UNIFORMS AND WEAPONS
Without going into the niceties of regimental detail, which were fully
developed by 1809, it is necessary to give a certain attention to the
dress of the army—we might almost add, to its occasional want of dress.
[Sidenote: Concerning Head-Gear]
The Peninsular Army was fortunate in having started just late enough
to be rid of the worst of the unpractical clothing—the legacy of the
eighteenth century—which had afflicted the troops of the earlier years
of the war. The odd hat, shaped something like a civilian beaver,
with a shaving-brush at the side, which had been worn in Holland and
Egypt, had just been superseded for the rank and file by a light felt
shako, with brass plate in front,[295] and a woollen tuft with the
regimental colours (worn sometimes in front, sometimes at the side),
and ornamented with white loops and tassels.[296] This was a light
head-dress, compared with what had gone before, and no less with the
heavy, bell-topped leather shakos that were to come after. Wellington
protested against an early attempt to introduce these, saying that he
always knew his own troops at a distance, even when great-coated, by
the fact that their shakos were narrower at the crown than the base,
while the French headgear was always bell-topped, swelling out from the
bottom to the crown, and the distinction was useful. The felt shako
had a peak to protect the eyes from the sun, and a chin-strap. It was a
serviceable head-dress, whose only fault was that, after long wear, and
exposure to much rain, the felt became soft and might crease or bulge,
and then dry into unsightly and lop-sided shapes.[297]
Down to 1811, officers of the line, except in rifle and light infantry
corps, were wearing cocked hats, as had been the custom since the
eighteenth century. The new clothing which came out in 1812 had
shakos (of a more ornamental sort) for officers as well as men. The
very sensible reason for the change was that obvious difference in
dress between commissioned and non-commissioned ranks enabled the
enemy’s marksmen to single out the officers, and to give them more
than their fair share of bullets. The discarded cocked hat had been
a stupid survival—a “burlesque of a _chapeau_ usually topped by some
extraordinary-looking feather,” says one wearer of it, while others
wore it without any feather at all. The “cut-down” hat, exactly a span
in height, was all the rage in the Lines of Torres Vedras during the
winter of 1810–11.[298] The felt shako was an enormous improvement in
every way. After 1811, only generals and staff officers, engineers,
doctors, commissaries, and drum-majors retained the cocked hat. The
last case that I remember of its being used in the line was that of
Lieutenant Maguire, of the 4th, who, leading the “forlorn hope” at the
storm of San Sebastian (Aug., 1813) put on a cocked hat with a white
feather “to make himself conspicuous and recognizable.” Clearly this
head-dress was by that date wholly abnormal.[299]
Another evil which the Peninsular Army escaped also belonged to the
head. Pigtails and hair-powder went out in 1808—an immense boon. As one
who had endured them says, “The hair required to be soaped, floured,
and frizzed, in order to be tortured into an uncouth shape, which gave
the man acute pain, and robbed him of the power of turning his head
easily, unless he brought his body round with it.” The grease and flour
matted the hair, and inclined towards all sorts of scalp diseases.
Wellington, who had discarded hair-powder and dressing long before
most officers,[300] must have been rejoiced when it became legally
permissible to do without it in all ranks. It was not every one who
agreed with him—a few old-fashioned men still wore pigtails and powder
for some time in the Peninsula; but they soon died out.
In the same year, 1808, that these monstrosities vanished another
affliction was relieved. Trousers of a blue-grey colour were
substituted for breeches and gaiters, as service dress, just before the
first brigades sailed, in 1808. The many-buttoned gaiters to the knee
had been an intolerable nuisance; there was every temptation not to
strip them off at all, when it took twelve minutes to button them up
efficiently, more if they were wet through. Hence troops liable to be
alarmed at any moment were tempted not to take them off at all for many
days, which led to uncleanliness and diseases in the legs. Trousers
were a great improvement—they were less tight, and could be easily
slipped into and out of. Under the trousers short boots (often called
shoes) were worn.
[Sidenote: The Regimental Coat]
The coat for all ranks in the infantry was cut short in front,
and had fairly small tails; it still preserved, more or less, the
late eighteenth century cut in this respect, but differed from the
earlier type in having the stiff upstanding collar supported by a
leather stock, an evil device which constricted the neck and tended
to apoplexy. On hard service, such as storming parties, the men
unbuttoned their collars and threw their stocks aside.[301] The most
characteristic point that strikes the eye in pictures of the rank and
file of the Peninsular period is the series of white stripes across the
front of the coat, caused by the ornamental prolongation of the button
guards. Bayonet and cartouche box were supported by the broad white
leather cross-belts, ornamented with a brass plate with the regimental
badge. The very heavy knapsack, normally of oilskin or glazed canvas,
was supported by a separate attachment of straps passing under the
arm-pits. The whole kit weighed some sixty pounds, when the canteen
and haversack are taken into consideration. Officers had only a single
leather belt coming from the right shoulder to the left hip, to sustain
the sword, and wore their red silk sashes girt tight, in several turns
around their waists.
One of Wellington’s most sensible traits was an intense dislike of
worrying officers or men about details of uniform on active service.
“Provided we brought our men into the field well appointed,” says
Grattan of the 88th, “with their sixty rounds of ammunition each, he
never looked to see whether trousers were black, blue, or grey: and
as to ourselves, we might be rigged out in any colour of the rainbow
if we fancied it.” The consequence was that scarcely any two officers
were dressed alike! Some wore grey braided coats, others brown: some
again liked blue; many (from choice, or perhaps necessity) stuck to the
“old red rag.” Some wore long-skirted frock-coats, as better protection
to the loins than the orthodox regimental cut. There are some curious
records of the odd clothing in which officers finished a campaign. One
records that he did the Burgos retreat in a garment improvised from the
cassock of a priest, slit up and cut short and furnished with buttons.
Another, a captain in the 29th, landing in Great Britain in a braided
pelisse and a fancy waistcoat with silver buttons of Spanish filigree
work, was taken for some sort of French prisoner by a worthy general,
who congratulated him on being allowed such freedom in the place of
his captivity.[302] As to the men, they wore anything that could be
got: a quantity of French trousers found at the capture of Madrid, in
the Retiro fort, were issued to some corps. A more rough expedient was
that of a colonel with a very ragged regiment in the winter of 1813–14,
who allowed blankets to be cut up by the regimental tailors, to make
up into trousers for such of the men as were absolutely disreputable
in appearance. The battalion made some sensation when it marched into
Mont-de-Marsan a few days later.[303]
All this did not vex Wellington’s soul in the least—from Picton’s
tall beaver hat to the blanket-trousers, he saw and disregarded every
detail. He himself was the most simply dressed man in the army, with
his small cocked hat unornamented save by the English and Portuguese
cockades, his blue, tight-buttoned frock-coat, and the short cloak with
cape which has been immortalized by a score of statues and pictures.
I ought, perhaps, to mention that the winter-clothing for the infantry
was a grey pepper-and-salt coloured great coat, of very thick cloth,
with a cape reaching down to nearly the elbow, so as to give a double
thickness of protection to the shoulders. There was also an oilskin
cover to the felt shako, which could not always be easily adjusted to
the latter, when it had got distorted in shape from much wear. Plate
No. 8 gives an illustration of this costume.
[Illustration: _PLATE VIII._
SERGEANT AND PRIVATE OF INFANTRY IN WINTER MARCHING ORDER.
1813.]
When the Peninsular Army first started on its campaigns, the heavy
dragoons were the most archaic-looking corps in it, for they still wore
the broad and heavy cocked hats, which had prevailed in all armies
during the middle years of George III., and jack boots up to the knee.
This headgear, which after a single campaign in the tropical rains
of the Peninsula always became sodden and shapeless, and hung down
limply towards the shoulders, was fortunately abolished by a royal
warrant of August, 1812, and during the following winter many of the
heavy dragoon regiments received brass helmets of a classical shape,
with a crest and plume, which, though rather heavy, were an immense
improvement on their former shapeless hats. At the same time they were
given instead of jack-boots (which had made skirmishing on foot almost
impossible) grey cloth overalls, with a broad red stripe, and short
boots. This was the dress of the heavies in 1813–14 and during the
Waterloo campaign.
The light dragoons had gone to the Peninsula in 1808 with the black
japanned helmet with a bearskin crest along its crown, which had been
in use since the time of the American War. With it they wore blue coats
with white froggings, and buckskin breeches with Hessian boots. The
general effect was handsome, and in use the dress was not unpractical.
General Foy mentions it with approval in his history. The French
outposts were much puzzled when, at the commencement of the Vittoria
campaign, the English vedettes and outposts appeared in a new uniform,
which was introduced for light cavalry at the same time as the changes
made for heavy cavalry just mentioned above. It was at first suspected
that new regiments had been joining from England. The 1813 uniform
substituted, for the black helmet with fur, a shako with a small
upright plume, slightly bell-topped in shape, and with ornamental cord
and tassels. It looks as if it had been suggested by the head-dress of
the French _chasseurs à cheval_, and was much too like it to please
Wellington. At the same time the blue jacket barred with white lace
was changed for a blue coat, with a very broad plastron of the colour
of the regimental facings in front, extending from collar to waist,
and the buckskin breeches were replaced by tight-fitting breeches of
webbing. This was the Waterloo uniform of all light dragoon regiments.
[Sidenote: Cavalry Uniforms]
The large majority of the British cavalry regiments in the Peninsula
were light dragoons: for the first three years of Wellington’s command
there were only three heavy dragoon regiments in the field, and no
British hussars. Of the latter, a new introduction in the national
Army, there was one brigade present in 1808 during Sir John Moore’s
operations,[304] and the same regiments came out in 1813, to see the
last year of the war.[305] During the greater part of Wellington’s
campaigns the only hussars present with the army were Hanoverians,
the very efficient corps belonging to the King’s German Legion. The
fantastic hussar uniform of the period, a development from a much
simpler Hungarian original, is well known. Over a jacket fitting
tight to the body, was worn the furred and braided pelisse, which was
usually not completely put on, but flung back, so as to hang over the
left shoulder. It flapped behind, and was a hindrance rather than a
covering. On the legs long overalls were worn. The head-dress was a
very large fur cap, or, as it would have been called later, a busby.
I find very severe criticisms on this head-gear. One officer says,
“These flimsy, muff-like appendages encumber the heads of our soldiers.
The awkward cap, being constructed partly of pasteboard, soaks up a
great quantity of wet during the violent rains of this country, and
so becomes unbearably heavy and disagreeable, while it affords no
protection to the wearer. At all times it can be cut down to his skull
with the greatest ease.”[306] The cause of its adoption seems to have
been rather the Prince Regent’s eye for splendour in military costume
than anything else. For strength and protection, no less than comfort,
the light helmet of the early dragoons was universally preferred by
critics. Later improvements made the busby more solid and less heavy,
but in 1808 it was evidently a most unsatisfactory head-dress.
[Sidenote: Artillery Uniforms]
Artillery uniform may be described in a few words. That of the horse
artillery was a close copy of that of the original light dragoon—black
japanned helmet with fur crest, blue jacket laced with gold (instead
of the dragoon’s silver) and buckskin breeches. Field artillery, on
the other hand, were clothed almost exactly like infantry of the
line, save that their coats were blue instead of red. Their tall felt
shako and tuft, trousers, and coat with white stripes, were exactly
similar to those of the linesmen. Engineer officers wore a dress like
that of line officers before the shako came in, having a cocked hat
down to the end of the war, and trousers. The rank and file of that
department—Royal Military Artificers down to 1812,[307] Royal Sappers
and Miners after—had shako and blue coat down to 1813, but changed the
latter for a red coat, like that of the line, in the last-named year.
It was braided with yellow across the front instead of white, the only
practical difference in appearance.
Doctors and commissaries down to the end of the war were wearing a
cocked hat, like that of a general or a staff officer. Hence some queer
mistakes, when these peaceful gentlemen were mistaken for combatant
officers, the colour of their plume, the one differentiating point,
failing to be observed in the dusk or in dirty weather. It is said that
some young commissaries were prone to pass themselves off as staff
officers on the Spanish and Portuguese peasantry, and even on local
authorities. A ridiculous anecdote is told of Doctor Maurice Quill,
the surgeon of the Connaught Rangers, who was the best-known humorist
in the army.[308] A general, who caught a glimpse of his cocked hat
behind a hedge, took him for a staff-officer shirking, and hunted him
for some time from cover to cover, the doctor meanwhile shouting back
to him, “I’m off; seen plenty of fighting for one day.” It was only
when he took refuge with his mules and medical panniers, that his irate
pursuer discovered that he was not a combatant officer. Other wearers
of the cocked hat were the drum-majors of the line, who are said to
have had much adulation paid to them by the country-folk, because of
their enormous gold-laced head-dress and lavish display of braiding,
which caused them to be taken for brigadiers at the least.
The most distinctive infantry uniform in the whole army was that of
the rifle battalions, whose sombre colours contrasted in the most
marked way with the red of the British and the bright blue of the
Portuguese line. The dress of the 5/60th and the two light battalions
of the K.G.L. differed from that of the three battalions of the 95th,
in that while both wore the dark rifle-green jacket, the three German
units had grey-blue trousers not unlike those of the line, while the
latter were in green from head to foot. All wore black shakos of a
high shape, like those of other regiments, and with a green tuft or
ball at the front. The accoutrements were all black, in order to avoid
the showing of light or shining points on the body, when the men were
dispersed in skirmishing. In the head-dress of the officers there was
a certain variety, the 5/60th and 1st Light battalion K.G.L. having a
tall shako similar to that of their rank and file, while those of the
95th and the 2nd Light battalion K.G.L. had a peculiar head-dress,
something like that of an eighteenth-century hussar; it was a tall,
narrow cap, much adorned with diagonal twists of braid, and destitute
of the peak to shade the eyes which formed part of the normal shako;
it had a green tuft at the front. The 95th officers for some time wore
over their tight jackets a black furred and braided pelisse, in the
hussar style—surely a most absurd and inconvenient encumbrance for men
who were continually scrambling through hedges, and working among
thick brushwood. When thrown back, as it seems generally to have been,
it must have caught in every possible twig. The officers’ jackets were
distinguished from the plain-breasted coat of the rank and file by
having a great quantity of narrow braiding across the front: they all
wore falling “wings,” instead of epaulettes. The Portuguese caçador
uniform, save that it was brown and not bottle-green, reproduced very
closely the cut and form of that of the 5/60th.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: “Brown Bess”]
A word as to armament naturally follows on notes concerning uniform.
The weapon that mainly won the Peninsular victories was the “Tower
musket” of the line battalions, the famous “Brown Bess.” It was a heavy
flint-lock, fitted with a pan, and weighing about nine pounds. Its
effective range was about 300 yards, but no accurate shooting could be
relied upon at any range over 100. Indeed, the man who could hit an
individual at that distance must not only have been a good shot, but
have possessed a firelock of over average quality. Compared with the
rifle, already a weapon of precision, it was but a haphazard sort of
arm. At any distance over the 100 yards the firing-line relied upon the
general effect of the volley that it gave, rather than on the shooting
of each man. Nevertheless, the British musket was decidedly a stronger,
better made and more accurate weapon than that used by Continental
armies, and was much preferred by our Spanish and Portuguese allies to
those of their own manufacture. Its calibre was sixteen, its missile
was a round leaden bullet (a little heavier than the French ball,
whose weight was twenty to the pound), and made up with a stout paper
cartridge, of which each man normally carried sixty. In order to secure
certain ignition by the snapping of the flint, the butt-end of the
cartridge had to be torn open by the teeth, before it was placed in the
musket barrel, and a splash of powder had to be thrown into the pan
to catch the spark and communicate it to the cartridge. The latter
was driven down the barrel by an iron ramrod. Raw recruits in a moment
of excitement, firing too fast, are said not infrequently to have
forgotten to withdraw the ramrod after loading, and to have shot it
away—which left them helpless.
The greatest hindrance to good musketry was wet. Long-continued
rain might penetrate the cartouch box, and damp all the powder, so
that every cartridge missed fire. But even a sudden heavy squall
might drench the particular cartridge that was being handled, and
make its torn-open end incapable of ignition. Or it might wash the
priming-powder out of the pan, or damp it into a paste, so that it
could not catch fire. In either case, infantry fighting in a rainstorm
could not count on any certain fire-effect; not one shot in four might
go off, and troops surprised in open order by cavalry would be very
helpless. Their only chance of salvation would be to form square and
trust to the defensive power of the bayonet. The latter weapon was
long, triangular, and rather heavy; its weight did not make accurate
shooting easier, when it was fixed.
There was a somewhat lighter and more carefully made weapon for light
infantry battalions, called the light infantry musket; except that its
sights were more accurately seen to, and that its length was slightly
less, I cannot find that it greatly differed from the normal Tower
musket. The same may be said of the _fusil_, which was an older type
of light musket, which had originally given its name to all fusiliers.
The last time that it occurs in use, was when it was given during the
latter years of the war to the experimental home battalions, into which
boys under seventeen were drafted. To suit their short stature and
younger muscles, fusils instead of full-sized muskets were served out
to them.
[Sidenote: The Baker Rifle]
Quite different from all muskets were the rifles served out to the
5/60th, the 95th, and the Light Battalions of the K.G.L. The pattern
was called the Baker rifle, from its inventor. It was a short weapon
with a barrel two and a half feet long, furnished with seven grooves
within, which made a quarter-turn in the length of the barrel. Its
calibre was a twenty bore, and it was stiff to load. An interesting
letter from one of the majors of the 5/60th to the assistant
adjutant-general at Cork, written just before the battalion sailed
for Portugal, makes a demand for 450 small mallets, for the purpose
of forcing the bullet down the barrel. “They should be made of hard
wood, with a handle about six inches long, pierced with a hole at the
extremity for fastening a string to it.” Major Davy adds that “the
instrument is absolutely necessary,” and a mallet for every two men
should be furnished.[309] These tools, however, were in use only for a
few months, were found not indispensable, and were finally withdrawn.
But to ram the ball home was always a hard job, owing to the grooves.
The rifleman carried no bayonet, his second weapon being a very short
and curved sword, more useful for wood-chopping than anything else.
Sergeants were not yet armed like the rank and file, except in
the rifle battalions, where they carried the normal weapon of the
“Baker” type. In the Guards and line alike they had a seven-foot
spear with a cross-piece below the head, to prevent over-penetration
after a thrust.[310] The names of pike and halberd were used for it
indifferently, though the former was the more correct, the original
halberd having been a cut-and-thrust weapon with an edge as well as
a point. In addition, the sergeant carried a brass-hilted sword at
his left side. I have never found any mention of its being used, the
halberd being always the preferred weapon—though in action a sergeant
often picked up a dead man’s musket, and joined in the firing.[311]
But, _en revanche_, I have found a confession by a newly made sergeant
of his having caught it between his legs, and had a nasty fall, on
his first appearance with the three stripes. The weapon was slightly
curved, and meant for cutting rather than thrusting.
On the other hand, the infantry officer’s sword was quite straight and
rather light, a thrusting weapon essentially. There are many complaints
that it was too slight for its work—_e.g._ it had no chance against a
French cavalry sword, which would always batter it down, when the two
clashed in stroke and parry. I have found it called a “toasting-fork,”
and other insulting names. Many officers provided themselves with
foreign weapons of a heavier make, and better adapted for cutting; no
objection was made to this departure from the regulations. Mounted and
staff officers carried a different sword—a curved broad-bladed sabre,
of the type of that used by light cavalry. Rifle officers also used a
curved sabre, of a rather short make, and not the straight infantry
sword.
Heavy cavalry used the broad-sword with steel hilt and guard, straight
and very heavy. It could be used for the thrust as well as for the
cut, but it would seem that the British dragoons (unlike the French
cuirassiers) always preferred the edge to the point. The sabre of
the light dragoon and the hussar was a markedly curved weapon, very
broad in the blade, and only suitable for the stroke, though very
occasionally we hear of a thrust being made.[312] From the enormous
proportion of wounded to killed in engagements where the French and
English light cavalry met, it is clear that the sabres of both sides
were better suited to maim than to slay. The thrusting sword of the
cuirassiers had a much more terrible reputation.
The rank and file of the Royal Sappers and Miners carried muskets
and bayonets like infantry of the line, and their sergeants the
regulation halberd. Horse artillery gunners had sabres of the light
dragoon type; but field artillery only very short curved swords, like
those of the rifle regiments. The drivers, who were organized as a
separate corps, had no weapons at all, in order that their attention
might not be distracted from their horses. This seems to have been a
very doubtful expedient, leaving them absolutely helpless if attacked
by hostile cavalry. It may have originated from the fact that the
driver, far into the eighteenth century, had not been a soldier at all,
but a “waggoner,” a civilian without uniform or arms. It was only in
1794 that the corps of Artillery Drivers was formed upon this rather
unpromising basis.
[Sidenote: Regimental Colours]
This is probably the place in which mention should be made of the
standards under which the army fought.[313] Cavalry banners or
_guidons_ had just gone out—if used at all in the Peninsular War, it
was only in its first year. Reports from the later years show that all
regiments had left them either at their depôt in England, or in some
cases at Lisbon. But infantry regiments, with few exceptions, took
their flags into the field, as was the custom with their successors
down to the last generation. It was only in the 1880’s that they
finally ceased to be displayed on active service. The Rifles, always
destined to fight in extended order, never had colours, and the
regimental annals of some Light Infantry corps (the 68th and 71st)
show that for similar reasons they had left their standards behind in
England. But this was not the case with all Light Infantry: the famous
43rd and 52nd carried them all through the war.
Of the two battalion colours the one or “King’s Colour” was a large
Union Jack, with the regiment’s number on a shield or medallion, often
encompassed with a wreath, and sometimes also with the badge of the
corps, when such existed. The second or Regimental colour was of the
same hue as the facings of the corps, and only had a small Union Jack
in its upper left corner, next the pole. On the plain silk of the main
surface of the flag were disposed the number of the regiment, often
in a wreath, and its badges and battle-honours, where such existed.
Since facings had many hues, the main effect of the two flags was very
different, the large Union Jack of the King’s Colour being contrasted
with the yellow, green, crimson, or white, etc., of the Regimental
Colour.
The colours were borne in battle by the two junior ensigns of
the battalion, who had assigned to them for protection several
colour-sergeants. It was the duty of these non-commissioned officers to
take charge of the flag if the proper bearer were slain or hurt, and
in many battles both colours came out of action in sergeants’ hands.
The post of colour-sergeant was honourable but dangerous, for the
enemy’s fire always beat hardest about the standards in the centre of
the battalion line. Sergeant Lawrence of the 40th notes, in his simple
diary, that at Waterloo he was ordered to the colours late in the day,
because both the ensigns and all the colour-sergeants had been hit.
“Though used to warfare as any one, this was a job I did not like.
There had been before me that day _fourteen_ sergeants already killed
or wounded around them, and both staff and colours were almost cut to
pieces.”[314] This was, of course, very exceptional carnage; but the
posts of junior ensign and colour-sergeant were always exceptionally
dangerous.