History of the Royal Regiment of Artillery Vol. 2 / Compiled from the Original Records

by Francis Duncan

1787. Rev. E. Jones to B. of Ordnance.

After patiently waiting for four years, the Chaplain again sent in a demand, stating that it was impossible to use those he had any longer.

The procrastination of the Board led, as may be imagined, to many inconveniences. A company in the Bahamas was ordered to be in readiness to return to England, and no clothing was sent to it for the year 1784, as the Board Colonel Macbean to Master-General, Feb. 9, 1787. promised to make immediate arrangements for its transport; but 1784 passed, and also 1785, and then 1786, and no transport was forthcoming, nor was any clothing sent for these three years.

It is a relief, however, to turn from the Board and its shortcomings, and to study the purely Regimental details of the period. Tame, and uninteresting, as they may appear beside the terrible seedtime in France, where the dragon’s-teeth of discord, licence, and rebellion were being scattered, to bring forth a thirty years’ harvest in Europe of armed men, they cannot be passed by in any work pretending to tell the story of the Regiment. They speak of an interior economy which has utterly disappeared,—of a time which might fitly be called “the age of the Colonels-Commandant.” So completely honorary has that rank now become in the Regiment, that the exercise of one small piece of patronage—the nomination of the Brigade Adjutant and Quartermaster—is the only link which connects those who hold it with the active duties of the Corps.

On the 30th January, 1873, the Colonels-Commandant were invited to leave their retirement, and to meet their brother officers once again at the Regimental mess. This rare réunion formed a marked contrast to the days referred to in this chapter. Then, the Colonels-Commandant of the four Battalions were entitled to live in barracks in the Warren; and an attempt was made to place them on the same roster for duty as the Colonels. Thanks to the conscientious and far-seeing judgment of the officers who then held the rank, this order was cancelled. The following protest, submitted by them to the Master-General, will sufficiently explain the situation:—

Letter to the Master-General, Sept. 1785, from Major-Generals Cleaveland, Pattison, Brome, and Godwin.

“With respect to the proposition of the 1st and 2nd Colonels of the Battalion quartered at Woolwich to take the duty alternately of being always on the spot, and commanding there, we beg leave to say (if by 1st Colonel is meant Colonel-Commandant) that, as General Officers, we are under the necessity of dissenting from it. We wish to look up to your Grace as the guardian and protector, under our gracious Sovereign, of the Corps of Artillery, as well individually as collectively; and, therefore, as this measure would be derogatory thereto, we trust that your Grace, having condescended to ask our opinions, will be pleased to relinquish it. Your Grace is sensible that by the custom of the Army immemorially established, and confirmed by the Royal sanction, Colonels having the rank of General Officers are exempted from being stationary with their Regiments; and that, by a late regulation, even Lieut.-Colonels having the rank of Major-General are not required to be with their Regiments any further than they may judge necessary for becoming responsible for their being in good order and discipline, the care and command devolving upon the Major or senior Captain. However faint, my Lord, our prospects may be of deriving equal advantages with other General Officers, from the rank we have the honour to hold, we have yet every reason to believe and expect that the privileges annexed to it will be equally preserved to us. In the year 1773, the late Master-General was pleased to give an order, which seemed to require the residence of the Colonels-Commandant at Woolwich, whereupon the late Generals Belford and Desaguliers had an audience of His Majesty, and laid at his feet a memorial praying for redress, which His Majesty was graciously pleased to grant.”

Although, however, relieved of a duty beneath their rank, the connection of the Colonels-Commandant with their Battalions remained of the closest description. No officer was allowed to be promoted, under the rank of Field-Officer, without a recommendation from the Colonel-Commandant of the Battalion in which he might be serving; nor was any exchange allowed without the consent of both the Colonels-Commandant concerned. The recruiting, clothing, and discharges of the men were under the same control; and the private affairs of the officers were also frequently the subject of their official consideration. It has been already hinted, at the commencement of this chapter, that for some reasons the period between 1783 and 1792 is a painful one to study. It is impossible to give a sufficient reason; but as to the fact, there is no doubt that there was then a bad spirit among some of the younger officers, which manifested itself not unfrequently in acts of open insubordination. The pages of the Ordnance letter-books of this time bristle with accounts of courts-martial on officers, an occurrence most rare before or since. Nor were they due to any stern, unforgiving discipline, visiting slight offences with heavy punishment. The offences were all of one description,—distinct and grave insubordination. Whether sufficient care had not been taken in the appointment of officers during the American War, or whether this war had engendered among some an unruly, ill-disciplined, and impatient spirit, it is impossible now to say. Nor was tragedy wanting. One case occurred, in 1785, of an officer who had been commissioned in America during the war, and who, on his return to England, had been repeatedly guilty of minor offences. A prolonged absence without leave brought matters to a crisis. He was, after some difficulty, traced to a low lodging-house in London, and, after many unavailing orders to return to Woolwich, was at last brought down by escort. A general court-martial was assembled for his trial at the Horse Guards, where all such courts were then held; and from the official registers it can be traced that he was convicted. Before, however, the sentence was promulgated, we learn from a letter in the Brigade-Major’s correspondence that he was found one morning dead in his room. No explanation is given,—merely a brief report of the occurrence, leaving the reader to his own conjectures as to the manner and the cause.

But, painful as it is to come across such passages, the pain is almost forgotten in the pleasure which the same correspondence affords, when treating of the earnest fatherly interest displayed by the Colonels-Commandant in the young officers under their control. In later days, the life and progress of the Regiment have been, as a rule, in the keeping of its younger members; but, at the time now spoken of, it was emphatically the devotion of the fathers of the Corps, which tided it over the shoals of discontent, stagnation, and despair. A jealous love of their noble traditions animated them; they had all shared the toils and the honours, which had so welded the Regiment into a glorious unity; and they laboured with an unselfish love to inspire the younger members with an esprit, which should make them worthy channels of their own deep feelings.

They expressed in the earnestness of their lives that which was said in words by one of the Colonels-Commandant at the réunion in 1873, mentioned above: “The glory of our Regiment General B. Cuppage. has been in our keeping; but we are now old and passing away, and we commit it to you.” How much of the noble spirit which animated the Corps in the commencement of this century was due to the unwearying teaching of the older officers at the period now treated of can never be told; but the student of the correspondence still preserved cannot but attribute to it an abundant share.