At Bayonne the last blow of the war was struck; for as soon as the news of Napoleon’s abdication had arrived, hostilities ceased. In May the five companies at Bayonne and Toulouse marched from their respective cantonments to Blanquefort and Bordeaux, where they were encamped for a few weeks awaiting the general evacuation of the country. An expedition being ordered to proceed to North America, the second company fourth battalion embarked with it on the 27th May; and the other four companies, viz., the seventh of the first battalion and the second, seventh, and eighth of the second battalion, sailed from Poulliac on the 22nd June, and landed at Portsmouth the 10th and 14th July, leaving fifty-five men sick in France. The casualties in these companies for the half year were thirty deaths and one missing.
The sixth company second battalion was removed to Italy in April. The sixth company first battalion from Cadiz, and the fifth company second battalion from St. Sebastian, sailed from Spain the latter end of August, and arrived at Woolwich early in September. These two companies were with the last troops which left the Peninsula after the close of the war.
The fourth company second battalion, counting eighty-two men, with Sub-Lieutenant T. Adamson under Captain R. Thomson, left Margate with the expedition under Sir Thomas Graham, and landed at Williamstadt the 18th December, 1813. There the company suffered loss by the accidental burning of the barracks in which it was quartered. After removing the stores from the shipping, parties were employed in preparing fascines and gabions, in bridge-making, constructing a landing place of faggots for the disembarkation of the cavalry, and in removing the platforms and heavy mortars from the ramparts at Williamstadt for carriage to Merxam.
These services being accomplished, the company was distributed to Klundert, Groat Zundert, Zandaarbuiten, Tholen, Steenbergen, and Fort Frederic near Lille. Among other duties the detachment at Zandaarbuiten formed, in a very expeditious manner, a bridge of country-boats over the river Maerk under two young lieutenants of engineers, which served for the conveyance of the heaviest artillery. The boats were of different shapes and sizes, collected for the occasion, and the materials for the superstructure were of irregular scantling, partly collected in the neighbourhood and partly felled on the spot.[[211]] At Tholen a corporal and eight men under Lieutenant Eyre, R.E., attached to the Prussians, built a battery on the bank of the river for the protection of a flying bridge; and at Fort Frederic a party restored a battery for two guns, which afterwards held an unequal contest with a French eighty-four gun ship, and prevented her proceeding to Bergen-op-Zoom with provisions. No less than forty-one, including the commander, were killed and wounded on board the man-of-war, while the casualties at the battery only amounted to one killed and two wounded.
Leaving sixteen men at Tholen and Zandaarbuiten, the remainder of the company, armed with short swords, felling-axes, saws, &c., and guarding an establishment of mules drawing about one hundred waggons laden with intrenching tools, commenced the march for Antwerp. They followed the royal artillery, and reliefs of twenty men were, by turns, repeatedly ordered to the front to remove abattis and other obstructions that were met with on the route. From intense frost and a heavy and continuous fall of snow blowing in their faces, they encountered many difficulties and suffered extremely during the journey.
Merxam being taken on the 2nd February the company and a strong force of the guards and line, began the erection of batteries to attack the fleet at Antwerp. By command, no relief was permitted to the sappers, and they continued on duty for seventy-two hours without intermission. Their steady labours at the Napoleon battery of sixteen guns, and their skill in revetting the embrasures, and in attending to the more perilous parts of the works, were the wonder of both officers and soldiers. Sir Thomas Graham, in general orders dated Merxam, 5th February, did full justice to the zeal and exertions of the sappers, and stated, “that they deserved the highest praise.” Two privates were wounded.[[212]]
Sergeant William Stevens and corporal Thomas Milburn distinguished themselves by their coolness and bravery in superintending the laying of platforms and making a splinter-proof magazine under a heavy fire. Recommended by Colonel Carmichael Smyth, the commanding royal engineer, the former was forthwith appointed colour-sergeant, and soon afterwards commissioned to a sub-lieutenancy in the corps; and the latter was promoted to be sergeant.
After the failure at Antwerp, the head-quarters of the company went into cantonments at Rosendaal, and parties were detached to Groat Zundert, Fort Henrick, Calmthout, Eschen, and Brieschaet. At Groat Zundert seven men under corporal James Hilton conducted some experimental bridging in the presence of Sir Thomas Graham and Colonel Carmichael Smyth, with the view of adopting the easiest plan for crossing ditches in future enterprises. Sir Thomas was struck with the simplicity of the corporal’s arrangement and the rapidity of its execution; and as a proof of his approbation gave him a Napoleon.
On another occasion, that distinguished general took particular interest in the formation of a ditch bridge and even laboured himself in its construction. From the unevenness of the banks the baulks did not lie firmly. Private James McKay was in the act of obtaining the desired steadiness, when Sir Thomas took a spare spade, cut some sods, and assisting to place them in the required positions, only gave up when the work was satisfactorily accomplished.
In the surprise of Bergen-op-Zoom on the 8th March, parties of the company were attached to each of the columns appointed for the attack. There were about forty men in all, who were provided with axes, saws, and crowbars, and also a few ladders to scale the walls of the fortress. At about half-past ten o’clock the attack was made. The sappers cut down the palisades, crossed the ditches, planted the ladders, and leading the way in the escalade, were the first soldiers on the enemy’s ramparts. They then pushed forward to remove any obstacle that opposed the advance of the assailants, and persevered in their several duties till the place was captured. A reverse, however, awaited the British: the enemy renewed the attack with unwonted vigour, and in a few hours regained the fortress. During these extraordinary operations the following casualties occurred in the detachment: Sub-Lieutenant Adamson was killed by a cannon-ball on the glacis when advancing. About twelve were wounded, of whom two mortally—privates John McKeer and James Munro—and ten were taken prisoners, and conveyed to Fynaart, but shortly afterwards released. Of the conduct of the sappers in this coup-de-main Colonel Carmichael Smyth has left it on record, that the company conducted themselves with the utmost coolness and courage, and the Master-General, in a letter dated 2nd April, was pleased to express himself highly satisfied with the zealous conduct of the Royal Sappers and Miners on the above occasion.[[213]]