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Sickness, Suffering, and the Sword

Page 4

by Andrew Bamford


  This policy of creating second battalions worked because, since recruiting was carried out at a regimental level, the only way in which to utilize surplus manpower within a given regiment was to create an additional battalion. The system also had the advantage of creating employment for deserving half-pay officers that enabled them to return to duty and draw full pay. However, whilst it was not uncommon for a regiment’s total strength to exceed the establishment of one battalion, it was rather more rare for it to total enough for it to be able to field two at full strength. As a result, although they were generally established at a lower strength to begin with, second battalions frequently remained weak, greatly limiting their utility. Although junior battalions were meant to remain at home, it was frequently the case that such units, particularly later in the war, were too strong for the depot role, yet too weak for overseas service—on the face of things, a waste of manpower. There are, however, two caveats to be inserted with regard to this apparent inefficiency. Firstly, although the threat of invasion largely disappeared after 1805, it was still necessary to keep at least some reasonably effective battalions on the home stations for the maintenance of law and order, particularly in Ireland, and for local defense in the Channel Islands. A weak second battalion of three or four hundred men represented a good solution to these problems, but deploying such a unit in this role limited how many drafts could be sent to the first battalion without rendering the second unfit for purpose at home.29 Secondly, the distinction has to be made between the original crop of second battalions created between 1803 and 1808, which generally had a high establishment of around 800 rank and file, and those raised afterward, which frequently had a far lower established strength. Battalions in the former category were strong enough to play an active role during the first half of our period, but those in the latter were generally made of poorer stuff. Particularly poor were the new second and third battalions created during 1813 and 1814, which were, on the whole, weak, ineffective, and largely unfit for service—to the detriment, as we shall see, of Britain’s attempts to mount a campaign in the Netherlands during the closing months of the war.

  Generally speaking, the senior battalion of a regiment would, upon embarking on campaign, exchange its ineffective personnel into the junior battalion, and be brought up to strength by drafts of effectives from that unit. By extension, the third battalion of a three-battalion regiment would have two active senior battalions to support, and the unfortunate 4/1st, three. In this way, at least in theory, a senior battalion would depart with an active strength of around 1,000 rank and file, and could, again in theory, be kept at a high strength over a prolonged campaign by further drafts. This process can be seen in action during the preparations for Wellesley’s 1808 expedition to Portugal, where the bulk of the battalions needed to be topped up in order to embark at full establishment strength. The largest influx on this occasion would seem to have been the 261 men sent to reinforce the 1/91st, who thereby ended up forming roughly a quarter of that battalion’s total rank and file.30 On occasion, however, men might not be available, or at least available in time. Whilst most of Wellesley’s battalions in 1808 could make arrangements to receive drafts from their second battalions, the 1/36th and 1/45th, having been on garrison duty in Ireland and reassigned to Portugal at the last minute, had to be brought up to strength by drafts from the Irish Militia, receiving 300 and 365 men respectively.31 This use of the Militia as a source from which active battalions could be directly augmented continued throughout the war, often at similarly short notice. Thus it was that elements of Wellesley’s army at Talavera a year later were remarked upon as still having their old Militia distinctions on their equipment, and that many of the men who defended Hougoumont did so wearing the Militia uniforms of their former regiments, rather than those of the Foot Guards regiments into which they had newly volunteered.32

  However, the system did not entirely debar second battalions from service, and if a two-battalion regiment had 1,600 or more effective rank and file on its strength, its second battalion would also become eligible for overseas deployment. Due to this caveat in the regulations, in 1808 the 9th Foot took 1,508 men to Portugal between its two battalions; whilst the combined strength apparently falls short of the required total, these figures make no account of additional manpower left in Britain.33 This deployment of both battalions was possible because the regiment was able to obtain an unusually high total of 833 volunteers from the Militia in 1807, which, sensibly, were distributed between both battalions in roughly equal proportions—a more typical distribution would have been to place them all in the second battalion and concentrate the experienced men in the first. Even so, the presence of the 2/9th on active service is still impressive, not least because it had given over a draft of one hundred men to the first battalion only a month before its own embarkation.34

  Lastly with respect to infantry, the British Army contained a number of foreign units, raised from various sources and differing greatly in their attributes and utility. Whilst foreign troops were employed in considerable numbers throughout the conflict, the last years of the Napoleonic Wars saw both an increase in the numbers actively deployed but also in their numbers tout court. Although the King’s German Legion was run down from 1812, after peaking at an all-arms strength of over 14,000,35 other foreign auxiliary formations continued to thrive, as with the Calabrian Freecorps and Italian Levy serving in Sicily and eastern Spain, and also the mercenary regiments of Dillon, De Roll, Watteville, and De Meuron, which served both in the Mediterranean and in North America. There was also the last vestige of the émigré formations of the 1790s in the shape of the single-battalion Chasseurs Britanniques. Recruiting for these regiments, however, had largely shifted from genuine volunteers to the employment of the steady stream of deserters from the Grande Armée, along with prisoners of war who preferred turning their coats to a life—and possible death—in the hulks. The practice of enlisting such men was hardly new, but subsequently became increasingly formalized with the KGL getting the pick of any non-French and the remainder going into one or another of the colonial corps. Exception would seem to have been made for “French” soldiers who were in fact of German or Flemish origins, allowing them to also join the KGL.36 This distribution of secondhand manpower is reflected in a return of July 1810, which shows that of 560 deserters enlisted—since when is not, unfortunately, made clear—147 men had gone to the KGL infantry and 58 to its cavalry, whilst the remaining 355 found themselves drafted into the York Light Infantry Volunteers and shipped off to the West Indies.37 Only in the closing months of the war does this system seem to have relaxed somewhat, and less reliable men enlisted into the KGL from which many of them subsequently deserted.38

  The organizational situation for the cavalry was rather simpler than for the infantry, since although each regiment was composed of several squadrons these did not have the same level of autonomous existence as did battalions of an infantry regiment. Indeed, it was almost unheard of for the active squadrons of a regiment to be split up. The differences between the regiments themselves, however, were confused by an overcomplex system of nomenclature that went through further changes during this period. In 1808 there were thirty-four regiments of British cavalry, household and line, and a further five belonging to the KGL. Officially, the mounted arm composed two regiments of Life Guards, and one of Royal Horse Guards—between them forming the Household Brigade, although strictly speaking the latter only formally became a household unit in 1820—plus seven regiments of dragoon guards and twenty-four regiments of dragoons numbered 1st through 4th and 6th through 25th. The number five was vacant due to the 5th Dragoons having been disbanded following implication in the 1798 Irish Rebellion. In terms of role, however, there were only two distinctions—heavy and light. The Household Cavalry, dragoon guards, and the five senior regiments of dragoons made up the heavies, whilst the junior regiments—7th through 25th—were designated light dragoons. To confuse matters further, however, the 7th, 10th, 15t
h, and 18th Light Dragoons were uniformed as hussars, and ultimately adopted this title officially; other than a certain self-assumed elite status, this made no difference to their organization. The KGL cavalry, meanwhile, initially comprised two regiments of dragoons and three of light dragoons. The latter had always been uniformed as hussars, and were generally referred to as such; in 1813 this designation was made official, whilst the two heavy regiments were simultaneously converted to light dragoons. Although there had been a proliferation of émigré cavalry units during the Revolutionary Wars, these had mostly disappeared by the turn of the century, and, aside from the KGL cavalry, the only other foreign mounted unit in our period was the Brunswick Oels Hussars, which saw service in eastern Spain.39

  Lastly, though not part of the regimental system or even under Horse Guards control, the troops of the ordinance nevertheless formed a vital—though usually small—part of all the campaigns with which this work is concerned. Although their corps was organized into battalions for administrative purposes, the men of the Royal Artillery were generally employed to form batteries manning six field guns. Such formations, combining a Royal Artillery company and a detachment of Royal Artillery Drivers, were confusingly known as brigades. Their mounted equivalent was the Royal Horse Artillery troop, which included its own drivers as an integral part of the permanent organization.40 To give some idea of the manpower requirements of these units, Captain Hew Ross’s A Troop, RHA, deployed to the peninsula in 1809 with 149 rank and file and 162 horses.41 Naturally for a horse artillery unit, this figure included riding horses for the gunners as well as draught animals, so the equine requirements of a brigade of foot artillery would be proportionally less. The Royal Engineers were represented by a handful of specialist officers, with manpower provided by the Royal Military Artificers, renamed Royal Sappers and Miners as of 1813. Because this small pool failed to produce sufficient manpower, 1798 had seen the creation of a parallel institution under Horse Guards control in the shape of the Royal Staff Corps. Equally small, this formation is not to be confused with the Staff Corps of Cavalry created by Wellington in the peninsula and Netherlands, who were orderlies-cum-policemen attached to army headquarters.42 Lastly in this rundown of manpower comes the commissary services, the bulk of which were effectively civilian in makeup, in the sense of being British clerks or indigenous hired muleteers and carters, but the men of the Irish Wagon Train and Royal Wagon Train also make appearances in the various returns, in numbers sufficiently small as to make it clear why their supplementation from outside the military system was necessary.43

  Active Service, 1808–1815

  Whilst an overview of the main campaigns during the period helps understand the shifting pressures placed on the British Army, it is important to appreciate that there were also significant permanent overseas commitments to be met, whose demands diverted manpower away from the active theaters of war. Although garrison forces were cut back to a bare minimum as demands for active manpower became more pressing, substantial numbers of troops had to be provided for stations across the British Empire. Firstly, troops were needed simply to maintain a military presence in the various colonial outposts: the West Indies; South Africa; Malta; right down to the convict guard in New South Wales. North America, at least until 1812 when the situation was transformed, may also be included in this category. These, by and large, were stations where there was no immediate threat, but which nevertheless could not be left completely undefended due to their strategic and/or commercial importance. Regiments often remained for long periods in these posts, particularly on the smaller stations, but there was greater mobility in the larger commands, and troops could be drawn from these for operations elsewhere as in 1809 when troops from North America formed part of the force assembled to capture Martinique.

  Of a rather more significant nature, both in terms of commitment of troops and relevance to the developing combat abilities of the units and commanders involved, were the two foreign stations that absorbed the greatest numbers of troops. These were India, with 21,534 British troops in January 1808, exclusive of the forces of the Honourable East India Company (HEIC), and Sicily. The latter was unusually short of men in the same month, the garrison being down to only 9,343, but there was a 5,194-strong reinforcement on the way that would bring it back to its usual level.44 India in 1808 was a less active station than it had been in the years immediately prior to our period, the Maratha Wars having been brought to a successful conclusion in 1806. Nevertheless, there remained an ongoing and drawn-out backcountry war in Ceylon, and troops were still required on minor policing duties, as well as to keep an eye on the largely native-recruited HEIC forces, elements of which had mutinied in 1807.45 King’s regiments serving in India tended to do so for some length of time—the future Duke of Wellington took the 33rd Foot out in 1796, for example, and the regiment did not return until 1811—and soldiers unwilling to leave the Indies, East or West, would often volunteer into regiments remaining on the station, thus leaving only a cadre to come home to be rebuilt.46 It is for this reason, as well as a very different campaigning environment, that India has been left out of this study, although commanders who had served in India, Wellington not least amongst them, were able to successfully apply some of the lessons learned there to European warfare. The presence on Sicily, meanwhile, dated back to 1805 and served a twofold purpose: firstly, to hold the island and keep an eye on its unreliable ruling dynasty; secondly, to provide forces for offensive operations elsewhere in the Mediterranean.47 Unfortunately these two requirements were largely mutually exclusive, with the result that it was never possible to dispatch sufficient forces from the island to make an appreciable difference elsewhere. Sir John Stuart’s 1806 descent on Calabria achieved success on the battlefield of Maida, which did great things for morale but achieved no lasting results, and troops from the Sicilian garrison also participated in the futile 1807 descent on Egypt.48

  With the major permanent garrisons accounted for, and leaving aside units stationed in Britain either recruiting or retained to supplement the Militia and Volunteers in the increasingly unlikely occurrence of a French invasion or Irish rebellion, the remainder of the British Army was available for active operations. To lead any such expeditions, a “disposable” or expeditionary force was kept at readiness to embark on transports specially set aside for its carriage. Whilst this was an excellent concept, there was some initial uncertainty as to how best to deploy these troops, newly available thanks to Castlereagh’s manpower reforms, and for the most part they were initially dispersed in penny packets. Nevertheless, it was from this force that troops were variously sent to Copenhagen, South America, and the Baltic during 1806 and 1807, and it was with an eye toward service in South America again that troops were being assembled at Cork when developments in Portugal and Spain opened up an entirely new arena of operations.49

  Britain’s initial commitment to the war in the Iberian Peninsula represented the same sort of opportunistic strategy that had characterized its previous expeditions ever since the recommencement of hostilities in 1803. Only after 1809 would it become apparent that there was no quick solution to be had, and that a prolonged commitment to continental warfare was required to achieve the sort of gains needed to bring France to heel. This realization would accordingly lead to a reassessment of priorities, as the focus of the war effort became increasingly centered on one theater at the expense of the standing commitments already outlined. By following the shifts in strategic priorities on a year-by-year basis, it is easy to see how Britain’s limited military resources were placed under increasing pressure. When this pressure could be withstood, and a balance between the requirements of the various active and inactive theaters of war achieved, the British Army was able to cope well enough; when that balance was upset, military overstretch ensued and, with it, the potential for disaster.

  In 1808, however, all this was in the future, and although there was some initial hesitation, as well as mutual difficulties so far as working
with former enemies was concerned, the success of the disposable force concept allowed for the speedy dispatch of significant forces to Portugal to help evict Général de Division Andoche Junot’s invading French. Five thousand men under Major General Brent Spencer were diverted from a planned reinforcement for Sicily, whilst the bulk of Lt. General Sir Arthur Wellesley’s corps was already assembling, as we have seen, with a view to operations in South America. In like fashion, Lt. General Sir John Moore’s 12,000-strong command had been engaged on a futile expedition to the Baltic, but could also be rapidly redeployed thanks to the ready availability of the necessary transport ships. To create the force of 29,000 men deemed necessary by Horse Guards, it was therefore necessary only to add a couple of extra battalions to Wellesley’s command before it left Ireland, bringing it up to a strength of around 8,500, and to prepare two additional brigades to embark from ports in England. With the system apparently working perfectly, more trouble was created by the need to find a suitable commander than to assemble an army for him to command; Wellesley and Moore both lacked political credibility, and the former was also too junior. Accordingly, once York had been dissuaded from assuming command in person, Lt. General Sir Hew Dalrymple, the commander in chief at Gibraltar, was given the post with Lt. General Sir Harry Burrard as his second. By the time the two senior generals arrived, Wellesley had already defeated the advanced guard of Junot’s army at Roliça on August 17 with only the six brigades of his own and Spencer’s commands. Four days later, when the French commander took to the field in person and gathered up a more respectable force to attack the British around Vimeiro, the only additional troops on hand were Wroth Acland’s and Robert Anstruther’s brigades newly arrived from Britain. Even this small reinforcement was sufficient to afford Wellesley a considerable numerical advantage, which, along with Junot’s unwise division of his forces, was enough to ensure a crushing French defeat. Only with the fighting at Vimeiro coming to a close did Burrard arrive on the scene, with Dalrymple finally taking command a day later and finding that Wellesley had largely done his work for him.50

 

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