Historical Record of the Thirty-sixth, or the Herefordshire Regiment of Foot: containing an account of the formation of the regiment in 1701, and of its subsequent services to 1852

by Richard Cannon

On the 24th of November the battalion marched to Gallegos, in Spain, with the view of intercepting a convoy of provisions intended for the garrison of Ciudad Rodrigo, but the incessant rain had so flooded the rivers that it was found impossible to cross at the points intended, which circumstance enabled the convoy to reach its destination.

The battalion commenced its march to new cantonments at Mongualda on the 27th of November, which it reached on the 3d of December.

1812.

On the 14th of January 1812 the battalion was moved from Mongualda, by forced marches, to assist in the siege of Ciudad Rodrigo, which, however, was taken on the night of the 19th of January by the troops under Viscount Wellington, just as the Thirty-sixth were on the point of leaving Nava d’Aver, within ten miles of the scene of operations; the battalion remained at Nava d’Aver until Ciudad Rodrigo was secured against a coup de main, and then marched into cantonments at Meda, which it reached on the 3d of February.

Major-General Henry Clinton arrived and assumed the command of the sixth division on the 11th of February. On the 20th of that month the battalion marched for the south of Portugal, reached Estremos on the 6th of March, and remained there until the 14th, on which day it proceeded to Borba, and on the 15th to the camp at Elvas, where the army was assembled. On the following day it marched to aid in investing Badajoz, and from thence proceeded with the covering army, under Lieut.-General Sir Thomas Graham (afterwards Lord Lynedoch), which, after the affairs of Usagré, Llerena, Berlonga, and Asuaga, effected the expulsion of the enemy from Spanish Estremadura, and then returned to support the attack on Badajoz. The battalion reached Albuhera on the 6th of April, on the night of which Badajoz was stormed and carried.

The enemy being thus thwarted in all his views against the south, in which the principal part of the British troops was assembled, made a sudden invasion of the north of Portugal, and advanced as far as Castello Branco. The sixth division was in consequence moved with the utmost rapidity in that direction, but on its approach the enemy retired, and the division again returned to the south, the Thirty-sixth taking up cantonments at Castello de Vide on the 30th of April.

On the 5th May 1812, Lieut.-Colonel Lewis Davies arrived, and assumed the command of the Thirty-sixth; towards the end of the month Major William Cross, who had been in very bad health for several weeks, proceeded to join the second battalion in England.

The battalion marched to Azumar on the 8th of May, and on the 13th to Arronches, from which it moved towards the end of the month to Puebla, in Spain, then to Badajoz, where it halted five days, thence to Castello de Vide for two days, from which it marched through Castello Branco in the direction of Salamanca, which it reached on the 17th of June, and operations were then immediately commenced against the Forts at Salamanca by the light companies of the division under Colonel Samuel Venables Hinde, of the Thirty-second regiment. They were attacked without success on the 23d, and carried on the 27th of June by a party under the command of Lieut.-Colonel Davies, of the Thirty-sixth, with a loss to the battalion of Lieutenant George Mackenzie and eleven rank and file killed, and Captain Paul Minchin Hobart and twenty-five rank and file wounded. Captain Hobart, who was promoted to the brevet rank of Major on the 23d of July 1812, died of his wounds.

The battalion then occupied different villages in the neighbourhood, and on the 22d of July it took a considerable share in the battle of Salamanca. The change of the allied position and various manœuvres occupied the day without any close engagement, excepting on the left for the possession of the Arapiles; the battle of Salamanca did not commence in earnest until after three o’clock, when the French left, having been very much extended by the advance of the division of General Thomières, with the light cavalry and fifty pieces of artillery, along a range of heights parallel with the British line, to cut off the right of the allies from the Ciudad Rodrigo road, the third division was ordered to advance in four columns, supported by cavalry to turn the French left. The evolutions of this great battle are too varied to be clearly described with brevity. The sixth division under Major-General Clinton, of which the Thirty-sixth formed part, was placed at first in reserve, but at a critical period in the action it was ordered up to relieve the fourth division, and the battle was soon restored to its former success.