Historical record of the Seventh Regiment, or the Royal Fusiliers / Containing an Account of the Formation of the Regiment in 1685, and of Its Subsequent Services to 1846.

by Richard Cannon

HISTORICAL RECORD

OF

THE SEVENTH REGIMENT,

OR

THE ROYAL FUSILIERS.

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1685

The invention of gunpowder was speedily followed by the introduction of cannon; but many years elapsed before a corps of artillery was added to the army. The guns were fired by men hired for the purpose, under the direction of a master-gunner, and an officer styled the Master of the Ordnance, and the whole were under the orders of the Master-general of the Ordnance. Non-commissioned officers and private soldiers of infantry regiments were frequently employed as gunners; and the care and protection of the guns were confided to particular corps. On the augmentation of the army during the rebellion of James Duke of Monmouth, in the summer of 1685, King James II. resolved, that the first infantry corps raised on that occasion should be an Ordnance Regiment, for the care and protection of the cannon; of which corps His Majesty appointed George Lord Dartmouth, then Master-general of the Ordnance, colonel, by commission dated the 11th of June, 1685.