britain announcing that Volunteer Corps might be formed under an Act passed in 1804, when a like course had been adopted as a precautionary measure against the threatened invasion of England by Napoleon.
The formation of Volunteer Corps was thereupon taken up with the greatest zeal, and by the end of 1860 the number of Volunteers enrolled throughout Great Britain was no fewer than 120,000. Other results of the national awakening in 1859 were the public discussion of the questions of coast defence and armoured trains, (of which mention has been made in Chapter VII,) and the appropriation, in 1860, of a loan of seven and a half millions for the improvement of our coast defences and notably the fortifications of Portsmouth and Plymouth.