COLONIAL AND HOME SERVICE
With the wound which struck him down on the Croix des Bouquets on the
7th of October 1813 Colin Campbell's active service in his original
regiment ended, and on the 9th of November in the same year he was
promoted to a captaincy without purchase in the Sixtieth Rifles.
Still enfeebled by his wounds, he came home before the end of the
year with the strongest recommendations to the Horse Guards from the
commanders under whom he had served in the field,--recommendations
which do not appear to have availed him materially. He made good
his claim to a temporary wound-pension of £100 a year, but the
application made on his behalf for staff-employment with Sir Thomas
Graham in Holland was not successful.
One would fain gain some introspection into the nature, character,
and tendencies of this young soldier, who in his twenty-first
year was already a veteran of war after more than five years of
pretty constant active service. It would be pleasant to have
opportunities for regarding him as something other than a mere
military lay-figure,--to attain to some conversance with his habits,
his tastes, his attitude towards his comrades, his relations with
his family, the character of such study and reading as he could find
time for, and so forth. But the means for doing this are altogether
lacking. Lord Clyde was a very modest man, and it was with reluctance
that he allowed his papers to be used for the purposes of a memoir.
He, however, left it by his will to the discretion of his trustees
to dispose of his papers, with the characteristic injunction: "If a
short memoir should appear to them to be absolutely necessary and
indispensable (which I should regret and hope may be avoided), then
it should be limited as much as possible to the modest recital of
the services of an old soldier." The trustees, seventeen years after
Lord Clyde's death, judged wisely in sanctioning the compilation of
a memoir, the material available for which was confided to the late
General Shadwell who had been long and intimately associated with
Lord Clyde both at home and on campaign. General Shadwell's biography
of his chief is a most careful and accurate work; but probably
because of a lack of such material as, for instance, familiar
correspondence affords, it somewhat fails to furnish an adequate
presentment of Colin Campbell as he was during the long years
before he emerged from comparative obscurity, and became gradually
a marked and characteristic figure familiar to and cherished by his
fellow-countrymen.
Campbell served with a battalion of the Sixtieth in Nova Scotia
from October, 1814, to July, 1815, when ill-health caused by his
wounds compelled him to return to Europe. After a course of thermal
treatment in southern France he served for two years at Gibraltar,
and early in 1819 followed to Barbadoes the Twenty-First Fusiliers
to which regiment he had been transferred. The next seven years
of his life he passed in the West Indies,--the first two years
of the seven in Barbadoes, the latter five in Demerara, where he
served as aide-de-camp and brigade-major to the Governor, General
Murray. The tropical climate of the West Indies agreed with him,
and notwithstanding recrudescences of Walcheren fever and frequent
annoyances from his wounds he was able to enjoy life and relish
the society of the colony. During his soldiering in Spain he and
his friend and comrade Seward had perforce lived on their pay,
and had firmly avoided incurring debt. With his captain's pay
and his wound-pension Campbell found himself no longer obliged
to live penuriously, and indeed was able to assist his father
by a considerable annual payment. And now in Demerara with his
staff-appointment he was so well off that, in his disregard for
money, he carelessly allowed his pension to lapse, a neglect which
he had bitter reason to regret later. His friend General Murray was
succeeded in the Demerara command by General Sir Benjamin D'Urban, a
distinguished Peninsular officer, between whom and his brigade-major
there was speedily engendered a mutual esteem and affection.
Probably, indeed, those years in Demerara were the pleasantest of
Colin Campbell's life. Comfortable (and we may be sure efficient) in
his staff-position, and the right hand man of a chief who loved him,
he was happy in his regiment and welcome everywhere in society. When
in November, 1825, the opportunity presented itself for his promotion
by purchase to a majority in his regiment, it was the spontaneous
generosity of a colonial friend which mainly enabled him to buy the
step. The promotion was of the greatest professional importance to
him, and indeed may be considered the turning-point of his career;
but it required him to vacate his pleasant appointment and to take
leave of the chief whose friendship he so warmly cherished. Returning
to England in 1826 to join the depôt of his regiment, he took home
with him the strongest recommendations from Sir Benjamin D'Urban to
the authorities at the Horse Guards; but he continued to serve with
his regiment at home until the autumn of 1832 in the rank of major,
although through the kindness of a relative the money was ready for
the purchase of his promotion to the rank of lieutenant-colonel.
General Shadwell furnishes us with an interesting sketch of Colin
Campbell's personal aspect from a portrait taken of him in his
uniform at this period of his career. "A profusion of curly brown
hair, a well-shaped mouth and a wide brow, already foreshadowing the
deep lines which became so marked a feature of his countenance in
later years, convey the idea of manliness and vigour. His height was
about five feet nine, his frame well knit and powerful; and but that
his shoulders were too broad for his height, his figure was that of a
symmetrically-made man. To an agreeable presence he added the charm
of engaging manners, which, according to the testimony of those who
were familiar with him at this period, rendered him popular both at
the dinner-table and in the drawing-room."
After several disappointments, in October, 1832, through the good
offices of Lord Fitzroy Somerset he was gazetted to an unattached
lieutenant-colonelcy by purchase. The promotion cost him £1300
and relegated him for a time to half-pay, "after," to use his own
words, "a period of nearly twenty-five years on full pay--viz.
upwards of five years as a subaltern, nearly thirteen as captain,
and seven as major." His time being now at his own disposal, his
active and energetic temperament would not allow him to vegetate
in idleness. He determined to watch the operations of the siege of
Antwerp conducted by a French force under Marshal Gérard against
the resolute but scanty Dutch garrison, which under the energetic
command of General Chassé was holding the citadel and outworks of
the historic Flemish city. He kept a detailed and technical journal
of the siege operations and of Chassé's obstinate defence, from
which he compiled reports for the Horse Guards; and for these he was
afterwards thanked by Lord Hill and Lord Fitzroy Somerset. It was an
experience which must have been of service to him when he came to
hold high command; as he wrote at the time, "To have been present at
and to have witnessed the operations of a siege commenced and carried
on _en règle_ to the crowning of the crest of the glacis, and the
establishment of the breaching and counter batteries thereon and the
descent of the ditch completed, has given me great satisfaction."
After the capitulation of Antwerp Campbell wintered in the quaint
old city of Marburg in Hesse-Cassel, with the twofold purpose of
acquiring the German language and of living economically. The summer
and autumn of 1833 he spent in Germany, but was in England during
most of 1834 undergoing disappointment after disappointment. His
means he found wholly inadequate for a London life, yet it was
clear that it would be unwise to absent himself from proximity to
the authorities. "Doing nothing and expecting nothing" is one dreary
note of this period. Indeed inaction, which he detested, and the
dregs in his constitution of the old pestilential Walcheren mischief,
were combining to make Colin Campbell morbid and desponding. Yet,
considering all things, he had attained better advancement than many
of his old Peninsular comrades. Take, for example, George Bell of
the Royals, a fellow subaltern with Campbell in Hay's brigade of
Graham's corps in the Vittoria campaign. Bell was a younger soldier
than Campbell by three years, but he had seen infinitely more
service than his senior. Bell "was engaged in the action of Arroyo
de Molino, the final siege of Badajos, capture of Fort Napoleon and
bridge at Almaraz, in the retreat from Burgos and Madrid, the battles
of Vittoria, the Pyrenees, Pass of Maya and Roncevalles, the Nive,
Bayonne, St. Pierre, Orthes, Tarbes, and Toulouse, with many other
affairs and skirmishes; and he possessed the Peninsular War medal
with seven clasps for as many pitched battles." Since the Peninsular
War he had fought in India and the Burmese War and had served in the
West Indies. And whereas Colin Campbell was a lieutenant-colonel
in 1832 George Bell was still a captain in 1839. To complete the
contrast, while Campbell was a peer and a full general in the middle
of 1858 Bell was still a colonel, after having fought throughout the
Crimean War in the command of a battalion. If the former despaired
of fortune when a lieutenant-colonel after twenty-seven years of
service, how bitterly must the latter have known the hope deferred
that maketh the heart sick when still a colonel after forty-eight
years of continuous service!
In the early part of 1835 Colin Campbell, still despondent, was
in London "living in very scanty hopes of employment." But in
May of that year he was offered and accepted the command of the
Ninety-Eighth regiment. Its service companies were at the Cape, but
as the regiment had nearly completed its period of foreign service
it was finally determined that it was not necessary that he should
join it there. How poor he was when he had the good fortune to revert
to full-pay, may be gathered from his hesitation to become a member
of the United Service Club. "My debts and embarrassments" he records
"indisposed me to entering it;" but a wise friend insisted upon his
taking up his election and backed his insistence by advancing the
entrance fees. The depôt of the Ninety-Eighth was at Devonport,
commanded by Captain Henry Eyre, afterwards General, and Colonel of
the Fifty-Ninth regiment; an officer between whom and Colin Campbell
there soon began a friendship which ripened into a most affectionate
and enduring intimacy. By dint of questioning this officer regarding
the minutest details of the regiment, its new chief was already
familiar with its interior economy before its arrival at Portsmouth
in the summer of 1837. He then assumed command, and at once set about
putting in practice the sound principles on which he himself had been
trained in the Ninth regiment,--principles which were the legacy of
Sir John Moore to the British army. In the camp at Shorncliffe that
great soldier had introduced a system of instruction and interior
economy which, in the words of General Shadwell, had produced in the
regiments serving under his command an excellence that had borne the
test of trial in the varied phases of the great Peninsular struggle,
and had left a permanent mark on the service at large. Campbell's
anxious and successful endeavour was to make the Ninety-Eighth a
well disciplined, thoroughly instructed and trustworthy regiment.
The material to his hand was good. He found the depôt in fine order;
the service companies brought home by Major Gregory required merely
the weeding out of some hard drinkers whose example was prejudicial
to the younger soldiers and whom the colonel was able to obtain
permission to discharge.
Colin Campbell had a genuine liking for and a thorough knowledge of
the private soldier. Throughout life he was by no means slow to wrath
when occasion stirred it, and sometimes, indeed, when the incentive
was inadequate, for hot Highland blood ran in his veins; and when
his face flushed and his gray eyes scintillated with passion, he was
not a man with whom it were wise to argue. The slack officer and the
bad soldier found no sympathy from a chief whose rebukes were strong
and whose punishments were stern; but he had a true comradeship with
those in whom he recognised some of that zeal of which he himself
had perhaps an excess. Himself ever sedulous in the fulfilment of
duty and sparing himself in nothing, he required of his officers a
scrupulous attention to their duties in everything regarding the
instruction, well-being, and conduct of their men. General Shadwell
writes: "Frugal in his habits by nature and force of circumstances,
Colonel Campbell laid stress on the observance of economy in the
officers' mess, believing a well-ordered establishment of this
kind to be the best index of a good regiment. Regarding the mess
as one of the principal levers of discipline, he made a rule of
attending it even when the frequent return of his fever and ague
rendered late dinners a physical discomfort. Cramped in his means,
he denied himself many little comforts in order that he might
have the wherewithal to return hospitality and be able to set an
example to his brother officers in the punctual discharge of his
mess liabilities. His intercourse with his officers off duty was
unrestrained and of the most friendly character. He sympathised with
them in their occupations and sports, and though the instruction and
discipline of the regiment was carried on with great strictness, the
best feeling pervaded all ranks."
In the ordinary tour of duty the Ninety-Eighth removed from
Portsmouth to Weedon, and thence it proceeded to Manchester which
was in what was then known as the Northern District command, now
subdivided into the North-Eastern and North-Western Districts. In
those days there were no railways, and the long marches by road,
in many respects advantageous though they were, and worthy as they
are, at least to some extent, of being reverted to at present,
certainly tested severely the discipline of regiments. An officer
who took part in the marches of the Ninety-Eighth thus records his
recollections:--"The regiment was in such a high state of discipline
in these marches through the length and breadth of the land, that
none of those occurrences which have since been the subject of
complaint took place. Day after day I had seen the regiment turn out
without a man missing; and drunkenness was very trifling considering
how popular the army then was, and how liberally the men were
treated. The fact was that Colin Campbell appealed to the reason and
feelings of his men, and made it a point of honour with them to be
present and sober in their billets at tattoo and at morning parade
for the march. He could invite, as well as compel obedience."
In April, 1839, the command of the troops in the Northern District,
which then comprised eleven counties, was entrusted to Sir Charles
Napier. For some time previous the disquiet among the manufacturing
population in this wide region had occasioned great anxiety to
the Government; and it seemed that the Chartist movement might
culminate in actual insurrection. An outbreak was apprehended almost
momentarily, and might occur at any point; so that all over the north
magistrates were nervously calling for military protection. Napier
had at his disposition a force of barely four thousand men; and those
were so dispersed that on assuming command he found them broken up
into no fewer than twenty-six detachments, spread over half England.
Those scattered handfuls of soldiers were worse than useless; their
weakness was dangerous and actually invited to mischief. Fortified by
the cordial support of the Home Secretary Napier insisted on three
points: the concentration of his troops, and, where detachments had
to be granted, proper quarters for them so as to keep the soldiers
together; that magistrates instead of clamouring for troops should
rally loyal citizens around them for self-defence; that the army was
to be regarded as a force of ultimate reserve, and that therefore it
was the duty of Government to establish throughout the country a
strong police force,--a measure which was soon to be dealt with by
Sir Robert Peel.
Napier had been in command of the district for some three months
before he and Colin Campbell met, although in the interval they had
corresponded officially and thus may have come to know something
of each other. Napier, at least, had gauged the character of his
subordinate officer. In July he had ordered the Ninety-Eighth from
Hull to Newcastle-on-Tyne. Things were then at about their worst,
and Napier wrote: "Great anxiety about the colliers in the north.
I have sent Campbell, Ninety-Eighth, there from Hull. The colliers
had better be quiet; they will have a hardy soldier to deal with;
yet he will be gentle and just, or he should not be there." During
its march the Ninety-Eighth was halted in billets over Sunday in
York. It chanced that Napier during a tour of inspection arrived
there by coach about noon, and alighted at the inn where the hurried
coach-dinner was served. Ascertaining that Colonel Campbell was
quartered in the house, the General promptly introduced himself.
Mentioning the number of minutes allotted for the meal, he asked
if it would be possible to collect the men under arms before the
coach went on. With perfect confidence Colin Campbell replied in
the affirmative. The "assembly" was sounded; and as the men were
gathering from their billets Napier, as he ate, cross-examined the
colonel of the Ninety-Eighth regarding the internal economy of the
regiment. He then inspected the troops, and on finishing the last
company as the horses were being put to, he mounted the box with
the remark, "That's what I call inspecting a regiment." "It was,"
comments General Shadwell, "what some commanding officers might term
sharp practice; but it was a satisfactory test of the discipline
and order which Colin Campbell had perfected in the Ninety-Eighth."
And he adds that this hurried meeting "formed an important epoch
in Campbell's career. From that moment he conceived an esteem and
respect for the noble soldier under whose command he had been so
fortunate as to find himself placed, sentiments which speedily
developed into a feeling of affectionate regard well-nigh amounting
to veneration."
The arrival of the regiment at Newcastle was welcomed by the
magistrates, colliery owners, and county gentlemen of Northumberland,
who in their apprehension of a Chartist rising leaned upon its
commanding officer for the maintenance of order. At no period of
his career did Colin Campbell evince greater wisdom and shrewdness
than during this critical and sensitive time. Neither rash nor
weak, he reassured the apprehensive and awed the disaffected. He
visited in person many of the Chartist meetings, and was not slow to
discern that the movement included a large proportion of supporters
who advocated moral in preference to physical methods for the
accomplishment of their objects. He became convinced that no serious
rising would take place, yet he took every precaution to meet such a
contingency. The regiment was carefully trained in street firing, and
such dispositions as would be requisite in the event of the troops
being called upon to act were sedulously practised. The Ninety-Eighth
were loyal to a man, and their discipline was faultless. Once the
Chartists seized a drummer-boy of the regiment and forced him to
beat his drum at the head of a procession. The cry rose that the
soldiers were fraternising with the mob and a magistrate hurried
to the barracks with the ominous tidings. Campbell immediately
answered--"Come, and I will show how the soldiers feel in the matter,
midnight though it is!" Ordering the bugler to sound the "assembly"
he took the magistrate into the barrack-yard. From the barrack-rooms
came rushing out the soldiers armed and accoutred, venting vehement
imprecations on the malcontents; and Campbell grimly called the
magistrate's attention to the wholesome views expressed by a local
"Geordie" of the regiment, who frankly signified his readiness to
"stick his own grandmother if she were out." But midnight _alertes_
on scant provocation Campbell steadfastly discountenanced. His most
sedulous care was for the health of his men. He habitually dispensed
with all superfluous and needless guards, and he resolutely cut down
sentry-duty which he did not consider absolutely necessary for the
protection of public property or the requirements of the service.
In this solicitude for the well-being of the soldier Campbell was
stoutly upheld by Sir Charles Napier. Holding though he did to
his conviction that no rising would occur, he nevertheless could
not resist an urgent application from the magistracy of Durham
for military assistance, and he took upon himself to despatch a
detachment to that town, reporting his having done so to the general
commanding the district. Napier approved of his conduct, but enjoined
on him the exaction from the Durham authorities of the stipulation
specified in the following terms:--"If the detachment is to remain
at Durham, the magistrates must furnish a barrack with everything
requisite for the men, and this barrack must be so situated that
the communication with the open country can be maintained--that
is to say, on the outskirt of the town. It must also be perfectly
comfortable for the soldiers, and the officers' quarters attached
to it. Unless these conditions be complied with, you must inform
the magistrates that I must positively order the detachment back to
Newcastle. I will not have troops in billets."
The disaffection in the north gradually died down as Colin Campbell
had prognosticated; and his wise and judicious conduct during the
troublous time was fully acknowledged by the authorities. From the
Home Office came the following approval of his behaviour. "Lord John
Russell desires to express to you the satisfaction he has received
from the report of the Newcastle-on-Tyne magistrates of the prompt
and valuable services which you have constantly rendered them since
the commencement of their intercourse with you. Lord John Russell
has not failed to make known to Lord Hill" (the Commander-in-Chief)
"the testimony borne by the magistrates to your valuable services,
and Lord John requests that you will accept his best thanks for your
exertions, and for the zeal manifested by you in supporting the Civil
authorities, and in the preservation of the public peace." Lord
Fitzroy Somerset conveyed to Campbell Lord Hill's satisfaction in
learning that "his conduct had met with the unqualified approbation
of Her Majesty's Government;" and the magistrates of the county
tendered him their acknowledgment of the cordial and efficient manner
in which he and the troops under his command had co-operated with
the civil power in the preservation of the public peace.
It is the experience of all soldiers that a regiment broken up in
detachments tends to fall into slackness as well in discipline as
in drill. But throughout his command of the Ninety-Eighth Colin
Campbell had the invaluable advantage of having exceptionally good
and zealous officers serving under him. Alike at headquarters and on
detachment discipline was rigid without being unduly severe; and when
the regiment was together at Newcastle its drill was admirable,--"so
steady, so perfect in battalion movements, so rapid and intelligent
in light-infantry exercise." It was when the regiment was stationed
at Newcastle that Campbell taught it to advance firing in line, which
was a specially difficult movement with the old muzzle-loader of
the period, but which on two subsequent occasions he brought into
practice against the enemy with particularly advantageous results.
The Ninety-Eighth had been serving for more than two years in
the Northern District, and a move was imminent in the summer of
1841. But it would seem to have been considered that the regiment
before leaving the north should receive new colours, and those were
presented to it by Sir Charles Napier on the 12th of May on the
Newcastle racecourse in presence of a great assemblage gathered to
witness the ceremony. Sir Charles addressed the regiment in a long
oration in the true Napier vein, in the course of which he paid
an almost ruthless compliment to Colin Campbell. The episode, if
somewhat theatrical, must have had a stirring effect. In the course
of his address the General said: "Of the abilities for command which
your chief possesses, your own magnificent regiment is a proof. Of
his gallantry in action hear what history says, for I like to read to
you of such deeds and of such men; it stimulates young soldiers to
deeds of similar daring." Then he read from his brother's _History
of the Peninsular War_ the account of Lieutenant Campbell's conduct
in the breach of San Sebastian: "'Major Fraser,'" he read in his
sonorous tones, "'was killed in the flaming ruins; the intrepid
Jones stood there a while longer amidst a few heroic soldiers hoping
for aid; but none came, and he and those with him were struck down.
The engineer Machel had been killed early, and the men bearing the
ladders fell or were dispersed. Thus the rear of the column was in
absolute confusion before the head was beaten. It was in vain that
Colonel Greville of the Thirty-Eighth, Colonel Cameron of the Ninth,
Captain Archimbeau of the Royals, and many other regimental officers,
exerted themselves to rally their disciplined troops and refill the
breach; it was in vain that Lieutenant Campbell, breaking through
the tumultuous crowd with the survivors of his chosen detachment,
mounted the ruins--twice he ascended, twice he was wounded, and all
around him died.' There," continued Sir Charles--"there stands the
Lieutenant Campbell of whom I have been reading; and well I know
that, if need be, the soldiers of the Ninety-Eighth will follow him
as boldly as did those gallant men of the glorious Ninth who fell
fighting around him in the breaches of San Sebastian!"
In July the Ninety-Eighth left Newcastle for Ireland, where, however,
it remained only a few months, its term of home service being nearly
completed. The original intention was that it should be sent to the
Mauritius. Colin Campbell worked hard to have its destination altered
to Bermuda, in the belief that the strained relations then existing
between Great Britain and the United States would result in war, in
which event the regiment at Bermuda would be advantageously situated.
But the roster of service, he found, could not be dislocated to meet
his desire; and all that he could accomplish was the permission
on arrival at Mauritius to effect an exchange with the officer
commanding the Eighty-Seventh, then garrisoning the island, should
that officer desire to remain there, and to return to Great Britain
in command of that regiment. Later he had reason to believe that the
Ninety-Eighth was intended for service in China; but that this was so
he did not ascertain for certain until the middle of October, when he
was informed that the service companies were destined to take part in
the hostilities against China which had been in progress with more
or less vigour for the last two years, and which were intended to be
prosecuted to a final issue when Lord Ellenborough, in the beginning
of 1842, should succeed Lord Auckland as Governor-General of India.