knew us, came and offered their services to us in the way of writing to
some of the higher powers; but my husband would not consent, neither
did I persuade him to do so, for the following reason: In 1812, or
thereabouts, a plan was in agitation to take away the military pensions
from the men employed in Fairy Land, during the time they were there;
but as their duties were at that time all very arduous, they objected
to it; and all the most efficient sergeants said they would resign. As
this would not have answered, it was settled that they should still
receive it, but that, on entering the Institution, the man’s first
quarter’s military pension should be stopped when due, and detained
till he left the Institution.
The military out-pensioners are all paid in advance, through the
medium of Chelsea Hospital, be in what part of the country they may;
but by this arrangement, instead of being paid in advance, it was paid
with their Fairy Land wages at the quarter’s end, instead of at the
beginning. And when a man left the Institution, he went to Chelsea
College, received the quarter’s pension, and was placed on the same
footing as before.
In January, 1821, a sergeant, named Delahide, died; and he having been
discharged as sergeant of dragoons, had a pension which amounted to
eight pounds a quarter. As he would have received the detained quarter
if he had left the place alive, his widow naturally expected it would
be paid to her in full; instead of which, she only received for the
time he lived after the 24th of December, at which time the quarterly
payments were then made, leaving about seven pounds odd justly due to
her; to get which, she made many applications in various directions;
but all without success.
This affair caused a great deal of remark amongst the people, as they
were all equally interested in it: and my first husband desired me, in
the event of his dying there, which he thought very likely to happen,
to try to get what might remain due to him, by every means in my power,
unless his death should take place at the end of a quarter, when, for
a week or two, as I should be paid to the day he died, it would not be
worth while for me to trouble myself. His death took place on the 31st
of March, 1829, and he had been paid on the 24th of that month; and I
was paid one week’s salary of Fairy Land, and one week of his detained
quarter’s military pension, leaving about four pounds due to him, and
consequently to me.
I first applied to the authorities at Chelsea College; but there I
was informed they had nothing to do with it. I then applied to the
heads of the different offices at the Horse Guards, and the petitions
and letters I sent were always referred to the Commissioners of Fairy
Land; and the answer I got from these used to be, that “although my
husband would have got it had he been living, as it was the custom
for military pensions to be paid in advance, there was nothing due.”
Now, that was the point; for if I had no right to the whole quarter,
I had no right to the one week which was paid: and that, of course,
made me sure I ought to have the other twelve weeks’ pay. I then wrote
to the Commander-in-Chief; and a kinder man than Lord Hill, or one
more inclined to cause strict justice to be done to every one, never
existed; but it no doubt never reached him, so back it came, according
to custom; and I was informed that the Commissioners of Fairy Land had
decided on the matter before.
All this had taken place during my widowhood, and it had given me
some experience in applications to “commissioners,” “heads of public
offices,” and so forth.
My husband’s reason for declining the offers made him about writing was
obvious enough: he was afraid that if he took means to get what he was
entitled to and had not, he might, perhaps, lose the one shilling and a
penny a day, which he had. Many persons in authority, who, from private
prejudice, impede and hinder those immediately under them, go on and
prosper for a long time, till they meet with somebody who has nothing
to lose by it. I weighed all these things carefully in my thoughts, and
when we left Fairy Land a year, I formed a plan which I soon put into
execution, as follows:——
I went to the house of an old acquaintance, and asked her permission
to let me write a letter there, as I could not do it at home without
my husband’s knowing it; and I did not want to implicate him, in the
event of my being blamed. I then wrote a petition to Her Most Gracious
Majesty Queen Adelaide, stating all the circumstances of the case,
and humbly begging that she would cause an inquiry to be made why my
husband was made an exception to a general rule.
It so happened that their Majesties had visited Fairy Land about a
month before we left; therefore she must have seen, as the clothing was
all new, that he had done his duty. I had waited for the Court going
to Brighton, as I thought it would stand a better chance of reaching
her there than in town, as she might not be so taken up with visitors.
After I had put it in the post, I would have given anything to have got
it back again, I felt so frightened; but as that would have been no
easy matter, considering whom it was directed to, I did not try, and I
was very uneasy for some days; but as nothing transpired, I began to
think but little of it. A fortnight passed away, when one morning I was
called to the door, as some one wanted to speak to me; it was a person
sent by a gentleman, an officer of Chelsea College, likewise holding a
situation in Her Majesty’s household, to make inquiries respecting the
truth of the statements made in my petition, which, happily for me, had
reached her. When he was gone, my husband inquired what his business
was, and I ventured to tell him: he was very much surprised, but he
could not well be angry. In about an hour after, I said I thought it
would be better for me to go and speak to the gentleman, and I could
give him any further explanation he might require. I went, and he
questioned me very particularly on the subject in all its bearings;
and, before I left, I requested that if any charge of misconduct of any
kind was made against myself or my husband, he would have the goodness
to let me know; but nothing of the kind was done, and I could only set
it down to some offence given by myself, in trying to get what was left
due of my first husband’s pension; for very soon after I had given
the matter up, the Sergeants of the Institution were all paid their
stopped-quarter’s pension; and the widows of those who had died ought
to have had what was due to their husbands. There were not above three
or four of these isolated cases—Mrs. Delahide’s case and my own being
the two worst; and I am sure, to this minute, that neither Government
nor Commander-in-Chief ever contemplated or sanctioned any such thing.
In about three months after the petition had reached her whom I may
well call “Most Gracious Majesty,” we were sent to by the gentleman
before mentioned, and informed that my husband was to receive his
superannuation allowance of half his full subsistence in Fairy Land,
being £37 7s. per annum; and he had likewise to endeavour to get his
back pay, as, in the event of my husband’s dying shortly, what had been
granted would be of little use. He succeeded; and it was above a year
and a quarter, and it was obliged to be paid from the funds of Fairy
Land. It was very fortunate for us that I applied as I did, for in the
following June, it pleased God to call away King William, of blessed
memory.
My husband’s mind was now healed and relieved of the weight which
undeserved ill-treatment had bent to the earth; and he lived six years
and a half after leaving Fairy Land, till he was nearly eighty-two
years of age. And I think the many struggles I have met with in
my journey through life, may be likened to some lines I saw in a
newspaper, of which the following is a copy:——
“A beacon that, perhaps, another,
Sailing on life’s stormy main—
A forlorn and shipwreck’d brother—
Seeing, may take heart again.
“Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving—still pursuing,
Learn to labour and to wait.”
CITY STEAM PRESS, LONG LANE.:
D. A. DOUDNEY.
Transcriber’s Notes:
Italics on page 54 were denoted by underscores. Small capitals appear
on page 4, 54 and 55. These were changed to all uppercase capitals
in the plain text version. Finally, a small number of obvious
typographical errors in the original have been corrected where leaving
them unaltered would likely be an unwelcome distraction for the reader.
These were:
Page 20: “a a hearty” has been corrected to “a hearty”.
Page 23: “wages wages” has been corrected to “wages”.
Page 25: “shonld” has been corrected to “should”.
Page 26: “avery” has been corrected to “a very”.
Page 41: “Alderma nGoodbehere’s” has been corrected to
“Alderman Goodbehere’s”.
Page 41: “ave” has been corrected to “have”.
Page 53: “llfe” has been corrected to “life”.
Page 56: “him o n” has been corrected to “him on”.
Page 66: “oftime” has been corrected to “of time”.
Page 90: “wewere” has been corrected to “we were”.
September 2026