[382, June 1815]

CHAPTER XXV

T may be imagined with what anxiety news was awaited in England, and with what joy and relief the intelligence was received of a victory so unparalleled in importance to the country and to Europe. Tidings of passing events could not then be flashed from the other side of the world as they now are. Major the Hon. Henry Percy was almost the only one of the Duke’s staff who remained unhurt. He posted to the coast, a sailing vessel landed him at Dover, from whence he drove post-haste to London, with the captured French eagles sticking out of the windows of the chaise, and presented them, with the dispatches, to the Prince Regent.[1]  The mail coaches dressed with branches of laurel announced the great news to the expectant groups collected at every cross-road, distributing the few and scanty papers, which were read out to crowds collected in the towns and villages; but it took days, and in the remoter districts even weeks might elapse, before it was known that the great peace-giving battle was gained.[2]

Early on the morning of the 19th June, all the men who could be spared were sent out to carry the wounded to the roadside, where waggons could be brought to convey them to hospital, friends and foes being treated alike. One of the 92nd described the “heart-melting spectacle,” the bodies not merely scattered over the ground, but lying in heaps, men and horses together. There are bad men among soldiers as in other professions, and some of the wounded told how they had been robbed during the night by plundering scoundrels in both British and foreign uniforms.

The Gordons had not been long employed in their humane duty when they were recalled. The Fifth Division was ordered to cook, and after dinner the regiment marched in pursuit of the French by the Nivelles road.[3]  At any other time they would have hailed the order with joy, but their minds were now pervaded by a very different feeling. They had to pass right through the field of battle, French and British calling on them to put an end to their sufferings, not to let them die among strangers. With hearts full of grief at having to leave so many of their brave comrades unburied, or dying with no friendly hand to close their eyes; with no triumphal music, more like mourners than victors, the regiment [383, June 1815] moved on, awestruck, and as silent as the dead that lay around them. “I confess my feelings overcame me; I wept bitterly and wished I had not been a witness of such a scene,” says the honest sergeant whose journal I quote.[4]

After marching a few miles through a country whose inhabitants had fled to the woods, they took some prisoners and halted near Nivelles, where the Duke of Wellington came up. He thanked and praised them for their conduct during the engagement, but he had one fault to find with the 92nd, and that was for being too forward in crossing the hedge in the early part of the action. As it turned out, he said, all was well, but it might have happened otherwise, “and he urged upon us to pay attention to the words of command that might be given next day.”

The first Regimental Orders after Waterloo are dated at Bavay, 23rd June, where they halted, but they were at Malplaquet and Mons (the birthplace so called of Mons Meg at Edinburgh Castle) on the 20th and the 21st. On the 20th a General Order was issued guarding the inhabitants of France as far as possible from loss, everything required to be paid for, but the inhabitants were cautioned to behave peaceably and to maintain no correspondence with the usurper.

At Englefontein, on the 24th, a Court of Inquiry is ordered to investigate the cause of absence of several men on the 16th and 18th inst.;[5] also as to those men who have returned without their arms and accoutrements, the Court to judge what stoppages they should be put under. Such of the band as have lost their instruments will also appear. Subalterns are named to take charge of seven companies which have evidently lost their captains, and they are directed, if the companies are strange to them, to lose no time in making themselves acquainted with the men present, and in gaining all the information they can regarding those absent.

Cambray, Peronne, Avesnes and other fortresses were taken by the Allies, but the 92nd were not employed in any affair of consequence. Marching through a pleasant country, they reached St Denis, near Paris, on the 3rd of July, where the French guns fired on them from the fortifications, and a battle was expected, but on the 4th the following General Order was issued by the Duke of Wellington:—

“The Field-Marshal has great satisfaction in announcing to the troops under his command that he has, in concert with Field-Marshal Prince Blücher, concluded a military convention with the [384, July 1815] Commander-in-Chief of the French army near Paris, by which the enemy is to evacuate St Denis, St Ouen, Clichy, and Neuilly this day at noon, the heights of Mont Martre to-morrow at noon, and Paris next day. The Field-Marshal congratulates the army upon this result of their glorious victory. He desires that the troops may employ the leisure of this day and to-morrow to clean their arms, clothes, and appointments, as it is his intention that they should pass him in review.”

The thanks of both Houses of Parliament were voted to the army with the greatest enthusiasm “for its distinguished valour at Waterloo,” and the 92nd and other regiments engaged on the 16th and 18th, or on one of those days, were permitted to bear “ Waterloo” on their colours.

The Highland Society of Scotland passed a unanimous vote of thanks “for the determined valour and exertions displayed by the regiment and for the credit it did its country in the memorable battles of the 16th and 18th June 1815.”

In acknowledgment of the services of the army at Waterloo and the actions immediately preceding it, each subaltern officer, n.c. officer and soldier was allowed to count two years additional service. Silver medals were, for the first time in the history or the British army, conferred on all ranks.

Lieut.-Colonel James Mitchell, who succeeded to the command of the 92nd at Quatre-Bras, was appointed a Companion of the Most Honourable Order of the Bath, and had the Order of St Anne of Russia conferred on him by the Czar. Major Donald MacDonald, who commanded the regiment at Waterloo, was promoted brevet lieut.-colonel and appointed a Companion of the Bath, and received the Order of St Vladimir of Russia. The share of prize-money falling to the 92nd regiment amounted to about £5000. Subscriptions were set on foot and liberally supported in London and other places for the purpose of creating a Waterloo Fund, out of which immediate relief might be supplied to the families of the fallen, and pensions given to their widows; sums of money were also given from this fund to wounded officers and soldiers. These honours and gifts were thoroughly appreciated by the troops. Lieutenant Hector Innes writes home—”Our country, I am proud to say, has more than compensated us for our dear-bought victory, but when so appreciated, who would not strive to serve and bleed for such a country!”  All soldiers’ letters were sent free, signed by the commanding officer.

The French troops began their march to the Loire on the 4th, and by the 6th the whole had proceeded to their destination. Guards were placed at the entrances of Paris, each with two fieldpieces loaded in case of disturbance.

[385, July 1815]

Wha keep guard at Vincennes and Marly?
Wha but the lads wi’ the bannocks o’ barley;
Bannocks o’ bere meal, bannocks o’ barley.

The allied armies entered Paris on the 7th July, and on the following day Louis XVIII was once more reinstated on the throne of France. The Gordons, after marching through Paris, encamped behind the neighbouring village of Clichy. Here the regiment was completed with knapsacks and other necessaries; the tailors were set to work to mend the war-worn clothing; and when all their appointments were clean and in good order, n.c. officers and soldiers had liberty to go into the city by turns, a hope being expressed that they would not quarrel with any French soldier that might happen to be there—half the officers remaining always in camp. Until a market was established in camp, parties were sent into Paris to buy vegetables for their companies. Sir Walter Scott, who was one of the many visitors to Paris, gives an entertaining description of the Highlanders making their bargains; the soldier holding his piece of money between his finger and thumb with the grip of a smith’s vice, and pointing out the quantity of the commodity which he expected for it; while the Frenchman, with many shrugs and much chattering, diminished the equivalent as more than he could afford. Then Donald would begin to shrug and chatter in his turn, and to scrape back again what the other had abstracted; and so they would stand for half an hour discussing the point, though neither understood a word of what the other said, till they could agree upon “le prix juste.”  “The soldiers,” Sir WaIter remarks, “without exception, conduct themselves in public with civility, and are very rarely to be seen intoxicated, though the means are so much within their reach”; and he mentions meeting men of all regiments and conversing with them in the picture galleries and other public places.

Napoleon, who had left Paris after a two days’ stay, concealed himself near the coast, intending to embark for America; but, finding that the British cruisers made that impossible, he surrendered himself on the 15th of July to Captain Maitland of H.M.S. Bellerophon, which brought him to Plymouth. The island of St Helena was afterwards appointed for his residence.

R.O., Camp near Paris, 18th July 1815.—Opportunity now offering of paying the last tribute of respect to the memory of the late Colonel Cameron, officers will be pleased to wear a black crape round their left arm for one month.

On the 24th of July there was a grand review of the British and Hanoverian troops before the Emperor of Russia in the Place Louis Quinze. Officers were in blue pantaloons and half-boots; the men in their best hose and new rosettes, without gaiters, but [386, July 1815] with knapsacks packed-blankets, etc.-every second man to carry a brush and towel to take the dust off on arrival at the ground. To spare the feelings of the Parisians, it was not intended that they should wear laurel, but almost the whole army did mount the emblem of victory. Immediately after the Gordons had passed the Emperor, their old general Howard, now Lord Howard of Effingham, who had commanded their brigade at Arroyo dos Molinos and other Peninsular actions, rode up in plain clothes, congratulated them on the additional honours the regiment had gained, and, glad to be again at their head, rode with the commanding officer as they returned through the streets of Paris to their camp. He was a great favourite with all ranks who had been with him in Spain. The Emperor of Russia was so much struck by the appearance of the Highland regiments that he afterwards requested that a sergeant, a piper, and a private from each of the three (42nd, 79th, and 92nd) should come to the Palace Élysée, where he resided. They were conducted by Lord Cathcart to the presence of the Emperor, who made a most minute inspection of their dress and appointments. He pinched Sergeant Campbell’s (79th) skin to be sure he wore nothing under his kilt, examined his claymore, and asked if they learned any special exercise for the broadsword; also as to their services and families at home. A private was put through the manual and platoon exercise. The pipers played the tune “Cogadh na Sith,” the Emperor appearing delighted with the music. Then they were served with refreshments, and each received a present of money. The 92nd men were Sergeant Grant, Piper Cameron, and Private Logan.[6]

The life of the regiment was now the ordinary routine of the camp; divine service on Sundays, with rather an extra dose of drill on week-days, and the Waterloo heroes grumbled a good deal at being turned out for “goose-step” at 4 a.m., with parades and field-days, regimental, brigade, or divisional, afterwards. Rolls were made out of all who had been present on the 16th, 17th, and 18th June, “No person to be included of whom the least doubt of his having been personally present on one or other of these days can be attached. The rolls will undergo a minute investigation at the War Office.” Officers’ servants and batmen having been on duty, though not actually in the ranks, were to be included.

On the 30th of August Lieut.-Colonel Mitchell resumed command.

R.O.—Hose and buckled shoes to be worn. The black gaiters only on marches, but one pair to be considered as necessaries. Greatcoats to be rolled on the top, and blankets on the back of the knapsacks as formerly (in Peninsula). Officers commanding [387, Aug 1815] companies to send in returns of widows and orphans who were rendered such by the casualties in the actions of the 16th, 17th, and 18th June, and also of dependent relatives of men killed on those days, with a certificate for each family, also as to prize-tickets being filled up and signed.[7]

On the 22nd September there was a grand review of the British and Hanoverian army on the plain of St Denis. The Duke of Wellington received the Emperors of Austria and Russia and the King of Prussia. In the suite of the allied sovereigns were many celebrated men—Prince Blücher, Prince Schwartzenberg, Field-Marshal Barclay de Tolly, Platoff, Hetman of the Cossacks, the Archduke Constantine of Russia, two sons of the King of Prussia, etc., all the British and foreign visitors, but not the Parisians. The operations represented those of the allied army at Salamanca. Before moving from the original ground, Blücher, Platoff, and other foreign generals came to examine the dress of the three Highland regiments, and “cracked their jokes at the expense of the philabeg, but Donald, instead of getting sulky, revenged himself by his remarks on the foreigners, some of whom were in uniforms which he considered no less singular than his own.”  Lieutenant Innes wrote that the Russian Emperor “paid us kilted lads most marked attention, and conversed with several officers and men, and was pleased to pay us many very handsome and highly honourable compliments.”  Another officer mentions that the Archduke Constantine rode up to the 92nd, began to scrutinise the dress of the men, and told a young soldier to hand him his bonnet, but the Highlandman had no idea of being ordered by a queer-looking foreigner, and refused. The Emperor, understanding that British soldiers were treated with more consideration by their officers than the Russians, politely asked the lad to show his bonnet “to this gentleman, my brother,” saying in French, “This is a brave regiment,” when the man at once took it off and gave it to the Russian Prince, who examined it for some time before returning it to its owner. They then asked Captain Ferrier to let them examine his claymore.

The French revenged themselves on the allied troops by caricaturing them, and the Highlanders came in for their full share, generally with reference to the admiration of the fair sex; there were also more respectful paintings of their picturesque costume as they were seen walking about in the streets of Paris. The drawings represent the feathered bonnet, kilt without purse, and buckled shoes.

[388, Sept 1815] There were a few regimental courts-martial during their stay at Paris, drunkenness being the usual crime, and there was some trouble with soldiers who robbed the market-gardens and orchards on the Seine. I find in Division or Brigade Orders fault found with some regiments for being slovenly on guard, etc., but not with either the 42nd or 92nd. A captain of a company describes with pride his success in reclaiming certain bad characters from the paths of vice “without the aid of the cat o’ nine tails.”  He divided his men into squads, and put one of the desperate characters in charge of each. The men at first demurred to being made responsible for the conduct of others, but after a fortnight had passed without any thefts or plundering excursions being heard of in the company, they were satisfied that “a remedy had been found for the evils which had arisen since the battle of Waterloo.”  A number of n.c. officers and privates waited on their captain, apologised for their previous grumbling, and thanked him for what he had done; and some time after, he had the satisfaction of enrolling four out of the six bad characters in the first class, and of seeing them draw in the lottery he had established for five prizes which he gave monthly to men of that class.

About this time each man received a present of a pair of shoes, called in Orders the “Waterloo donation shoes,” but who the donor was does not appear.

On the 29th October the encampment on the banks of the Seine was broken up, and the regiment marched to St Germains, where they were billeted. Here they were able to visit the palace in which they were led to understand that Prince Charles Stuart had died. Lieutenant Innes, in a letter to his mother, says: “Many of our Highlanders were greatly affected on entering the chamber where their Prince died.” It was not, however, really “Bonnie Prince Charlie” who died there, but his grandfather, James II (VII of Scotland). The incident, however, shows how fresh the memory of the’ 45 remained in the sentiment of many of the men, though they served King George III so loyally.[8]

The brigade under Sir Denis Pack left St Germains on the 31st, and were cantoned at Montainville and the surrounding villages. On the 2nd November the headquarters of the regiment [389, Nov 1815] were at Neuf le Vieux, the companies being scattered at Crecy and other villages; officers of companies being desired to take particular care that the men were comfortably housed, and that everything they required was paid for on the spot, and no damage done to property. The Prussians were not so particular; but it is not to be wondered at if they meted out to the French people the measure their country had received when it was invaded by the French army. Two 92nd officers were billeted on a gentleman’s house near Montainville, where they spent two pleasant days with the family. After doing justice to a substantial breakfast on the morning they marched, they went out to see after the men and baggage; on returning to bid adieu, they found the servants busy packing up wine, cold fowls, ham, etc., with which the table was loaded, and to their surprise the butler asked respectfully where they wished him to put the parcels. On being told that British officers never carried things off from their billets, and receiving a handsome tip and thanks for his attentions, he first remained dumb with astonishment, and then exclaimed, “You English behave very differently to the Prussians!”

On the l0th November they marched to Montfort and the neighbourhood, where they remained till the 30th, when the brigade was broken up. The 4th Battalion Royal Scots, which had joined the brigade some time before, and the 42nd and 92nd, marched independently en route for embarkation at Calais, and the Gordons moved to Pontoise. Sir Denis Pack, in an Order of the 29th, taking leave of the regiments of his brigade, says: “The services rendered by the 92nd Regiment in the Duke of Wellington’s campaigns in the Peninsula, and his Grace’s late short and triumphant one in Belgium, are so generally and so highly appreciated, as to make praise from him almost idle; nevertheless, he cannot help adding his tribute of applause.”

The regiment marched by Chambly, Beauvais, Abbeville, Montreuil, and Boulogne. On arriving at the gate of Calais on the 17th December, they were surprised to find it closed against them; and the commanding officer was informed that the troops (the 28th and 42nd had also arrived) would not be allowed to pass unless each company marched at a distance of a hundred yards from the one preceding it ; the men to reverse their arms, the colours to be kept cased, and the bands not to play through the town. Instant admittance was demanded and refused; a second message was sent to the governor, who was probably one of Napoleon’s old officers, giving him a quarter of an hour to open, or take the consequences. This brought him to his senses; and the battalions passed in at the usual distance, with bayonets fixed, colours flying, and the bands playing the” Downfall of Paris” all the way to the [390, Dec 1815] place of embarkation.[9] The regiment immediately embarked and sailed on the morning of the 18th for Dover, but a foul wind obliged their ship to anchor in the Downs. On the 19th the Highlanders landed at Ramsgate; and their reception on the shores of Britain would have been a cold one but for the attentions of a neighbouring gentleman named Sir Samuel Curtis, who showed them great kindness, especially to the soldiers’ wives—helping them and giving each a present of money. He also invited al officers to eat their first bit of the roast beef of Old England at his dinner table.

On the 20th they proceeded to Deal and Sandwich, and next day to Dover, where blankets and camp equipage were given into store; from thence they proceeded to Brabourne Lees, where they spent Christmas Day.

R.O.—Officers commanding companies will take care that the men are provided with a good dinner on Christmas and New Year’s Day, for which purpose they will advance each man 1s. 6d.

The regiment marched on the 28th December, one wing by Feversham, the other by Ospringe, and on the 2nd of January 1816 they arrived at Colchester Barracks, where they were receive, by a guard of honour composed of wounded soldiers belonging to almost every regiment engaged at Waterloo. They were about 150 in number, and lined each side of the street, greeting the regiment with tremendous cheering. Most of them had lost an arm or a leg, some both. Sir John Byng, who had commanded a brigade of the Second Division in Spain and the south of France, and a brigade of the Guards at Waterloo, was the general at Colchester.

District Orders, January 2nd, 1816.—Major-General Sir John Byng is much gratified at having under his command the 92nd Regiment, with which he served so long a time in the Peninsula, a regiment which he highly respects for its invariable steadiness and gallantry in the field, and for its discipline and good conduct in quarters. This Order to be read at three successive parades.

In Regimental Orders mention is made of the men being credited with a daily payment caIled “the Waterloo gratuity penny.”  The men were subsisted at the rate of 4d. a day for vegetables, salt, and washing, which, with 6d. for bread and meat, amounts to 10d. per day.”

The Waterloo Roll Was revised. No man to be entered who was not actually present with the regiment for some part of the period between the 15th of June and 7th July inclusive.

[391, Jan 1816] In February they got new clothing, the men to make their kilts with as little delay as possible, and the white waistcoats to a collar of the same stuff “at their option”; each man was provided with “a good pair of leather gloves.”

On the 19th February 1816, the regiment marched for Hull where it arrived on the 2nd March. On the march the men ordered to wear their kilts inside out, new waistcoats and old jackets, the new jackets to be carried in the knapsacks. They were treated with great kindness on the road, and hospitably entertained in almost every place at which they halted.

The War Office seems to have given long credit in those days.  A correspondence took place at Hull between the paymaster (Mr James Gordon) and the Commissary General, as to whether shoes issued to the regiment in Spain in 1808-9 should be paid for by the regiment. It was decided that they were to be paid for at the rate of 6s. 6d. a pair!

All the bonnets were set up afresh, at a cost of 1s. 8d. each; the colonel appears to have given four flat feathers yearly to man, but as they were dear this year he only gave three. Heckles cost the sergeants and “music” 3s. 1/2d. each, the men of the grenadiers and Light Company 1s. 6 l/2d. each, and battalion companies 1s. 1/2d.

Compensation was received for necessaries and musical instruments lost at Quatre-Bras and Waterloo.

In April 1816 the muskets, which hitherto had been brightly polished, were browned by instructions from the Board of Ordnance.

On the 23rd April the Waterloo medals were transmitted by order of “the Prince Regent in the name and on behalf of His Majesty”; ribbon was also received by which the medals were to be “suspended on the breast on the button-hole of the uniform.”  Thoroughly as the men of Quatre-Bras and Waterloo deserved their medals, it must have seemed rather hard to their comrades who had fought and conquered from Egmont-op-Zee to Toulouse that they should have no such distinction. (Medals were presented to the survivors of these campaigns by Queen Victoria in 1848.)

In May the “Recruiting Company” joined from Edinburgh.  There seems to have been some misbehaviour at Hull, absence and breaking out of barracks and the like, and the conviction of two soldiers of a more serious crime induced Colonel Mitchell call attention to it by an order, in which he regrets that a court-martial for such an unsoldierlike and disgraceful offence should be entered on the records. “Since the return of the regiment foreign service, the commanding officer has had every reason to be [392, May 1816] highly pleased with the general conduct of almost every individual under his command; but unfortunately a few men, regardless of their own character, have for a moment sullied the fair reputation of the regiment and brought upon themselves shame and disgrace.”  He “desires it to be clearly understood that drunkenness will never be received as an excuse for committing a crime, but, on the contrary, will be held as an addition to it.”

On the 22nd August the regiment left Hull and marched by Berwick-on-Tweed to Edinburgh, being the second visit of the battalion to its native country since its formation.[10] the church bells of the English villages rang peals of welcome as they passed, and they were entertained with profuse hospitality in most of the towns where they were billeted. Their reception in the Scottish capital was most gratifying; crowds were assembled on the road by which they approached the city, and the throng in the streets was so great that the leading company had difficulty in passing along. The 42nd, between which distinguished regiment and the Gordons there had always been a friendly rivalry—brothers in arms, but rivals in renown—had lately left the Castle, and a soldier of that regiment, standing looking on, cried “This is nothing to the crowd when we came home; we could hardly get through them at all!”  “You should have sent for us to the way for you, as we often did in Spain,” was the ready retort of a Gordon Grenadier.[11]

In Edinburgh the regiment was the object of marked attention, [393, Aug 1816] but the ideas of the period on the subject of hospitality were rather excessive, and the gentlemen who gave banquets to the troops expressed their gratitude to the soldier for his glorious victory by doing their best to make him gloriously drunk! Notwithstanding the unanimous admiration for the deeds of the British soldier of those days, it has often been repeated that his character for sobriety was indifferent. The Duke of Wellington himself had not a very high opinion of either the officers or men of his army, at any rate when he first commanded it, except as to their fighting qualities. The occasional jealousies or mistakes of his generals, the inattention to orders of some of the regimental officers, the love of plunder and want of sobriety on the part of many of the rank and file, had sometimes interfered with the success of his plans, and he seems perhaps to have been inclined not to distinguish between the good and the bad. His own pervading sense of duty, the energy of his iron constitution, and his abstemious disposition prevented his understanding or excusing either indolence or excess; still, after having served with the troops of all nations, he said there would be nothing so intelligent as the British soldier if he would keep sober, and, in fact, he promoted many of them to commissioned rank. Napier, who had served chiefly as a regimental officer, and who had a far higher opinion of the soldier than Wellington, allowed that they drank, but drunkenness was the great fault of our countrymen, civil as well as military. To love liquor too well was a crime in the army; in civil life it was pardonable conviviality.

The cock may craw,
The clay may claw,
But aye we'll taste the barley bree,

 was the idea of good fellowship in Burns’ days.

“That the British infantry soldier is more robust than the soldier of any other nation can scarcely be doubted by those who, in 1815, observed his powerful frame, distinguished among the united armies of Europe, and, notwithstanding his habitual excess in drinking, he sustains fatigue and wet and the extremes of cold and heat with incredible vigour. When completely disciplined, and three years are required to accomplish this, his port is lofty and his movements free; the whole world cannot produce a nobler specimen of military bearing. Nor is the mind unworthy of the outward man. He does not, indeed, possess that presumptuous vivacity which would lead him to dictate to his commanders, or even to censure real errors, although he may perceive them; but he is observant and quick to comprehend his orders, full of resources under difficulties, calm and resolute in danger, and more than usually obedient and careful of his officers in moments of imminent [394, Aug 1816] peril. It has been asserted that his undeniable firmness in battle is the result of a phlegmatic constitution uninspired by moral feeling. Never was a more stupid calumny uttered. . . . While no military qualification was wanting, the fount of honour was also full and fresh within him.”[12]

Such was the opinion of British soldiers in general of one who had spent the best years of his life among them; and the testimony borne to the character of the Gordon Highlanders by those under whom they served, and particularly by the inhabitants of the various countries among whom they lived, shows that theirs was a discipline “which, in the full sense of the word, is the fruit of moral and religious instruction.”[13]

Before entering on the life of the regiment during the long ,succeeding years of peace which its services had helped to secure, I will now give a short notice of a few of the veterans from whose reminiscences I gleaned information as to the regimental habits and customs of early times.

Corporal John M’Innes, pensioned after Waterloo, 10s. 6d. a week, joined when the regiment was raised; a fine-looking old Highlander when I saw him in 1852. He kept a shop at Tom ‘a Mhulin, Glen Livat, and gave details of the first uniform and those who wore it; he had served in all the campaigns, but said little of his own exploits.

John Cattanach, Badenoch, pensioner. He had no education and spoke little or no English; he tried to enlist when the regiment was raised, but was too young, and was taken later. He spoke much of his captain, MacDonald (Dalchosnie); he and many other officers constantly spoke Gaelic to them, and would give news from home to those from their own districts, and Gaelic was commonly spoken in the regiment. He spoke often of “Fassiefern” as a hard man on soldiers who neglected their duty, but just, and a fine officer. On the retreat to Corunna he saw officers as well as men without shoes or hose; some made “brogan gaelach”[14] out of hides of horses dead on the road. He liked the Spaniards, who often gave them wine and food; they danced together; but they were very cruel and barbarous to their French prisoners, hanging them to trees with weights to their feet, etc. John had been a fast runner as a boy at home, and was proud of [395, Aug 1816] having won races in the regiment. He was taken prisoner in the Pyrenees, but knocked over one of his captors; another charged at him with his bayonet, when he caught the weapon, which ran through his hand; and jumping down a ledge of rock, he got away among the bushes and boulders, bullets hitting the rocks about him, but he escaped by his fleetness without knowing that a bullet had grazed his shoulder, till he saw the blood trickling down on his belts. This was the only time he was wounded. He never went home till the regiment came to Edinburgh after Waterloo, when he married, and was discharged three years later. He got a bit of land at Strone from the Duke of Gordon at a low rent, and had cows and sheep. Served in Holland, Egypt, Peninsula, Waterloo; had the Waterloo medal, but they never sent him the Peninsula medal. He lived to eighty-nine years of age. A cousin of his, whose father, an old soldier of the American War, had given him a good education, also enlisted in the Gordons, got a commission, and retired as Captain Cattanach. The captain was a frequent guest at Gordon Castle, where his wit made him a general favourite. He lived near Kingussie in the old cottage home, where he was often visited by the Duke of Gordon, when he would turn out the hens and ducks, saying, “There’s not room at the fire for both you and the Duke.”  He afterwards went to Canada.

John Ferguson, pensioner, a native of Dunean, Inverness, enlisted in Colonel Baillie of Dunean’s Fencible Regiment, and volunteered to the 92nd. He served in Egypt, Corunna, Peninsula, Waterloo; was taken prisoner, and said the French were civil, but sometimes the prisoners got short commons, and never clothes or clean linen. Gaelic was ordinarily spoken in the regiment; officers used English on parade, but many spoke Gaelic to the men at other times. He mentioned drinking with the French soldiers, and being quite friendly when not fighting; liked the Spaniards, from whom he got lots of wine and other good things. Wine was sometimes easier to get than good water. He mentioned the Spaniards torturing French prisoners; spoke much of the sore eyes in Egypt, the dust storms and want of water, and of the hardships and severe discipline in the Peninsula. He could speak Spanish better than English; he was married when he enlisted, and came home after Waterloo; at first he had 6d. a day pension, increased to 1s. 3d. from the Kinloch Fund;[15] and lived to be a very old man.

[396, Aug 1816] Alexander Achinachy, pensioner, a Lowlander from Banffshire, was still with the regiment as civilian messman in 1851, when I often talked to him. Enlisted in 1810, and had been through the Peninsula and Waterloo campaigns. He said that on these campaigns the officers wore nothing of the Highland dress but their bonnets and broadswords, but the n.c. officers and men always wore it except on fatigue, or when in cantonments, at night on guard. The fatigue trousers were grey, or anything they could get, and were not expected to be in good order. They never wore purses when marching and fighting, but left them with the heavy baggage, or carried them on the back of the knapsack. The men were generally decent and respectable, of the agricultural class, but some bad characters were among them. There were a few Irish and English, a good many Lowlanders, but the regiment generally was very Highland, far more so than in 1851. Grant’s “Romance of War” had been lately published, and I remember telling him some of the incidents in that novel, and he recognised them, and said they were quite true. “Old Alexander” was greatly respected, and it was always said that, little and flat-footed as he was, he had never fallen out or been in hospital during the campaigns.

John Downie, native of Glenshee, Perthshire, pensioner with 9d. a day for wounds, increased to 1s. 3d. from the Kinloch Fund, joined 1810; a blacksmith by trade, but determined to enlist, and walked to Edinburgh for that purpose. An English regiment was quartered there. That did not suit him; but meeting a sergeant of the Gordon Highlanders, he took the shilling from him for seven years’ service, and was soon sent to the 1st Battalion in Portugal. A good scholar, both in English and Gaelic, he kept a journal, which was unfortunately lost with his knapsack at Waterloo, where he was picked up insensible the day after the battle. His heroes were Wellington, “Fassiefern,” Cameron the pipe-major, and Private Norman Stewart, and of these he had many tales to tell. There was no talk of teetotalism in these days, but moderation was expected. “Where is your fortitude, man?” the colonel would say to one who pleaded in excuse for being drunk that he seldom tasted liquor at all. Downie said that the night before Waterloo some took a desponding view of the situation—the retreat of the Prussians and the strength of Napoleon’s army, and spoke of their great losses at Quatre-Bras. “Comadh co dhiubh,” said a Lochaber man, “thug sinn buaidh, dh’ aindheoin co’ theireadh e “ (No matter, we licked them, say what they may); and they began to speak cheerfully of what they would do in Paris, but the French prevented his seeing their capital by putting a bullet in him, which he carried with him to the grave. He had been wounded twice before by both bayonet and bullet. On one of these occasions, [397, Aug 1816] when he was making his way to the rear with a wounded comrade, they came on a man M’Intosh, who was one of the Duchess of Gordon’s recruits; he was sitting on a dead horse, and, pointing to his leg shattered by a cannon ball, said, in Gaelic, “ What can I make of that?” “Mind, lad, ye got a kiss from the Duchess o’ Gordon for that,” was the rather unfeeling reply. Downie had a great contempt for the Spanish soldiers. “Clarty deevils,” he called them, but thought very highly of the Portuguese troops. He had a great respect for the French army, and in 1870 was surprised at their being defeated by the Germans. “They can’t be the same sort that fought against us in Spain,” he said. Discharged after Waterloo, he first kept a small school in Glenshee; when afterwards many people left the glen owing to the introduction of sheep-farming, he entered the post-office service at Alyth, where he was highly respected. He had always been a very religious man, and could read his well-thumbed Gaelic Bible without spectacles at the age of 93; he died at a still greater age.

Peter Stewart, pensioner. His parchment discharge mentions the actions of Vittoria, Maya, Donna Maria, Bayonne, Hillette, Garris, Aire, Orthes, Toulouse, Waterloo, his Peninsula medal having clasps for Vittoria, Pyrenees, Nive, Orthes, Toulouse. At some place in Spain the sentries had got into trouble from the spare ammunition being stolen. One night, Peter being sentry over it, a calf appeared, and kept getting nearer and nearer to the ammunition carts. It had rather odd action, and Peter challenged, when the creature answered with a prolonged “Bo,” which had something of the human voice about it. He fired; it fell; “Bo noo, ye beggar,” said Peter, and a Spaniard in a calf’s head and hide was his bag. He said if he had his choice, he preferred close quarters and the bayonet to shooting and being shot at. He was in the Duke of Gordon’s and afterwards in the Duke of Richmond and Gordon’s service in the deer forest of Glen Fiddich ; and when the Duke built him a new house, he named it after what he said was by far the toughest fight he had ever seen—Maya—and by that designation he was afterwards generally known. When the Queen visited the Duke of Richmond at Glen Fiddich, his Grace presented “Maya” to Her Majesty, who, after speaking to him of his services, gave him a sovereign. Afterwards the Duke said: “Well, Peter, I suppose you will put the Queen’s sovereign on your watch chain.” “I’ll hae a dram to her health oot o’t first.” When old and infirm, the Duke took a house for him at Banff to be near the doctor, and there he died. His son is a gamekeeper on the Gordon estates.

Reminiscences of Private William MacKenzie, Onich, who enlisted at Fort-Augustus, and served with the Gordons from [398, Aug 1816] Egmont-op-Zee to Waterloo; from notes by his grandson, the Rev. Dugald MacDonald, Episcopal Church, Oban:—

“In Holland William was up to the waist in water and got his powder wet. In the tussle there, they used their fists when grappling.”

At one fight, a piper named M’Lachlan had both legs broken, but continued to play ‘Cogadh na Sith ‘ till he fainted from loss of blood.

“He also mentions the incident of the piper’s bag being spoiled at Fuentes d’Onor, as mentioned in the text from the account of another man.

“On the retreat to Corunna, some of them ground little bit  of horse flesh between stones to squeeze out the blood, and ate it raw, as the old Highlanders used to do with a deer’s liver when benighted in the chase. He mentioned the incident of the child on its dead mother’s breast, as told in the text from other accounts. When the treasure was thrown away on the retreat, he said some of the men picked up gold doubloons as they passed and put them in their hose, which lamed them.

“At an engagement where his company had to stand long under fire of the enemy close in front, his Celtic impatience could not stand the strain, and he in his excitement shouted ‘Hurrah, fhearaibh, bitheamaid aca ‘ (Hurrah, men, let us be at them). His comrades, mistaking his voice for that of their officer, charged at once and routed their opponents. William was tried by court-martial for this breach of discipline, but in consideration of the circumstances, was pardoned. He mentioned that at one place the men used stones to hurl down on the enemy, their ammunition being exhausted (probably Maya). Though very strong, he was the shortest man in the battalion but one, being 5 feet 5 inches. In crossing the Nive he was carried off his legs by the stream, when Colonel Cameron rode to him, told him to catch his stirrup, brought him to land, and gave him a biscuit from his haversack and a drink of wine from his flask.

“He spoke of ‘Fassiefern ‘ as the finest soldier possible, but very strict. Men must turn out with arms and accoutrements clean, no matter how short the halt might be. He would allow no excuse for drunkenness or dirt. William thought him too hard on those who were ‘heavy on the dram.’ He lived to nearly a hundred, and would often say to the boys and their mothers, ‘If I was young again it’s not sitting by the fire at home I would be, but with the lads with the yellow tartan’ (gillean a’ bhreacain bhuidhe), telling his young friends they should join the Gordons.”

The veterans were generally very reticent as to their adventures, unless specially drawn out. One said, “ If I was to tell [399, Aug 1816] people the hardships we endured and the sights we saw, they would not believe me.”

I have often seen it stated both that the Highland regiments were not largely composed of Highlanders, and that they did not wear the Highland dress on active service. The three kilted regiments who fought throughout the great French war were recruited much in the same manner; more than once it appears from the remarks of 92nd men, as at Minorca, at Orthes, at Ghent, that they had brothers and neighbours in the 42nd and 79th, and that the regiments were delighted when they met to talk of mutual homes. Anyone who knows the Highlands intimately must be aware that there is hardly a respectable family who cannot tell you of an ancestor who was in the army of that period; there were many from the Lowlands also in these regiments, but the Highland element must have been very strong. I myself met a Chelsea pensioner of the 42nd, about 1863, a Waterloo man, who, though himself a Lowlander from Renfrew, spoke Gaelic with ease, and when asked how he came to know it, replied that he learned it in the regiment.

With regard to the dress, the orders and the statements of those present show that the Gordons wore the kilt during every campaign they took part in, though after the Egyptian campaign of 1801, when their clothing was worn out, they came home in anything they could get, white, blue, and grey breeks! There is not much in the orders on active service as to officers’ uniform, but from what there is, and incidentally, it appears that they wore the kilt in all the campaigns up to and including Sir John Moore’s. In Wellington’s campaigns they wore grey or blue pantaloons and shoes with gaiters; and the reason given for this by the late Sir John MacDonald, was that officers were encouraged to ride as much as possible, in order that they might be able at any moment to take a message quickly, but chiefly that they might be fresh at the end of a march to attend to the comforts of their men in the straggling villages and farms in which they were often billeted, for an officer’s most important work began when the march was over; and though a great advocate of the Highland garb, as long as he commanded he would not allow an officer to wear it on the line of march.[16]  The regiment seems first to have worn gaiters for marching when they went to Egypt, the low quartered buckled shoes having been found inconvenient in the sands of Holland.[17]  The [400, Aug 1816] sporran was never worn by the men except on occasions such as Sundays, guard, and inspections; just as at home, when the kilt was commonly worn, a hillman never thought of going to the hill with his sporran on, but kept it for high days and holidays (sporrans seem not to have been taken at all on the Waterloo campaign). The feathered bonnet was the everyday wear of the men, and of officers on all duties, and often in walking out, though they had a sort of undress bonnet and feather also. Colonel Cameron’s Waterloo epaulettes[18] are still at Callart; they are of silver bullion with yellow and silver strap, having the crown in gold and” 92 “ on a scarlet ground, surrounded by a silver belt inscribed” Gordon Highlanders. “ Although the Highland uniform of the time was picturesque and showy, the brick-red colour of the coat was subdued to a great extent by lace, facings, and accoutrements, so that the various colours became blended, and the dress was perhaps less conspicuous at a distance than the dark figure of a rifleman. It is remarkable that among the various deaths from sickness and accident which are noticed in journals or regimental books, I have seen no notice of sunstroke, which speaks well for the feathered bonnet.