Soldiers

by Richard Holmes

  21 Ibid. pp.47.

  22 Mercer Journal of the Waterloo Campaign (1815), Vol 1. p.320.

  23 Edward Costello p.108.

  24 George Robert Gleig The Subaltern: A Chronicle of the Peninsular War (Edinburgh 1877) p.277.

  25 Mercer Journal p.14.

  26 A good deal of rubbish is written about the losses suffered by 2nd Light Battalion KGL. Forty-two of the defenders did indeed escape from the farmhouse with Baring, but others had left earlier in search of ammunition: my figure is from Baring’s own return. For a helpful analysis see Gareth Glover Letters from the Battle of Waterloo (London 2004) p.251, and Baring’s account ibid. pp.242–9.

  27 Christopher Hibbert (ed.) The Wheatley Diary: A Journal and Sketch-Book Kept during the Peninsular War and the Waterloo Campaign (London 1964) pp. 4, 7, 8–9, 70.

  28 Peter Stanley White Mutiny (New York 1998) p.115.

  29 Quoted in Niall Barr Pendulum of War: The Three Battles of El Alamein (London 2005) p.101.

  30 Mitchinson and McInnes Cotton Town Comrades p.38.

  31 See John Starling and Ivor Lee No Labour, No Battle (Stroud, Gloucestshire 2009) for a comprehensive and long overdue history of labour in the First World War.

  32 Johnson Beharry Barefoot Soldier (London 2006) pp.165, 169, 174.

  Chapter 16: Women Soldiers

  1 Marjorie Grindle née Mullins typescript memoir Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum 06/128/1.

  2 Ibid.

  3 Ibid.

  4 The Hon Dorothy Pickford, letters in the Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum.

  5 Chief Controller Dame Helen Gwynn-Vaughan Service with the Army (London 1952) p.50.

  6 Olive Taylor, handwritten memoirs, Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum 83/17/1.

  7 P. Dalgliesh, typescript account in Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum, 93/30/1.

  8 Quoted in Gerald J. de Groot ‘Whose Finger on the Trigger? Mixed Anti-Aircraft Batteries and the Female Combat Taboo’ in War in History 1997 (4) p.434.

  9 Quoted www.thegarrison.org/uk/ats_section, accessed 25 March 2011.

  10 Marjorie Inkster Bow and Arrow War (Studley, Warwickshire 2005) pp.19, 31, 38.

  11 ATS Remembered website, accessed 25 March 2011.

  12 Ibid.

  13 Army Rumour Service website accessed 26 March 2011.

  14 The Values and Standards of the Army January 2008, paras. 22 and 32.

  PART IV

  Chapter 17: The Regimental Line

  1 Peter Drake Amiable Renegade: The Memoirs of Captain Peter Drake (Stanford, Calif. 1960) p.51.

  2 Letters of Private Wheeler p.22.

  3 Hugo White One and All: A History of the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry (Padstow, Cornwall 2006) p.91.

  4 David Kenyon ‘British Cavalry on the Western Front 1916–18’ (Unpublished PhD thesis, Cranfield University, 2007) p.294.

  5 Quoted in Anglesey British Cavalry V p.340.

  6 Quoted in Allan Mallinson The Light Dragoons (Barnsley, South Yorkshire 1993) pp.211–12.

  7 Quoted in Spring Zeal and Bayonets p.112.

  8 Ibid. p.113.

  9 Quoted in French Military Identities p.13.

  10 Rudyard Kipling ‘Back to the Army Again’ in Barrack Room Ballads (Second Series) (London 1896).

  11 Peter Downham (ed.) Diary of an Old Contemptible: From Mons to Baghdad (Barnsley, South Yorkshire 2004) p.1.

  12 Quoted in French Military Identities p.21.

  13 Quoted in Richard Holmes Shots From the Front (London 2008) p.381 from a typescript memoir in the Royal Hampshire Regiment Museum, Winchester.

  14 Quoted in Henderson Highland Soldier p.230.

  15 Ibid.

  16 French Military Identities p.45.

  17 Ponsonby Recollections of Three Reigns.

  18 Dunn The War the Infantry Knew p.393.

  19 Starling and Lee No Labour, No Battle p.323. At this stage the Green Howards was formally known as Alexandra Princess of Wales’s Own (Yorkshire Regiment).

  20 F. J. Hodges Men of 18 in 1918 (Ilfracombe 1988) p.17.

  21 Shephard Sergeant Major’s War p.69.

  22 Ibid. p.38.

  23 Richard Holmes Firing Line (London 1995) p.299.

  24 Shephard Sergeant Major’s War p.124.

  25 Corns and Hughes-Wilson Blindfold and Alone pp.199–200.

  26 Quoted in French Military Identities p.279.

  27 Ibid. p.280.

  28 Quoted in Brig B. B. Kennett and Col J. A. Tatham Craftsmen of the Army: The Story of the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (London 1970) p.150.

  29 Quoted in French Churchill’s Army pp.71–2.

  30 Peter White With the Jocks (Thrupp, Gloucestershire 2001) pp.170, 303, 333.

  31 Picot Accidental Warrior pp.282, 263.

  32 Fergusson The Trumpet in the Hall p.24.

  33 French Military Identities pp.280–1.

  34 David Williams The Black Cats at War: The Story of the 56th (London) Division TA 1939–1945 (London 1995) p.73.

  35 Jim Bellows When in Doubt, Brew Up (Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire 2002).

  36 Bridgeman Memoirs pp.210–11.

  37 Fergusson The Trumpet in the Hall pp.11, 18, 22.

  38 Field Marshal Sir William Slim Courage and Other Broadcasts (London 1957) pp.85–6.

  39 John Masters Bugles and a Tiger (London 1956) p.121.

  40 Lord Moran The Anatomy of Courage (London 2007) p.166.

  41 F. M. Richardson Fighting Spirit: a Study of Psychological Factors in War (London 1978) p.21.

  42 Martin Lindsay So Few Got Through (London 1946).

  43 Wheeler p.28.

  44 Schlaefli Emergency Sahib pp.17–19.

  45 Sheffield Leadership in the Trenches p.161.

  46 Ibid. p.162.

  47 Sidney Rogerson Twelve Days on the Somme (London 2006) p.22.

  48 Ibid. pp.113–14.

  49 Sheffield Leadership in the Trenches p.185.

  50 Paul Addison and Angus Calder (eds) Time to Kill: The Soldier’s Experience of War in the West 1939–1945 (London 1997) p.84.

  51 White With the Jocks p.183.

  52 John Hill China Dragons: A Rifle Company at War, Burma, 1944–45 (London 1991) pp.22–23.

  53 Ibid. pp.137, 165.

  54 Quoted in French Military Identities p.282.

  55 Raleigh Trevelyan The Fortress (London 1979) pp.18, 46, 202.

  56 Craig Broken Plume p.149.

  Chapter 18: Imponderable Entities

  1 Trevelyan Fortress p.46.

  2 Charles Carrington Soldier from the Wars Returning (London 1965) p.98.

  3 Montague Disenchantment p.40.

  4 Farley Mowatt And No Birds Sang (Toronto 1979) pp.109–10.

  5 Quoted in Spring Zeal and Bayonets pp.110–11.

  6 Bryant Jackets of Green pp.24–5.

  7 Bagshawe pp.226, 230, 231.

  8 Sir James Edmonds History of the Great War … Military Operations, France and Belgium 1916 Vol I p.473.

  9 Ian Fletcher Bloody Albuera (Ramsbury 2000) pp.99–100.

  10 J. M. Brereton A History of the Royal Regiment of Wales (24th/41st Foot) (Cardiff 1989) p.122.

  11 Bernard Livermore Long ’Un: A Damn Bad Soldier (Batley, W. Yorks 1974) p.97.

  12 Anthony Farrar-Hockley The Edge of the Sword (London 1954) pp.37, 52.

  13 Craig Broken Plume p.184.

  14 Stewart Unimportant Officer pp.150–1.

  15 Alan Hanbury-Sparrow The Land-Locked Lake (London 1932).

  16 Bridgeman Memoirs pp.23–4.

  17 Maitland Hussar of the Line p.22.

  18 Mays Fall Out the Officers pp.49, 51, 92.

  19 Bruce Shand Previous Engagements (Wilton, Wiltshire 1990) pp.13–22, 103.

  20 Ibid. pp.89, 141, 143, 163.

  21 Questionnaire compiled during research for my Firing Line (London 1985). US Edition as Acts of War (New York 1986).

  22 Questionnaire for Firing Line.

/>   Chapter 19: The Regiments Depart

  1 Fergusson Trumpet in the Hall p.243.

  2 Ibid. p.194.

  3 Ibid. p.245.

  4 There were particular complexities in the Fusiliers’ amalgamation. TheRoyal Welch Fusiliers were part of the Welsh Brigade, and the Royal Highland Fusiliers were (controversially) part of the Lowland Brigade: neither was involved in this amalgamation. The Fusilier Brigade, which was to constitute the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, consisted of the three traditional English fusilier regiments (the Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, the Royal Fusiliers, and the Lancashire Fusiliers) together with the Royal Warwickshire Fusiliers, which had been the Royal Warwickshire Regiment till 1963 when it had been retitled to join the Fusilier Brigade.

  5 Lieutenant Colonel J. P. Riley Soldiers of the Queen: A History of the Queen’s Regiment 1966–1962 (Chippenham 1993) pp.667–8. Lieutenant Colonel Riley, disgusted by his regiment’s treatment, declined to join the amalgamated PWRR but transferred to the Royal Welch Fusiliers. He won a DSO commanding its 1st Battalion in the Balkans and retired as a lieutenant general in 2009.

  6 The Light Division disappeared in 2007 when its component regiments, the Light Infantry and the Royal Green Jackets, amalgamated to form the Rifles.

  7 Maj Gen A. S. H. Irwin to Brig E. R. Holmes 3 July 1999. The letter covered a helpful pamphlet, ‘Notes for Colonels and Commandants of Regiments, Divisions of Infantry and Corps’.

  8 In the cavalry, in contrast, Regimental Headquarters runs the fighting part of the regiment, with the commanding officer in charge. The cavalry equivalent of the infantry’s Regimental Headquarters is Home Headquarters.

  9 General Sir Richard Dannatt Leading from the Front (London 2010) p.28.

  10 House of Commons questions 23 February 2009 in theyworkforyou. com/debates, accessed 27 July 2010.

  11 This was largely thanks to Lieutenant Colonel Patrick Mercer, who was then posted, on promotion, to be Director of Strategy and Communications at the Army Training and Recruiting Agency. He became MP for Newark, in his regimental heartland, in the 2001 General Election.

  12 Black Watch website quoted in French Military Identities p.348.

  13 Dannatt Leading from the Front p.118.

  14 Quoted in Holmes Dusty Warriors p.22.

  15 Dannatt Leading from the Front p.228.

  16 Fergusson Trumpet in the Hall p.278.

  17 My digest of the Irwin paper in Dusty Warriors pp.18–19.

  18 Dannatt Leading from the Front p.229.

  19 Ibid.

  20 BBC News news.bbc.co.uk 16 December 2004, accessed 27 July 2010.

  21 Alternative Army Web Site www.arrse.co.uk, accessed 27 July 1010.

  22 The Times 25 November 2005 in www.timesonline.co.uk, accessed 27 July 2010.

  23 Alison Anderson ‘Cherished Icon Lost to History’ Perthshire Advertiser 2 December 2005.

  24 The Sunday Times Scotland 21 August 2005 in www.royalregimentofscotland.org.uk/comments.php, accessed 27 July 2010.

  25 Dannatt Leading from the Front p.230.

  Chapter 20: Tribal Markings

  1 C. H. Firth Cromwell’s Army (London 1962) p.233.

  2 Lewis S. Winstock ‘Hot Stuff’ Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research Vol 33 (1955). It was firstpublished in the New York Gazetteer in 1774, described as being ‘by Ned Botwood, Sergeant of Grenadiers in the 47th Regiment … Tune: “Lillies of France.”’ Botwood was apparently killed on 31 July 1759. It is difficult to be sure of Botwood’s fate or the song’s alleged popularity in the Seven Years War or the American War of Independence. Its final verse, though, must have appealed to Thomas Atkins: ‘With Monkton and Townsend, those brave brigadiers,/I think we shall soon have the town ’bout their ears./And when we have done with the mortars and guns,/If you please, Madam Abbess, a word with your nuns./Each soldier shall enter the convent in buff/And then, never fear, we will give them Hot Stuff.’

  3 This simply summarises a long and complex history, and leaves the Foot Guards, who characteristically had rules of their own, out of the story. See Ian Sumner British Colours and Standards 1747–1881 (1: Cavalry and 2: Infantry) (Oxford 2001), and P. R. Phipps ‘Notes on the Dimensions and Design of Regimental Colours’ Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research Vol XIV (1935).

  4 Lt Col William Gordon-Alexander Reflections of a Highland Subaltern (London 1889) p.3.

  5 William Lawrence The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence (Cambridge 1987) p.210.

  6 Quoted in Ian Knight Zulu Rising (London 2010) p.557. In 1907 Lieutenants Teignmouth Melvill and Nevill Coghill were both killed, and were later awarded the VC for attempting to save the colour.

  7 Riley Soldiers of the Queen p.235.

  8 Peebles American War pp.103, 169–70, 432.

  9 Ibid. pp.312–13.

  10 Roger Norman Buckley (ed.) The Napoleonic War Journal of Captain Thomas Henry Browne (1807–1816) (London 1987) p.73.

  11 Dunn The War the Infantry Knew pp.449–50.

  12 ‘Fusiliers celebrate St George’s Day in Afghanistan’ 24 April 2009 on http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/… accessed 6 August 2010.

  13 A. G. Oakley ‘Diary’, Department of Documents, Imperial War Museum.

  Chapter 21: Full of Strange Oaths, and Bearded Like the Pard

  1 Grattan Adventures in the Connaught Rangers p.126.

  2 Laurence Sterne The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (London 2003) p.74.

  3 General Officer Commanding; Brigadier General Royal Artillery; Brigadier General, General Staff; General Staff Officer Grade 1 (a lieutenant colonel, often holding the key appointment of chief of staff to a division), and aide-de-camp to the Corps Commander Royal Artillery.

  4 Edwin Mole A King’s Hussar, Being the Military Memoirs for 25 years of a Troop Sergeant Major of the 14th (King’s) Hussars (London 1893) pp.29–30.

  5 The period was further reduced in 1977 to fifteen years, and stands there at present. The good conduct element of the medal has always been taken seriously, and a youthful mishap is enough to prevent its award.

  6 Henry Yule and A. C. Burnell Hobson-Jobson A Glossary of Colloquial Anglo-Indian Phrases … (New Delhi 2000) pp.48, 135.

  7 Hobson-Jobson p.503.

  8 Shephard Sergeant Major’s War p.27.

  9 Maj Gen Sir C. E. Callwell Stray Recollections 2 Vols (London 1923) I p.255.

  10 Fitzroy Maclean Eastern Approaches (London 1951) pp.149, 151–2.

  11 Stephen Graham A Private in the Guards (London 1919) p.78. During the First World War, private soldiers in the guards were styled private rather than guardsman. They were termed guardsmen from 1920 onwards, and the headstones of guards privates killed during the war bear this new rank.

  12 Paul Fussell (ed.) The Ordeal of Alfred M. Hale (London 1975) p.43.

  13 The high port is a product of the drill movement ‘port arms.’ The rifle is held obliquely across the body with its muzzle uppermost, and to the left.

  14 Iris Butler Rule of Three. Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough and her Companions in Power (London 1967) p.325.

  15 J. L. Findlay Fighting Padre (London 1941) p.133.

  16 ‘We are … We are … You have a slang world that expresses well what I want to say.’ ‘We are fucked, My Lord? I hope not.’

  17 Drake Amiable Renegade p.319.

  18 Browne Napoleonic War Journal pp.114–15.

  19 Mary McGrigor Wellington’s Spies (Barnsley 2005) pp.168–9.

  20 Anglesey Cavalry I p.127.

  21 Pamela McCleary (ed.) Dear Little Girl: Letters from the Front 1914–18 (Shipston on Stour 2004) p.18.

  22 ‘The use of Beards in the British Army’ in Army Rumour Service, accessed 3 December 2010.

  23 http://www.shinycapstar.com and http://www.irishguards.org.uk, both accessed 3 December 2010.

  24 Grenadier Guards Association, Nottingham Branch, in http://beehive.thisisnottingham.co.uk, accessed 3 December 2010.

  Chapter 22: Tunes of
Glory

  1 Francis Markham Five Decades of Epistles of Warre p.59.

  2 Captain Thomas Venn Military and Maritime Discipline (London 1672).

  3 Quoted in Hugh Barty-King The Drum (London 1988) p.51.

  4 Sir Charles Oman (ed.) Adventures with the Connaught Rangers 1809–1814, William Grattan Esq late lieutenant Connaught Rangers (London 1902) p.128.

  5 Charles John Griffiths A Narrative of the Siege of Delhi (London 1910) p.136.

  6 There are many versions of the words: this is from the website of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Royal Regiment, www.farmersboy.com, accessed 18 August 2010. The Duke of Edinburgh’s used the march until its amalgamation, and The Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment inherited it from the Royal Hampshires, with whom it had been popualr. The PWRR now marches past to a mixture of the Queen’s Regiment’s ‘Soldiers of the Queen’ and ‘Farmer’s Boy’.

  7 Osbert Sitwell Great Morning (London 1948) p.197.

  8 Rudyard Kipling ‘The Drums of the Fore and Aft’ in Wee Willie Winkie and other Child Stories (Calcutta 1888). The action best describes the Third Afghan War victory of Ahmed Khel (April 1880), when the 59th Foot was caught changing formation without bayonets fixed.

  9 John Shipp Memoirs of the Extraordinary Military Career of John Shipp (1830) p.127.

  10 http://theminiaturespage.com, accessed 19 August 2010.

  11 Ian Knight Zulu Rising p.471.

  12 London Gazette 18 June 1858.

  13 London Gazette (Supplement) 9 September 1916.

  14 ‘The Pope and the Warpipes’ in http://st.louis.irish.tripod.com, accessed 19 August 2009.

  15 The Drummer’s Call April 1978.

  16 George Simmons A British Rifle Man p.287.

  17 Barty-King The Drum p.80.

  18 http://military-bands.co.uk/3rgj.html accessed 19 August 2010.

  19 Richard Barter The Siege of Delhi: Mutiny Memoirs of an Old Officer (London 1984) p.23.

  20 Sir Frederick Maurice History of the Scots Guards (London 1935) p.45.

  21 Unpublished diary of Sergeant Shawyer ‘Wanderings of a Windjammer’ quoted in http://military-bands.co.uk/3_rgj.html accessed 20 August 2010.

  22 Mays Fall Out the Officers pp.13, 19, 23, 39.

  23 Shawyer ‘Wanderings of a Windjammer’.

  24 ‘Love Farewell’ was arranged from its traditional format by folk singer John Tams for the Sharpe series, and then recorded with the band and Bugles of the Rifles to raise money for the service charity Help for Heroes.