He approved of my remark, and resolved accordingly to form at least one regiment of Rifles, and, as a first step, to appoint me Lieutenant and Adjutant of the regiment. He then gave me instructions to form recruiting parties, to raise five or six hundred men for that regiment, and particularly enjoined me to get as many old soldiers of the British Rifles as I possibly could. The Adjutancy I declined accepting, but I begged to be empowered to appoint a few non-commissioned officers as an encouragement to the old Peninsulars. This power he instantly granted me, and extended even to all whom I thought fitting for that duty, adding, “I will acquaint the Colonel of your regiment that I have granted you these privileges.” Mr. Bulwer remarking, “If I went into the country I might pick up many gamekeepers, who, he thought, would make excellent riflemen.” I replied, “That man shooting and game shooting were very different,” at which they both laughed heartily.
I immediately set to work and got hand-bills printed, and established recruiting parties at Westminster, the Borough, and Tower Hill, &c., and appointed about half a dozen sergeants and corporals, who were immediately supplied with green clothing. I next proceeded to Chatham and Gravesend, and stationed recruiting parties there also; and in the short space of two months we raised five hundred men.
A motley group I enlisted, from the sons of peers, down even to dustmen, including doctors, lawyers, parsons’ clerks, and all the trades necessary to form a national hive of cunning, craft and industry. I had an honourable for a sergeant (the Honourable A. Curzon), a doctor for a corporal (A. M. Hart), the former of whom was afterwards appointed Lieutenant.
These recruits I sent in small detachments on board the ‘Swiftsure,’ then lying at Portsmouth, the head-quarters of the regiment, appointing one sergeant and one corporal to every sixteen privates. In the beginning of September 1835, I received a letter from Baron de Rottenburgh, our Colonel, that the regiment was about to start for Spain, wishing me to make as much haste as possible in joining.
A few days after this I embarked from Gravesend, with nearly one hundred more men for the Rifles, on board the ‘London Merchant’ steamer, and arrived at Portsmouth the following day; but, unfortunately, the whole of the regiment had already sailed for Spain; after paying the men their bounty of two pounds each, the next morning we sailed also.
After a very pleasant voyage through the Bay of Biscay, about the middle of September, we came in sight of the Spanish coast; at first the eye was struck with the wild and magnificent sweep of the Pyrenean mountains, which to those unaccustomed to such scenery must be truly sublime. Through our glasses we could distinctly perceive the various little towns that dotted here and there the different inlets of the bay, and which had a very peculiar and wild appearance. But as we approached the land we could plainly discern, marching up the mountain sides, small bodies of soldiers which many on board mistook for the troops of Don Carlos, but on closer inspection we discerned to be the Queen’s.
Brigadier-General Evans, who was on board, having determined to land here, the necessary preparations were being made, when, to our surprise a vessel hove in sight, bearing the remainder of the Rifles from Santander to Bilboa. They were fully equipped with rifle and green clothing, and disembarked near Portugaletta, while we with the recruits landed also.
Thus, on the 19th September, about seven o’clock on a beautiful summer evening, I again landed on that soil on which, some four or five and twenty years ago I had witnessed so many severe contests. We landed near an old church, where the recruits were to remain for the night, without blankets, great-coats, or any sort of comfort, in the colonnades of a damp church. I shall never forget the discourse which took place between two of the men. One said to the other, “Are we to get no billets, but stop here for the night without straw, and nothing but these cold damp flag-stones to lie on? why, I see the General’s horses over the way, that have just landed, put into warm stables with straw; surely we are better than horses?” “Arrah, and who the devil tould you so?” said a countryman of mine, looking him hard in the face, “be my soul, the Queen of Spain only gave two pounds a-head for such fellows as you and me, and can get thousands more at the same money; while she is compelled to give fifty pounds for every horse!” Pat’s logic had the desired effect, and the poor recruits stretched their weary limbs for the night, with nothing but a thin smock-frock to keep them warm.
There was, at the time, in possession of Portugaletta, a Spanish regiment of the Queen’s Infantry doing duty, this made it exceedingly dangerous for any of our men to approach those fellows, from their ignorance and stupidity, for they looked upon anything bearing arms to be an enemy. One of my company had a melancholy experience of this, for on coming close to a Spanish sentry, under the darkness of the evening, he was challenged from a loop-hole through the mud-wall surrounding Portugaletta. The Englishman not knowing the language, could give no answer, and the consequence was, the Spaniard instantly fired and shot him through the knee. The poor fellow remained on the spot where he fell until the morning, his comrades being afraid to approach him for fear of a similar fate, and when brought to the company the next day, through weakness and loss of blood, while under amputation he died under the hands of the doctor. This for the first night of our landing was rather a bad omen. Passing the guard-house, with the intention of seeing how the men had fared during the night, at least half a dozen voices assailed my ears, “Oh! Sir! I hope you will get us released; we have been confined all night and have done no crime.” Perceiving they were some of the recruits I had brought over, I called the sergeant of the guard to inquire the cause; he informed me that they had been confined by officers of our regiment, for walking about without their regimentals; the men, however, had disembarked only the night before, and had not received their clothing; I ordered them to be released.
For this act of justice I shortly afterwards was nearly what was termed “called out” by a brace of officers of the Rifles (whom I knew only by their uniform), and who very abruptly asked me, why I had released men whom they had confined! I answered, that no crime had been committed by them, and that I deemed it right to release them, as men in the British Army were never confined without cause.