[382]. This non-commissioned officer afterwards broke his leg at Beirout in falling from the roof of the ordnance store in endeavouring to get access to a building adjoining it which was on fire. In January, 1843, he was pensioned at 1s. 9d. a-day, and emigrated to Canada.
[383]. Was a clever mechanic and a handsome soldier, but his constitution eventually gave way under the influence of the Syrian fever, and he died in October, 1847.
[384]. Was discharged in October, 1850, and pensioned at 1s. 9d. a-day. Out of a service of thirteen years in the corps, he was eleven abroad, at Gibraltar, in Syria, and China. From the last station he returned in a distressing state of emaciation and weakness. There, though a sergeant, the necessities of the service required that he should labour at the anvil, and the skilfulness of his work was superior to anything that could be procured at Hong Kong.
[385]. See a representation of the encampment in the ‘Professional Papers, R.E.’ vi., p. 22. This was the note affixed to the first edition, but the plate referred to is on so small a scale, it would need more than the assistance of a powerful glass to discover the site of the tents.
[386]. Was pensioned at 2s. a-day in January, 1851. In the corps he served nearly twenty-four years, of which period he was seventeen and a-half abroad, at Corfu, the Euphrates, Gibraltar, Syria, and Halifax, Nova Scotia. His great merits obtained for him the grant of an annuity of 10l. a-year, and a silver medal, and an appointment as messenger to the commanding royal engineer’s office, in the London district. Through Lieutenant-Colonel Aldrich, his commanding-officer in Syria, he was also appointed a yeoman of the Queen’s Guard. The emoluments derived by him from these different sources, amounting to about 160l. a-year, with excellent quarters, are the hard and just earnings of a life full of vicissitude and devotion to the service.
[387]. Now a quartermaster-sergeant in the corps; and besides serving a second tour at Gibraltar, was present at the reduction of Bomarsund and the siege of Sebastopol. Is in receipt of an annuity of 10l. a-year, and wears five medals and a clasp for his active services.
[388]. The medals were copper, but washed, at the expense of the wearers, with a preparation that gave them the appearance of gold. In 1848, the British Government awarded them silver medals for the same campaign.
[389]. An anecdote may be given of this non-commissioned officer. One of the princesses of Iddah conceiving a liking for Edmonds, who was a handsome, dark-complexioned man, with a brilliant black eye, solicited the king, her father, to beg his retention there. Captain Trotter consented to let the corporal remain until the return of the expedition. Edmonds was not averse to the arrangement provided he was permitted to have with him a comrade from the ‘Albert.’ This, however, was not conceded, and the corporal rejoined his ship; but before doing so, the love-stricken princess contrived not to part with her paramour without easing him of his silk handkerchief!—to keep, perhaps, in remembrance of the interesting feeling he had unwittingly awakened in the royal breast. Edmonds served two stations, at Bermuda and Gibraltar, became a sergeant, and, on his discharge in 1854, was appointed foreman of works under the Inspector-General of Prisons in the convict establishment at Portland.
[390]. Sergeant March was two seasons at Spitbead. Many of the sketches of the wreck were executed by him with the assistance of the camera lucida, kindly lent for the purpose by the late Captain Basil Hall, R.N., from whom he received much useful instruction. Almost the whole of his service has been passed in the professional office of the director of the royal engineer establishment at Chatham, in which, either as a draughtsman or a confidential leading clerk, he has always been found, from his attainments and constitutional energy of mind and body, efficient and valuable. From time to time he has drawn the plates forming the architectural course of the study of the junior officers of the corps and the East India Company’s engineers, and also the plans and other drawings and projects comprised in the military branch of the course. He is an excellent colourist, and has a good conception of light and shade. As an artist in water-colours, he possesses undoubted talent and merit. Sergeant March is moreover an intellectual man and well informed. His controversial letters in reply to the calumnious attacks on the royal engineer establishment at Chatham have been remarked for their honesty and boldness; and his series of communications in the ‘United Service Gazette,’ in answer to the forcible animadversions of the celebrated ‘Emeritus’ in the ‘Times,’ concerning Ordnance finance, were not only well and truthfully written, but deserve for their vigour and appositeness as prominent a place in the columns of the ‘Times,’ as the communications of the more favoured ‘Emeritus.’ This non-commissioned officer is now quartermaster-sergeant of the corps at Chatham.
[391]. Three feet of the heel of it, with clamps attached, had been recovered in the previous year by George Hall the civil diver.