A general rule for the conduct of a good Soldier.—The beginning of Sailors.—The origin of the British Army.—The oldest regiment in the service.—Description of the Life Guards.—British Soldiers and Sailors the best in the world.—The Flemish brig and the Deal galley.—The French sloop and the British fisherman.—The Black Trumpeter and the bold Soldier.—A Soldier should attend to his own duty.
“Bear in mind, boys, that I shall tell you of many places where I have never been, and of 13battles that I have never seen. Much have I talked with old soldiers and sailors in my time and much have they told me. It may happen that in speaking of ships I may be, now and then, ‘out of my reckoning,’ and a little ‘disorderly’ at times, in describing things belonging to the army, for we are all of us liable to commit mistakes, and no doubt I make as many as other people.”
“The more you tell us of the army and navy the better.”
“Well, I will do my best for you. Let me here give you one of my general rules for the conduct of a good soldier. The advanced guard should fall back from every dishonourable action, and every rear-rank man should set a bold front against insubordination.”
“Yes, that is a capital rule. Please now to tell us what was the very beginning of soldiers and sailors?”
“That would puzzle the horse-guards and the Admiralty to tell you. Sailors I suppose began with ships; and father Noah, who commanded the good ship the Ark, was the first sailor that I ever heard of. As to soldiers, we must confine ourselves to our own country, for we know very little about the soldiers of the earliest nations of the world.”
“Please to tell us, then, the beginning of English soldiers?”
14“We must go back to the time when the Romans invaded England. The British soldier was then rude in discipline and dress, but intrepidity marked his every action, as it does now. As the Roman soldiers descended from their ships the undaunted Britons rushed into the sea to attack them, and the flower of C?sar’s troops were astonished and fear-struck by their fierce and dauntless bearing.”
“Had they red coats and guns, as they have now?”
“No! no! their dress was of a very different kind: and the trade of gun-making was unknown among them. Their arms were clubs, short swords, and spears. Their cavalry had chariots, to the axles of which were fastened sharp pieces of iron, resembling scythe-blades; and their infantry went to war in long vehicles much like our waggons, from which they alighted and fought on foot, jumping into them again, and driving off, when it suited their purpose.”
“Had we any sailors at that time?”
“I fancy not: if we had they must have been very different to what British sailors are now, or they would have met their invaders on the deep, and not have allowed them to set their feet on the shores of old England unmolested. Offa, one of the Saxon kings, had a fleet, and King Alfred invited over from abroad ship-builders, to build vessels, and mariners to man them. The ships 15were, however, comparatively small. In the time of Henry VIII., and especially in that of Elizabeth, the British navy became formidable.”
“And when did soldiers begin to dress as they do now, and to have guns, and pistols, and cannon?”
“These things were brought about by degrees. I have read that the soldiers of the Anglo-Saxons were mostly foot-soldiers, though some of them fought on horseback; but when William the Conqueror came, soldiers were mostly cavalry. Under the feudal system, if a man held land to a certain amount, called a ‘knight’s fee,’ he was obliged to serve the crown a period of forty days every year at his own expense, finding a horse, a helmet, a coat of mail, a shield, and a lance. After that, spear-men, battle-axe men, cross-bow men, and archers made their appearance; but when gunpowder was found out, it made a wonderful difference in the army.”
“No doubt it did. Bows and arrows would not do against guns and cannon.”
“At first fire-arms were very imperfectly made, and then British bowmen, being strong, brave, and skilful, were very formidable; but the bravest archers that ever drew an arrow to the head would make a poor stand now against British soldiers. The Artillery Company of London had once a company of bowmen attached to them, but they have long since put down the bow, and taken up the musket.”
16“All boys remember about Robin Hood, and his merry men in Nottingham Forest; and about William Tell, the Swiss archer, shooting the apple off his son’s head.”
“No doubt they do. At the battle of Cressy, in France, two thousand British bowmen drew their shafts against as many French bowmen. But now for the beginning of the British army.”
“Ay, now for the British army!”
“The army began with the guards that attended the king, though their weapons and uniform were very different to those that the household troops now use and wear. Whatever armed attendants monarchs may have had around their persons from the earliest times, there was no regular body of armed men appointed as guards till the reign of Richard the First. Richard instituted a body of twenty-four archers, and called them the ‘sergeants-at-arms.’ Their duty was to keep watch round the tent of the king, clad in complete armour with a bow, arrows, and a sword. Henry VII. established, in 1485, a band of fifty archers, all chosen men, to attend him; they were called ‘Yeomen of the Guard.’ This body still forms part of the royal establishment.”
“The yeomen of the guard hardly look like soldiers.”
“True: the commencement of the present regular army may be said to be the corps of life-guards established by King Charles II. at the 17Restoration. To these he added a regiment of horse-guards, with two regiments of foot-guards. A regiment of foot-guards was raised also in Scotland. These corps are what are usually called the British household troops; and the additions of horse and foot soldiers since made, constitute the British army as it exists at the present day.”
“The guards, then, are the oldest regiment of any soldiers we have?”
“They are. In the year 1679 the corps of life-guards were thus described:—‘The guards of horse—which the Spaniards call guardes de á caballo; the French, guardes du corps; the Germans, leibguarde; and we, life-guards, that is the guards of the King’s body—do consist of six hundred horsemen, well armed and equipped; and are, for the most part, reformed officers, and young gentlemen of very considerable families, who are there made fit for military commands. They are divided into three troops, viz. the King’s troops, distinguished by their blue ribbons and carbine belts, their red hooses and houlster caps, embroidered with his Majesty’s cypher and crown. The Queen’s troop, by green ribbons, carbine belts covered with green velvet and gold lace; also green hooses and houlster caps, embroidered with the same cypher and crown. And the duke’s troop, by yellow ribbons and carbine belts, and yellow hooses, embroidered as the others. In each of which troops are two hundred gentlemen, besides 18officers. There are four gentlemen who command as officers, but have no commissions, viz. sub-corporals or sub-brigadiers.’ The ranks of the life-guards are not at the present time recruited with sons of the higher classes, aspiring to commissions, but with men of good repute, generally sons of persons in a respectable sphere of life.”
“The life-guards are fine looking fellows!”
“In 1716, when George I. visited Hanover, the Prince of Wales, who was then left guardian of the kingdom, reviewed the brigade of life and 19horse-grenadier-guards, in Hyde Park, November 21st, when he declared them to be one of the finest bodies of men in person, appearance, and exercise that the world had ever produced. A life-guardsman, as he is seen at the Horse Guards at the present time, is indeed an imposing sight. We must not, however, be led astray by the size of men, nor by their gay regimentals. Many a foot-soldier in his coarse grey great-coat, and his knapsack on his back, has a heart in his bosom as brave as that of a life-guardsman!”
“Ay! a little man may be quite as brave as a big man.”
“I have somewhere heard the remark that ‘all great men are little men,’ but there is not much truth in it, though many great military commanders have been of small stature: Alexander the Great, and Napoleon Buonaparte among them. The body, after all, let its stature be what it may, is of little value compared to the mind. The one is the leathern scabbard, the other the finely tempered sword. The poet has well expressed himself:
‘Were I so tall to reach the pole,
Or grasp the ocean with my span,
I must be measured by my soul;—
The mind’s the standard of the man!’
“In a military paper that I have seen, the regulation given by King Charles II. runs thus:—‘Each horseman to have for his defensive arms, 20back, breast, and pot; and for his offensive arms, a sword, and a case of pistolls, the barrels whereof are not to be under foorteen inches in length; and each trooper of our guards to have a carbine, besides the aforesaid arms. And the foote do haue each souldier a sword, and each pikeman a pike of sixteen foote long, and not under; and each musquetteer a musquet, with a collar of bandaliers, the barrels of which musquet to be about foor foote long, and to conteine a bullet, foorteen of which shall weigh a pound weight.’”
“How very particularly they are described!”
“When the war with Holland broke out in 1672, a regiment of dragoons was raised, when the soldiers therein were ordered to carry halbards, pistolls with holsters, matchlock, musquet, a collar of bandaliers, and one bayonet or ‘great knife.’ The arms of dragoons in 1687, (James II.’s reign,) were, snap-hanse-musquets, strapt with bright barrels of three foote eight inches long, cartouch boxes, bayonets, granado pouches, buckets, and hammer-hatchets.”
“They called a bayonet, then, a great knife?”
“They did. Since then, regiment has been added to regiment, till the army has arrived at its present state. It is now, perhaps, about a hundred and twenty thousand strong, and is spread over Great Britain, Ireland, and our possessions in other quarters of the Globe—undoubtedly the first soldiers in the world.”
21“Then we have got the best soldiers and the best sailors?”
“Indeed we have! I believe there are neither sailors nor soldiers in any quarter of the world that would be a match for an equal number of British blue-jackets and red-coats. If ever you should go on board a King’s ship you will be surprised at the order and discipline that prevail, from the figure-head to the rudder, from the main-mast head to the hold. Discipline is everything in the army and navy, and I shall give you, by and by, some striking instances that set forth its use and abuse.”
“What daring fellows sailors are!”
“If British sailors are daring in battle, they are equally so in braving all dangers to save the lives of others. A Flemish brig in a heavy gale struck on a shoal, to windward of Ostend harbour, and the crew clung to the rigging for safety, as the vessel was fast going to pieces. Several Flemish boats attempted to get to the wreck in vain, and the crew seemed doomed to destruction. It happened, however, that a Deal galley was in the harbour, and the little band of daring tars aboard her were somewhat more accustomed to such scenes. They launched their light bark, and though every sea hid them from view, and every breaker covered them with foam, they persevered, undiscouraged by repeated failures, until they reached the wreck, and saved every man that was found in her.”
22“Noble! noble! It is pleasant to hear of such things! It makes us think better of sailors.”
“Some time ago a French sloop was stranded near the port of Dover, when some English fishermen, who are half sailors, directly put off for the sloop and rendered effectual service. ‘Your opposite neighbours, the French,’ said a spectator afterwards, ‘are not quite so ready to help you.’ ‘Maybe not,’ replied the fisherman; ‘maybe not; but we do our duty to the unfortunate without troubling ourselves about that matter. An English seaman don’t learn his manners on the deck of a French ship.’”
“Well done, fisherman!”
“Presence of mind and intrepidity are qualities very common among British soldiers and sailors. I will give you an anecdote that I read the other day, of a soldier. ‘When Buonaparte was preparing his flotillas, and his soldiers, to invade Old England, we expected every day to hear of his being at sea, so we all kept ready at the barracks, to act at a moment’s warning. One night, when we were snugly tucked up in bed, news came suddenly, that the French had landed. One of our trumpeters was a black, a tall strapping fellow, more than six feet high, and he was so frightened that when he took up his trumpet to sound an alarm, he let it fall from his hand and fainted away. A bold fellow, who happened at the time to be at his elbow, snatched up the trumpet from 23the ground, and blew a blast that made the barracks and the barrack-yard ring again. Up we jumped, hurried on our clothes, ran to the stables, leaped on our horses, and in eight minutes and a half every man of us was drawn up in the barrack-yard ready for action.’”
“The poor black must have been half frightened out of his senses.”
“He certainly was; and it was all very well that, being unable to do his duty, another was ready to do it for him. On common occasions, however, a soldier should attend to his own duty, and not intermeddle with that of his comrades. A gunner may prove himself a good swordsman, a riding-master may be a capital walker, and a foot-soldier may know how to manage a horse, but let each keep to his own duty. It would be bad indeed for a drummer to be his own trumpeter, and still worse for a fifer to be drummed out of his regiment for bad conduct.”