During this interval (9th of September, 1813) Lieutenant-Colonel Taylor joined the regiment, and superseded Lieutenant-Colonel Macpherson in the command.
The colours of the Eighty-Eighth bear testimony that it had its share on the 10th of November, in the storming of the formidable lines which the French had erected on the river Nivelle, and in the various actions which took place on the banks of the Nive, between the 9th and 13th of December; but on neither of these occasions had it the good fortune to come into actual contact with the enemy. On the 17th of December it went into cantonments in the village of Urcuray, situated on the high road leading from Bayonne to St. Jean Pied de Port, and the adjacent hamlets, where it remained till the army again moved forward in February following.
1814
In the battle of Orthes, 28th of February 1814, the third division was directed to attack the heights on which the enemy’s centre and left stood, and the Eighty-Eighth had once more an opportunity of distinguishing itself, when its loss was more severe than on any other occasion, except the siege of Badajoz. The Fifty-Second led the attack; the Eighty-Eighth advanced on the right; the heights were carried, and the regiment advancing in pursuit, its left flank was charged by a body of French cavalry, which it entirely overthrew, killing, wounding, or taking prisoners the whole detachment, which was hemmed in in a narrow road, and precluded from all retreat. In this battle, Captain Oates’s conduct was particularly noticed, and procured for him the Brevet rank of Major in the army. The loss of the battalion was three officers, Captain M‘Dermott, Lieutenant Moriarty, and Ensign Reynolds, five Serjeants and thirty-six Rank and File killed; and eleven Officers, Lieutenant-Colonel Taylor, Captains Oates and Bunworth, Lieutenants Fitzpatrick, Davern, Faris, Creswell, Holland, and Stewart, Ensign M‘Intosh, Ensign and Adjutant Mitchell, thirteen Serjeants, and two hundred and one Rank and File wounded. Total, two hundred and seventy-seven.
After this severe action the regiment was placed in cantonments until the 13th of March, when it again took the field, and was present on the 4th of April, at the battle of Toulouse. Although only three companies of the regiment were engaged on this occasion, they had the good fortune to perform a critical and important service, in supporting the Forty-Fifth and Seventy-Fourth when engaged with very unequal numbers of the enemy. The Light Infantry Company, in particular, suffered, and its Captain, R. Nickle, was severely wounded: the loss of the three companies in killed, was equal to that of the whole battalion at Vittoria, amounting to one Serjeant and twenty-nine Men; the wounded were Captain Nickle and Lieutenant Poole, one Serjeant, and fifty-three Rank and File.
The Serjeant who fell at Toulouse, was much regretted by the whole corps; his name was Thorpe, and he was Serjeant-Major of the battalion. He had been originally Drum-Major, in which capacity he was present at the battle of Busaco: on that occasion, when ordered with the band and drummers, to the rear, he entreated his commanding officer to allow him to join his company, and having obtained permission he fell into the ranks, behaving with the utmost gallantry throughout that memorable day. This, and other instances of his courage, induced Lieutenant-Colonel Wallace to consider him qualified for a higher situation, and to remove him from the band into the line. He had for some time been recommended for a commission, to which the Gazette which arrived from England a few days after his death, contained his appointment.
The peace of Paris in 1814, having put an end to the war on the Continent, the Eighty-Eighth Regiment was among the corps ordered to proceed to America, where hostilities were still raging. It embarked in the Gironde on the 15th of June, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Macpherson, and, without returning to England, sailed direct to Quebec, where it arrived on the 3rd of August following. The unfortunate failure of the combined military and naval operations on Lake Champlain and at Plattsburgh put a stop to active hostilities in Canada, and the Eighty-Eighth had only one opportunity of coming into contact with the enemy, viz., at the passage of the Savannah, where the light company, under Captain Nickle, distinguished itself.
If, however, the period of its stay in Canada was barren of laurels to the Eighty-Eighth, it gave the regiment an opportunity of displaying qualities which, if not so dazzling and brilliant, are equally valuable in, and honourable to the soldier, namely, firm discipline and unshakeable fidelity to his king, his country, and his colours. The extent to which desertion prevailed amongst the British troops in America, is unhappily but too well known; but although the Eighty-Eighth was stationed on the banks of the river Richelieu, within a few hours’ sail of the province of Vermont; although the men were considerably in debt to their officers, and under stoppages to pay off an incumbrance, of which desertion would at once have relieved them; although tempting rewards awaited such as should reach the American territory, which could be done without the slightest risk; although American ships were daily arriving and departing, and the facilities were such that, if so disposed, the whole battalion might have deserted in a night, the Eighty-Eighth did not lose one man by desertion, during the whole eleven months that it remained in Canada!!
1815
This honourable conduct of the men of the Eighty-Eighth did not go unnoticed or unrewarded; their reward was exemption from the painful duty of being present when the extreme sentence of martial law was executed upon deserters from other regiments. The following is a copy of the brigade order on one occasion of the kind, more than nine months after the arrival of the regiment in America.