A British army, as it was,--is,--and ought to be

by James Campbell

In former days (and I may go back even to the days of Marlborough) captains were men of some importance, and were allowed to exercise much more authority over their companies, than has for many years past been the fashion. They could keep them at drill, or confined to barracks, or camp, if their conduct was irregular, till the offenders were found out, and punished by the soldiers themselves. These offenders were tried by what were then called Company Courts-Martial, which consisted of a non-commissioned officer and four privates. The sentence (nothing else being written) having been approved of by the captain, or officer commanding the company, it was in presence of the non-commissioned officers, and sometimes of a subaltern, privately carried into execution, either by the drummers of the company giving the culprit a certain number of blows, or else all the soldiers had to do so with the slings of their firelocks. This having been properly, and often severely done by themselves, the company was considered as purified, and were then dismissed from drill, or released from confinement to barracks or camp. If a plan of this kind in spirit was properly followed up, how admirably it would be found calculated for service in the field even in our days. When the importance of company officers is raised, so is proportionally that of the non-commissioned officers; and does not the superiority of our companies of guards consist in the respectability of their non-commissioned officers?

Not very long ago, what, I believe, was called Picketting, was practised as a punishment in our regiments of cavalry for minor offences, and I have heard from old officers, that the soldiers had a great dread of it; they assured me it did not in the least injure their health, or unfit them for immediate duty; and it almost entirely obviated the necessity for flogging. Would it not therefore be well, if the reviving of this kind of punishment in every corps, when an army took the field, were to have due consideration. I am aware of the outcry which most likely would be raised by injudicious men against such a plan, and nothing would have induced me to venture to mention it, but my abhorrence of flogging, and my fear that capital punishments might become frequent and unavoidable, if there were no other mode, of maintaining discipline amongst our troops. I therefore must not shrink from suggesting it, as I feel convinced, that in the field, our military police, might be safely trusted with the power of using it as a punishment; and it would, I have no doubt, deter soldiers from straggling from their corps in search of liquor or plunder.

We are constantly hearing of the horrors of flogging in our regiments, and scarcely an instance occurs, but that some of the newspapers endeavour to hold it up in the most exaggerated language, and strongest colouring, to the detestation of the nation; but after all, what is such punishment, as now inflicted, to what takes place all over Germany, and in the armies of the Czar? We are told—and it should be known in Great Britain—that the kind of bastinado, by which the flesh is most cruelly torn off by the point of the stick, is so severe in the German and other armies, that few men can stand many blows of the corporals who inflict it; and as for the Russian knout, half a dozen strokes, or even less, can be made fatal by a skilful hand.

Unluckily, by our mode of proceeding, punishment is, in some measure, converted, by its slowness, into a kind of torture; and if flagellation is to be unfortunately allowed to continue in a British army, it most probably would be better if fewer lashes were awarded by the sentences of courts-martial, but to be inflicted more after the manner practised in our navy. At all events, what may be termed the teasing system, which now prevails in regiments, and to which commanding officers, in compliance with existing circumstances, must adhere, cannot be productive of good, and must from necessity, and want of time and means, be nearly abandoned when our army is actually in the field. In what way then, I beg to ask, are officers to maintain discipline, if their power and influence in their companies are not increased?

It has always been the practice in our army to direct attention—and in this commanding officers of regiments had no choice—more particularly to what was necessary for home service, or garrison duty abroad, or their attention was called (as in the Russian service) to what would produce effect, through a splendid display of neatness, uniformity, and regularity in dress, messing, barrack and other arrangements; which in themselves are much to be lauded and admired; but with regard to what were really essential and indispensable in the field, for which most of this instruction or knowledge, but little prepared them, such matters seemed generally to be left to chance, or to be acquired by both officers and men when once there; and this was one of the reasons why so few regiments did not fall off in every respect, the very first campaign in which they were employed.

One of the chief objects which I have in view being, however, to do away with corporal punishment, and still to insure our having a well-conducted and highly disciplined army, I consider as essential towards securing this, that the utmost attention should be paid to what was formerly so lamentably neglected—that is to say—the religious instruction, and general education of corps. Without this all our efforts must be useless and unavailing.

To expect that such objects can be attained by merely paying the clergymen of towns, where troops are usually quartered, a certain sum annually for performing clerical duties, is altogether out of the question. Every regiment ought to have its own chaplain, and the changes which have of late years taken place in the religious, as well as in the moral feelings of the country, (for we ought not to attend to the wild ideas and effusions of men, who in the present day are leading the unwary astray,) have rendered their appointment to corps no longer objectionable. The regimental chaplains should be required, before appointment, to produce to the chaplain general, certificates from bishops of the church of England, or from, at least, two ministers of the church of Scotland, setting forth the respectability of their characters, their fitness to discharge the religious duties, and to direct and superintend the instruction of the regiment, to which they might be attached, and in which a higher description of education was hereafter to be looked for.

I must here declare, and I do so after long and serious consideration of the subject, that the consequences of a mixture in corps of men professing Protestant and Roman Catholic creeds have always been, that religion, of any kind, became altogether a forbidden subject, and I firmly believe, that much of the depravity and irregularities committed by our soldiers, may be attributed to this cause; for what could be expected from men, who, I may say, never gave religion even a thought. The officers were almost all Protestants, whilst a considerable proportion of the soldiers, in many regiments, from having been raised in Ireland, were Papists; and it, unfortunately, yet clearly, became the duty of those under whose command they were placed, to show no respect of persons, or to hurt the feelings of either party on account of religious opinions or differences; and thus what is commonly looked upon as sacred amongst men, could not even be named, and much less brought to the assistance of officers in the management of their men, so that fear of punishment was all they had to depend upon (and even corporal punishment when too frequently resorted to, lost its effects,) for the maintenance of discipline, it was, therefore, to the system pursued, and not to the officers that blame ought to have been attached for much of the misconduct which the commanders of our armies, and Lord Wellington in particular, had to lament and contend with. Much more might be said upon this subject, but I do not wish to pursue it farther.

But let us for a moment look at the effects of unanimity in religious views in a Russian army, in which, however, is to be clearly seen far too much of the old Prussian severity of discipline to be productive of good; and I am also aware, that in consequence of the power that the upper class—themselves exempted from the conscription—possess over their serfs, many bad characters are forced into their ranks; yet their Emperor, generals, officers and soldiers are, I may say, of one mind and of one religion. See the whole joining in its—to them—sacred offices, and imposing ceremonies; and who then can deny, but that their chiefs thus establish a firm hold upon the minds and affections of their soldiers, who may, by this means, be led to respect morality, and to imitate praise-worthy conduct, whilst they are at the same time rendered more formidable as enemies.

Regimental chaplains ought to be married, and should be allowed sufficient means to provide themselves with suitable lodgings, and when it could be done, outside the barrack walls; and to insure their respectability and fitness for the performance of their important duties, they ought to receive the same pay and allowances as pay-masters.