As a reward for undoubted merit two staff ranks—sergeant-major and quartermaster-sergeant—were given to the survey companies on the 28th July by Sir Hew Ross, Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance. Similar appointments had been held by the companies for many years with only modified advantages, but now they were constituted permanent ranks and carried with them all the benefits prescribed by the rules of the service.

This year the moustache, under certain restrictions, was permitted to be worn; and the Kilmarnock bonnet, discarded in 1837, was revived. Its dimensions, however, were of a more reasonable measurement than in olden times, and suitable for campaigning. A yellow band was added, also a plain yellow ornament on the crown, and the scanty peak worn for nearly forty years, was replaced by one familiarly termed the war peak, sufficiently large to offer an efficient shade to the face from the sun.

Leaving the great events which occurred about this period, to be treated without interruption in subsequent chapters, the more ordinary incidents of the corps will first be disposed of.

Unable to obtain British troops to furnish contingents of sufficient magnitude for the East, parliament voted the formation of regiments of foreigners to meet the pressure. Depôts for their enrolment were fixed at different places, but the principal station was at Heligoland, a small rocky island in the North Sea. As however the embodiment could not take place without the means of sheltering the force, the island itself having only accommodation for the native population, Lieutenant A. R. Lempriere of the engineers, with three sapper carpenters, were sent there in March, in the steamer ‘Hamburg.’ Towards the end of the month the party landed, and with the assistance of some broad-backed women—the men being too indolent to work—the huts brought out were carried up the stairs—a stupendous flight exceeding 200 steps formed in the face of the steep cliff—to the position where the cantonment was to be established. Hopeless to complete them within the time required, twelve other sappers, mostly carpenters, under sergeant Goodear, sailed from Woolwich on the 28th July. In a few days they were deep in the work. Rows of huts covered with Croggan’s asphalted felt, built in streets, were always ready by the time the troops arrived to occupy them. It took one hundred and four of these portable houses to accommodate the legion. Tanks were also built to supply water in case of fire, and an apparatus was erected for distilling sea-water so that it might be used for domestic purposes by the troops. When all these services were completed, the sappers no longer needed in Heligoland were shipped for England, landing at Folkestone on the 29th December. Lieutenant Lempriere remained, as did also sergeant Goodear, to oversee the native workmen in the formation of roads and in executing repairs to the huts. At the conclusion of the war they returned home. The efficiency and usefulness of the party were warmly acknowledged by Colonel Steinbach, commanding the legion.

At the instance of the Royal Society, a sergeant and three rank and file were sent to Paris in April to exhibit, at the Palais de l’Industrie, several specimen maps and some of the chief instruments used in the trigonometrical surveys of the United Kingdom. The two non-commissioned officers employed under the Board of Trade at the department of Practical Science and Art also accompanied Captain Fowke and Mr. Henry Cole, to assist in the British section of the Exhibition. The sappers were—

Besides arranging spaces for the exhibitors, opening the cases as they arrived, and arranging the articles for exhibition, the sappers turned their hands to a hundred different duties, making themselves generally useful and sustaining the character which the corps had received for its services at the Great Exhibition of 1851. The British department was surveyed by them and corporals Mack[[129]] and Clabby drew the plans. Key was the overseer of skilled labour and likewise superintended the hanging of the paintings at the Palace des Beaux Arts. The remainder had the care of the professional instruments. Of these Hart was instructed at Paris in the process of photography by Mr. Thurston Thompson, and the proficiency he attained there in the art, has introduced him to a similar duty at Southampton, in which the progress he has made promises to be a great saving to the public by reducing plans photographically, and thus superseding the hand-labour of draughtsmen.[[130]]

The Emperor in one of his visits to the Palace examined the maps and instruments, and sergeant Jenkins had the singular distinction of explaining their nature to His Imperial Majesty.[[131]] This was the first party of English soldiers that had been in Paris since the army of occupation quitted the suburbs of the French metropolis in 1815. Appearing invariably in the uniform of the corps they were regarded with peculiar interest, and from all quarters were received with a friendliness more than ordinarily debonair and cordial. For their assistance in extinguishing a fire at the Manutention du Commerce, the press of Paris handsomely acknowledged their services.[[132]] Individuals left for England at different times, and on the return of the last two in January, 1856, the Board of Trade honoured the whole party with presents. Sergeant Jenkins received a silver watch with the most approved compensation arrangements for use in connexion with astronomical observation; Key a gold one; Mack an expensive photographic apparatus; and the other three each a case of beautifully finished mathematical instruments. The gifts bore an inscription to the effect that they were given “for services at the Paris Exhibition, 1855.” The French Commissioners also gave them bronze medals.

An agitation which for more than a quarter of a century had exposed the inappropriateness of the old costume, at last succeeded in effecting its abandonment. Involved in the change the royal sappers and miners adopted an uniform under royal sanction, which has the credit of being the neatest in the service.

Late in the summer the coatee with its double breast, short body, garish trimmings, and narrow skirts gave place to a scarlet single-breasted tunic with facings and edgings of dark blue plush. Falling back with a curve, the collar is bound all round with yellow cord while the pointed cuffs are embellished with an Austrian knot of yellow cord which, stretching over the plush rises with a flowing involution more than seven inches up the sleeve. Plain skirts measuring about twelve inches long, lined with white shalloon, are broken in their plainness by two upright pocket slashes with plush edgings having three points and as many buttons. Double cords take the place of the huge epaulettes of former days, and the buttons unaltered in shape and device, are sewn two inches asunder down the breast as low as the waist, and two smaller ones add to the ornamentation of the cuff. All ranks wear the same description of tunic. That for the drivers is shorter in the skirts for riding.