With the capture of the Mozzello redoubt, however, the enemy's resistance virtually came to an end, and his guns ceased to fire. Yet the Frenchmen refused to capitulate, and the British prosecuted the siege with vigour, pushing forward new batteries and mounting upwards of thirty pieces of ordnance. Moore wrote at the time: "The men and officers fall ill daily; considerably more than a third of our force are in the sick report; perhaps there never was so much work done by so few men in the same space of time."[19] By the 30th July the enemy began to consider the matter of terms, as Calvi had been set on fire in two or three places, and the British guns were doing much damage. After this General Stuart stopped all firing, while he entered into negotiations with General Casabianca; and on the 10th August Calvi surrendered, the defenders laying down their arms and forthwith embarking on transports.
Young Rice, as a very junior subaltern in the 51st, of course had no opportunity of distinguishing himself in these operations, and he does not appear to have been much impressed by his first campaign. On the 2nd August 1794 he wrote to his father from "Camp before Calvi," as follows:—
"A flag of truce having just gone in, or rather hoisted in the town by the enemy, and being not so much distracted by shot and shell, I embrace the opportunity (which I may say with truth is almost the only one I have had since the commencement of the siege) of writing these few lines. Do not expect now, when I begin, that I am going to give you minute details of all our operations here. In the first place, it would not be in my power, and, in the next, they would be very uninteresting. The papers will in all probability soon show the fate of Calvi and the operations before it. They are, in my opinion, better able to provide news of that nature than are private letters. The most satisfactory news, I imagine, to you will be that of my health and safety. The flag of truce above mentioned will in all probability terminate in the capitulation of Calvi, which I am extremely glad to think likely, not on account of the danger of shot and shell, but on account of the great sickness from which both officers and men are suffering. The disease, which is a fever, not only happens to the most delicate, but seizes in the most sudden manner on the most robust and healthy. We have now out of our army upwards of 2000 lying in fevers, and a great number of officers. It is not very dangerous, but two officers have died of it. In my opinion, the disease arises from our having to lie in the trenches exposed to the intense heat of the sun. I am quite tired of the siege. We have taken all the enemy's outposts and silenced all his guns, and the town has been in flames for some days. If they continue stubborn, the General is determined to hearken to no more flags of truce, as he has so often been humbugged by them before; but to batter a breach and enter the town by storm, which will be easily effected, though perhaps not without a few broken heads. As yet only four officers have been killed, and six or seven wounded. Colonel Moore was slightly wounded on the head at the storming of the Mozzello redoubt, but is now, I am happy to say, quite recovered. An unfortunate shot killed an officer[20] of ours the day before yesterday in the trenches. He had only just joined, and was an excellent young fellow, and is much lamented.
"I would thank you to tell Mr Greenwood[21] to write to Colonel Moore, as is customary, about my promotion; for until that time I do not take the rank of lieutenant in the regiment.
"I was at the taking of Bastia, though did not reap many laurels there. All I can say is that we were ready to do anything that there was to be done. My Lord Hood and his marines claimed the honour—if there was any—of taking that town. Bastia is a very good town, and will make very pleasant quarters. Calvi is to appearance no great things. Ajaccio is much the pleasantest place in the whole island.
"August 4th.—My lieutenancy was this day noted to the regiment—the commission dated 1st April. We have not yet taken possession of the town, but are pretty certain the business is at an end. The General has not thought fit to divulge the great secret.
"August 11th.—The enemy marched out of Calvi yesterday with the honours of war, and embarked on board transports for conveyance to Toulon. The town of Calvi is in a deplorable state."
Sir John Moore's Diary bears out this last statement. "It is inconceivable," he wrote, "the destruction our fire has occasioned; there is literally not a house which has not been damaged by shot or shell. The whole is a heap of ruins." Moore also often lamented the sickness from which the troops suffered, but an entry made in his Diary of the 16th August shows that Sam Rice's regiment was better off than most. "The 51st," said Moore, "have fewer sick than any other regiment, owing undoubtedly to our surgeon, M'Cleish, who is a diligent and intelligent man; but also, in a great degree, to the good regulation of our regimental hospital for these three or four years past. This was one of the first things to which I attended on getting the command of the regiment. It has remained in good order ever since then. I am now rewarded by having three times the number of duty men of any regiment here."[22]
The cause of all this sickness among the troops was undoubtedly exposure, for there appears to have been no epidemic of any kind, and modern soldiers under similar circumstances would probably suffer equally. In the daytime the men lay out continuously beneath the fierce heat of a Mediterranean summer's sun, and their dress was that worn in England in the winter—viz., tight-fitting cloth clothes, with their "clubbed" hair beneath a hat which, if anything, made their heads the hotter. At night they slept out, almost uncovered, among the mountains, at a temperature sometimes so low as almost to freeze the very marrow in their bones. That sunstroke and sun fever should have fallen upon them was little to be wondered at.