Now three companies are known to have been present at Minden. Of one, Captain Phillips', there is fortunately no doubt. It was then No. 5 Company of the 1st Battalion; and after long and glorious service became on the 1st July, 1859, No. 7 Battery, 14th Brigade, when that change in the nomenclature of the companies took place, which is always baffling the student. On the 1st January, 1860, the exigencies of the service required yet another christening, and it became, on transfer, No. 4 Battery of the 13th Brigade, which it now is. This Battery was undoubtedly present at Minden.
The tracing of the other two companies is not so easy. It is on record that one was commanded by Captain Cleaveland. In 1758, this officer was in command of No. 2 Company of the 2nd Battalion, but in the winter of that year he exchanged with Captain Tovey, of the 1st Battalion, and almost immediately marched with his new company to join the Allied Armies on the Continent. This was then No. 4 Company of the 1st Battalion; and as Captain Cleaveland exchanged into it on the 30th October, 1758, and was in Germany with his Company in the beginning of December, (no second exchange having taken place,) there can be little doubt that another of the Companies at Minden was No. 4 Company of the 1st Battalion, now designated No. 3 Battery of the 5th Brigade.
Judging from a mention of Captain Drummond in one of Prince Ferdinand's despatches, the third company present at the battle would at first sight appear to have been No. 6 of the 2nd Battalion, commanded by Captain Thomas Smith,—Captain Drummond being at that date his Captain-Lieutenant. But there is no mention of Captain Smith in any of the despatches; and as there is a very frequent and most honourable mention of Captain Forbes Macbean, who was undoubtedly present in command of one of the companies, it would appear that Captain-Lieutenant Drummond must have been transferred to some other company for this service. Fortunately the Records of the 1st Battalion—generally a wilderness at this time—contain a key to the solution of the difficulty, for they show that Captain Forbes Macbean (on his promotion on 1st January, 1759, the very year that Minden was fought) took command of No. 8 Company of the 1st Battalion, now A Battery, 11th Brigade. As he never exchanged, and is specially mentioned as having taken his company to Germany, this may be assumed with certainty to have been the third of the companies present at Minden.
A little confusion has been caused by the mention of Captain Foy in Prince Ferdinand's General Order after the battle; and one writer, generally marvellously accurate, assumes that he commanded one of the companies engaged. But, in the first place, he was then merely a Captain-Lieutenant, and much junior even to Captain Drummond, and, in the second, he was then holding a special appointment, namely, that of Bridge-master to the Artillery. Although he and Captain Drummond had undoubtedly each charge of some guns during the battle, he was certainly not there with his Company. Indeed, in a contemporary notice, we find that this officer proceeded alone to join the Allied Army in the capacity named above. He held a similar appointment in America afterwards for nine years, and died in that country in 1779.
The two most prominent of the Artillery officers present at Minden were Captain Phillips, who commanded, and Captain Macbean; and both deserve more than passing notice. The former joined the Regiment as a cadet gunner in 1746, became Lieutenant-Fireworker in the following year, Second Lieutenant in 1755, and First Lieutenant in 1756. When holding this rank, he was appointed to the command of a company of miners raised in 1756 for duty in Minorca, but no longer required after the capitulation of Port Mahon. Instead of disbanding them, however, the Board of Ordnance converted them into a company of Artillery, and added them to the Regiment. Greatly to the indignation of the officers of a corps, whose promotion then, as now, was by seniority, Lieutenant Phillips was transferred with the company, as a Captain, without having passed through the intermediate grade of Captain-Lieutenant. If the end ever justifies the means, this job on the part of Sir John Ligonier, then Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance, was justified by Captain Phillips' subsequent career both in Germany and in America. A minor point in connection with this officer is worthy of mention. He was the first to originate a band in the Royal Artillery—not a permanent one, however—the present Band only dating as far back as 1771, when the 4th Battalion was formed, and with it the nucleus of what has developed into probably the best military band in the world. Captain Phillips died—a general officer—in Virginia, in the year 1781, from illness contracted on active service.
Forbes Macbean, the next most worthy of mention, began his career in the Regiment, as a Cadet Matross, and died in 1800 as Colonel-Commandant of the Invalid Battalion. He was present at Fontenoy, as has already been mentioned; in Germany during the campaign of which Minden was part; in Portugal, where he reached the rank of Inspector-General of the Portuguese Artillery; and in Canada, in the years 1778-9, as commanding the Royal Artillery. He is mentioned in Kane's List, as having been the second officer in the Regiment who obtained the blue ribbon of Science, the Fellowship of the Royal Society—an honour borne by a good many in the Regiment now, and valued by every one who appreciates its position as a scientific corps.
The battle of Minden was the first during the operations in Germany of the Allied Army under Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, at which special notice was made of the English troops.
These operations commenced in 1757, the year in which Prince Ferdinand assumed the command of the Allied Army, and terminated in 1762. On the 8th March, 1758, Prince Ferdinand captured Minden from the French—a town situated on the river Weser, about 45 miles W.S.W. from Hanover; and retained possession of it until July, 1759, when it was retaken from General Zastrow and his Hessian troops by the French under M. de Broglio.
During this interval, however, the Allied Army had been strengthened by the arrival of the following Regiments from England, sent by King George, as Elector of Brunswick-Luneberg, viz., Cavalry: Horse Guards Blue, Bland's, Howard's, Inniskillen, and Mordaunt's. Infantry: Napier's, Kingsley's, Welsh Fusiliers, Home's, and Stuart's.
These were afterwards joined by the North British Dragoons, and Brudenel's Regiment of Foot. The Artillery which first accompanied this force consisted of a Captain, six subalterns, and 120 non-commissioned officers and men, but in 1759 it was reinforced to a total strength of three companies. At first nothing but light 6-pounders had come, for use as battalion guns, and had this state of matters remained unaltered, this chapter need never have been written. But with the reinforcements of 1759 came also twenty-eight guns of heavier calibre, and the Artillery was now divided into independent Brigades or Batteries, with a proportion merely of battalion guns; and as it now ceased to march in one column, as had formerly been the case, the great kettledrums were no longer carried with the companies.