There was, throughout the war, a perceptible proportion of officers who had risen from the ranks. Meritorious service, showing good capacity as well as courage, not unfrequently led to the promotion of a sergeant to an ensigncy. A well-remembered case is that of the Sergeant Newman of the 43rd who rallied the stragglers during the march from Lugo to Betanzos, in the Corunna retreat, and beat off the pursuing French dragoons. Another is that of Sergeant Masterson of the 2/87th, who captured the eagle of the 8th Ligne at Barrosa. Many more might be quoted, though none of them is so striking as that of a man who did not serve in the Peninsula, but in contemporary campaigns in India, the celebrated John Shipp. He was twice given a commission for deeds of exceptional daring. After winning his first ensigncy in the storming party at the Siege of Bhurtpoor in 1805, he was forced to “sell out” a little later by improvident living. He enlisted as a private in another regiment, and was again promoted from the ranks for a single combat with a Nepaulese chief during the first Goorkha War of 1815. Conducting himself with more wisdom on his second chance, he served long as an officer, and when he went on half-pay became chief-constable of Liverpool. His autobiography is an artless and interesting piece of work well worth perusal.
When a regiment had greatly distinguished itself in the field, Wellington not unfrequently directed its colonel to recommend a sergeant for a commission. This, for example, was done for all three battalions of the Light Division after their splendid exploit at Bussaco. Yet he did not approve of this system of promotion as anything but a very exceptional measure, and in his table-talk with Lord Stanhope we find some very harshly worded verdicts on old rankers, “their origin would come out, and you could never perfectly trust them,”[211] especially in the matter of drink. This seems to be a typical instance of the Duke’s aristocratic prejudices—but there was something in what he said. The position of the promoted sergeants was certainly difficult, and it required a man of exceptional character to make it good. As a rule, they drifted into the position of paymasters, recruiting officers, barrack masters, and such-like posts. But many of them made useful and efficient adjutants. In command they were not as a rule successful,[212] and I have only come on a single case of one who reached the rank of full colonel, and of two who were fortunate enough to obtain a majority. It is clear that the purchase system pressed very hardly upon them: with no private resources it was impossible for them ever to buy a step, and, after reaching the rank of captain, they almost invariably went upon half-pay or looked for employment in some civil or semi-civil capacity.
Concerning the equipment of the officer, his baggage, his horses and mules, and his servants, information will be found in another chapter. Here we are dealing with him as an item in the machinery of the regiment.
CHAPTER XII
INTERNAL ORGANIZATION OF THE REGIMENT: THE RANK AND FILE
He who would make himself acquainted in detail with the many experiments by which British Governments, from the rupture of the Peace of Amiens onward, strove to keep on foot in full numbers the very large army that it had raised, must satisfy his curiosity by studying the admirable volumes of Mr. Fortescue. Here we are concerned only with the methods which prevailed from 1809 till 1814, and gave Wellington the invincible, though often attenuated, battalions which conquered at Talavera and Bussaco, at Salamanca and Toulouse.
Volunteers from the Militia
In the Peninsular Army the system of territorial names prevailed for nearly all the regiments of the line, but in most cases the local designation had no very close relation with the actual provenance of the men. There were a certain number of regiments that were practically national, e.g. most of the Highland battalions, and nearly all of the Irish ones, were very predominantly Highland and Irish as to their rank and file: but even in the 79th or the 88th there was a certain sprinkling of English recruits. And in some nominally Scottish regiments like the 71st Highland Light Infantry, or the 90th Perthshire Volunteers,[213] the proportion of English and Irish was very large. Similarly in almost all the nominally English regiments there was a large sprinkling of Irish, and a few Scots. This came partly from the fact that, though the corps recruited in their own districts, yet they were often allowed to send recruiting parties to great centres like London, Bristol, Liverpool, Glasgow, or Dublin. But still more was it due to the fact that the larger half of the recruits were raised not in the old normal fashion, but by volunteering from the embodied militia, and that in this system practically no attempt was made to confine the choice of militiamen wishing to join the regular army to their territorial regiment. Nothing, for example, was more usual than to find such things as 100 of the King’s County Militia joining the 31st or Huntingdonshire Regiment. When the 77th or East Middlesex Regiment returned from India in 1808, it was completed, before going out to the Peninsula, from the 1st West York, North and South Mayo, Northampton, and South Lincoln Militia, but did not get a single man from the Middlesex Militia.[214] The Shropshire Regiment (53rd) when allowed in a similar case to call for volunteers, did get 99 from its own county militia, but 144 more from the Dorset, East York, and Montgomery local corps.[215] The 81st or Loyal Lincoln was filled up in 1808, before sailing for Portugal, from the Dublin, King’s County, South Devon, and Montgomery Militia. Instances might be multiplied ad nauseam. It was quite exceptional for any English corps to contain a preponderance of men from its own nominal district, and nearly all of them had from a fifth to a fourth of Irish.
It is impossible to exaggerate the advantage to the Peninsular Army of the system, the invention of Castlereagh when War Minister, which enabled it to draw in such a heavy proportion on the militia for recruits.[216] The men thus obtained had all had at least twelve months’ drill and discipline, in a corps which had been under arms for many years: they were trained soldiers of some little experience, much superior in fact to the recruits who had been procured in other ways. The permanent militia represented the force raised by the counties by ballot, though substitutes rather than principals were procured by that device. Being forced to serve at home for a period of years, the militiamen freely volunteered into the line, from love of adventure, dislike of dull country quarters in England or Ireland,[217] and, it must be added, the temptation of the enormous bounty, running at various times from £16 up to £40, which was given to those changing their service.[218]
It is a mistake to make a point, as some writers have done, of the fact that many regiments appeared in Spain with their ranks “full of raw militiamen, who sometimes still bore their old militia badges on their knapsacks.” So far from their being ineligible recruits, they were the very best, for the militia of 1808–14 was not a body called out for short service during one month of the year, but a permanent institution which practically formed a second line to the field army. And no man was allowed to volunteer into the regulars till he had served a full year in the local corps in which he had enlisted. A regiment must get drafts on active service, and these were the very best sort that could be obtained. Of course a corps filled up hastily with a great number of them, would want a little time to shake down, but it would take far longer to assimilate a corresponding number of ordinary recruits, hurried out from its regimental depôt—for these men would neither have had a whole year’s drill, nor would they have been accustomed to the daily economy of a full regiment—depôts seem to have been slackly administered, in many cases by officers and sergeants invalided and past service, or who had of their own desire shirked the service at the front.