Henry Manners Chichester

“ He led a brigade of foot into the river to attack some of William's Huguenot regiments ; but his followers deserted him, leaving him almost alone in midstream, and he returned to the bank disheartened. Later he made desperate efforts to retrieve the fortunes of the day, charging at the head of the horse, and engaging in a fierce hand-to-hand conflict with Solmes's blues. ”

“ Of a placid disposition, kindly, even-tempered, and possessed of an intimate acquaintance with the habits, feelings, and prejudices of the natives, Burrell had the gift of winning the confidence and esteem of all with whom he came in contact. Under his rule, his regiment is said to have been a model of good order in the field and in cantonments, and whenever volunteers were called for, as in the cases of the expeditions to Mauritius and Java and the proposed occupation of Macao, the 15th native infantry was always ready with double or treble its quota. ”

“ Horace Walpole speaks of Guise as a very brave officer, but an incorrigible romancer. He writes to Sir Horace Mann: ‘When your relative, General Guise, was marching up to Carthagena, and the pelicans were wheeling round him, he said, “What would Chloe [the Duke of Newcastle's French cook] give for some of these to make a pelican pie!” What a pity that a man who can deal in hyperboles at the mouth of a cannon should be so fond of making them with a glass of wine in his hand! ”

“ On 28 Oct. 1767 she was married to Alexander, duke of Gordon, at the house of her brother-in-law, Mr. Fordyce, in Argyle Street, Edinburgh. Two sons and five daughters were the result of the union. The duchess soon took the management of family affairs into her own hands, with an unscrupulous desire for family aggrandisement (Autobiog. Sketch, Preface) . She possessed beauty —as may be seen in her portrait painted by Sir Joshua Reynolds in 1775, which has been often engraved—excellent business capacity, good nature, and ready wit, marred by singular coarseness of speech. ”

“ The era was one of peace, but the troops abroad and at home were often called on to aid the civil power in the cause of order, and the attitude assumed by the government press towards the military authorities on some occasions, as during the chartist disturbances, and the growing tendency of the House of Commons to intermeddle in army matters, proved pregnant sources of vexation. Failing health at length compelled Hill to resign, when he was succeeded by the Duke of Wellington as commander-in-chief. ”

“ Gage, a brave, though not a brilliant soldier, had six regiments with him in Boston, but his efforts to bring the colonists into a more submissive attitude towards the ministry at home proved as unavailing as thankless. He proclaimed the solemn league and covenant as a traitorous assemblage, and bade the magistrates arrest all persons aiding and abetting it. He likewise issued a proclamation for ‘the encouragement of virtue and suppression of vice,’ in which, according to an American historian, he gave great offence to many by ranking hypocrisy among the immoralities. ”

“ A fine soldier, in every sense, a genial, large-hearted man, ever ready and unselfish in encouraging merit in any grade, and with ideas of tactical instruction far in advance of the practice of his day, Chichester was reputed one of the best regimental commanding officers in the British army. ”

“ Of moderate stature and spare active form, his forty-seven years of military service sat lightly on him, and he was known to be one of the best regimental officers in the service. His previous Indian experience may be summed up in his own words: He served in the Madras presidency many years, and in Burmah for a time; in the Bombay presidency many years, and in Scinde for a time; in the Bengal presidency, at two periods of his life, for a vast number of years; and at almost every station in the three presidencies where European troops were located. ”

“ At the time of his first marriage the duke was reputed one of the handsomest young men of his day, and was described by Lord Kaimes as the greatest subject in Britain in regard not only of the extent of his rent-roll, but of the number of persons depending on his rule and protection. He caused Gordon Castle to be rebuilt from the plans of Baxter of Edinburgh. In 1784, in consideration of his descent from Henry Howard, last earl of Norfolk, the English titles of Earl of Norfolk and Lord Gordon of Huntley, Gloucestershire, were revived in his person. ”

“ The heroic leader of the French fell, dying against the portcullis which closed the breach, yielding up his sword to Gough through the bars. An open breach between two turrets, with the British colours flying, and the word ‘Tarifa,’ are among the honourable augmentations to the Gough family arms. The battalion with Gough in command was ordered to join Lord Wellington's army in October 1812, and was present at the battle of Vittoria, where Marshal Jourdan's baton was captured by it, and in the subsequent campaigns. ”

“ In a memorial to the Venezuelan government, dated from Caraccas in 1839, Macgregor refers to the misfortunes which have befallen him, and appealed for naturalisation in the republic, and restoration to his former military rank. The Venezuelan government granted his requests, and directed that, in view of the very eminent services rendered by him to the cause of South American independence during the wars of 1812-21, he be restored to the rank of general of division with his former seniority, and that a sum of money be granted to him. He is believed to have died at Caraccas a few years later. ”

“ Grey was author of `Some Account of the Life and Opinions of Charles, second Earl Grey,' London, 1861, and of 'Early Years of his Royal Highness the Prince Consort,' London, 1867, compiled under direction of the queen, and translated into the French, German, and Italian languages. He is described by those who knew him well as a man of masculine mind, of great readiness and sound sense, and highly independent character, who faithfully discharged the duties of his important and delicate post. ”

“ A ‘Te Deum’ was celebrated at Madrid for the victory, and Gage was made a grandee of the first class. The same year Gage was surprised by the Austrians under Count Brown at Villetri, but subdued the resulting panic, and by his masterly arrangements compelled Brown to retire. In his report of the affair to the king of Naples Gage generously admitted: ‘I have been surprised in my camp, which has been forced. The enemy even reached the headquarters, but have been repulsed with loss. Your majesty's arms are victorious, and the kingdom of Naples is safe. ”

“ Colby was a knight of Denmark, a distinction conferred in recognition of aid afforded by the ordnance survey to the Danish geodesists under Professor Schumacher; a LL.D. of the university of Aberdeen, a member of the Royal Irish Academy, fellow of the Royal Societies of London and Edinburgh, and of various learned societies of London and Dublin, and a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers. While living he received no mark of distinction from his own country; but after his death his eminent public services were recognised by the grant of a life pension to his widow. ”

“ In after years the East India Company erected a monument to Lawrence in Westminster Abbey, surmounted by his bust by Taylor, and inscribed: 'For Discipline established, Fortresses protected, Settlements extended, French and Indian armies defeated, and Peace restored in the Carnatic.' Monuments exist at Madras and Calcutta. A portrait of Lawrence by Sir Joshua Reynolds is in the India office.
Sir John Malcolm says (Life of Clive, ii. 66) that Lawrence neither was nor pretended to be a statesman, but was an excellent officer. ”

“ The youngest, Brigadier-general the Hon. Adrian Hope (1821–1858) , of the 60th rifles and 93rd highlanders, was much distinguished in the Crimea, and in command of a brigade at the siege of Lucknow, where he fell 14 April 1858 (see Gent. Mag. 1858, pt. ii. p. 85) .
The pupil and friend of Abercromby, the friend of Moore, and, in Wellington's words, ‘the ablest man in the Peninsular army’ (Gurwood, Well. Desp. vii. 22) , Hopetoun was no less esteemed in civil life, in which his soldierly mien, polished bearing, his high ideal of duty and strong common sense, rendered him generally popular. ”

“ After accepting Grant's parole, Marmont ultimately sent him off under an escort of three hundred men to Bayonne, with secret orders to put him in irons on reaching French soil. Holding himself thus absolved from his parole, Grant made his escape at Bayonne, introduced himself as an American officer to the French general Souham, with whom he travelled unsuspected to Paris, where he found out an English secret agent, and with his aid remained in the city openly for several weeks, sending intelligence thence to Wellington, as he had done from Salamanca. ”

“ French, physician to the county infirmary, he was one of the founders of a local medico-chirurgical society among the students, which survives as the'ehief medical society in the north of Scotland. Desiring to become an army surgeon, he went to London, where he attended Mr. Wilson's lectures on anatomy, and after the outbreak of war with France obtained, by purchase through the regimental agent, the post of surgeon to De Burgh's regiment, an Irish corps then being raised, and since famous as the 88th or Connaught rangers. ”

“ Graham had been superseded in the command by Major-general Pigot just before. After the surrender, Graham sailed to join his regiment, which had greatly distinguished itself in Egypt. On his arrival there the military operations were over, and Graham, in company with Mr. Hely Hutchinson, brother of Abercromby's successor, travelled home through Turkey, staying some time at Constantinople. He was in Paris after the peace of Amiens, and with his regiment in Ireland in 1804–5, until its departure for the West Indies, after which he was in London, attending to his parliamentary duties. ”

“ The autonomy of the Sikh nation, such as it was, was to be preserved ; the Sikh army was to be reduced in numbers ; its guns were to remain in the hands of the victors ; certain portions of territory were to be annexed to the company's dominions; and a British resident (Henry Lawrence) , with ten thousand men at his back, was established in Lahore (the text of the treaty will be found in the Ann. Reg. 1846, pp. 368-73) . The arrangement was admittedly an experiment, but the force at Hardinge's disposal was not sufficient to justify annexation of the whole country. ”

“ No portrait of Braddock is known to exist, but he is described as rather short and stout in person in his later years. To failings common among military men of his day he added the unpopular defects of a hasty temper and a coarse, self-assertive manner, but his fidelity and honour as a public servant have never been questioned, even by those who have portrayed his character in darkest colours. ”

“ When Hyder Ali, with an army of 100,000 fighting men, swooped down on the Carnatic by way of the Changama Pass in July of that year, Baillie was ordered to unite his force with the army collecting near Madras under command of Lord Macleod, who was immediately afterwards succeeded by Sir Hector Munro. Moving down with the gigantic camp-following then customary, and, as some writers assert, with many needless delays, Baillie drew near to Madras, defeating a division of the enemy under Hyder's son Tippoo, which attacked him on the march near the village of Perambaukum. ”

“ Starting at once with a squadron of the 19th and some native cavalry, and directing the rest of the dragoons with their ‘galloper’ guns to follow, Gillespie hurried to Vellore, to find that the sepoy troops had massacred the Europeans, and that the survivors of the 69th foot had spent their ammunition, and were making their last stand. With the aid of a rope Gillespie had himself hoisted into the fort, where he rallied and encouraged the 69th until the arrival of the guns from Arcot, when the gates were blown open, and the dragoons entering cut down over eight hundred of the mutineers. ”

“ Any other relations I have are not in want, and as I never married I have no heirs. I have therefore long since taken it into my head to adopt a son after the manner of the Romans, who I hereafter name. ”

“ Again and again they withstood the fierce charges of fresh bodies of Hyder's horse, supported by masses of infantry in the intervals, until all the officers lay killed or wounded, and but sixteen soldiers out of the five hundred of all ranks in the square remained unhurt. ”

“ Before leaving Manchester, in June 1813, on promotion to major-general and appointment to the staff in the West Indies, he was waited on by a deputation of gentlemen, who presented him with a sword valued at a hundred guineas. A few days later it was notified that the prince regent had been pleased to transfer Clay to the home staff, and he was appointed to the command of the great depot of prisoners of war on the north road at Norman Cross, Huntingdonshire, which he held until September 1814, when, in consequence of the termination of the war, his duties ceased. ”

“ He had a pleasant manner and a frank open countenance, bespeaking the modest kindly disposition of one who had never been heard to utter an ill-natured remark, and in whom dislike of ostentation was as characteristic as quickness of decision and firmness in peril. ”

“ He was likewise secretary to the college of Fort William, Persian translator to the government, and government examiner in Arabic, Persian, and Urdu for all branches of the service, besides being for some years part proprietor of the ‘Times of India’ newspaper, and was an incessant contributor to the daily press on all Indian topics, political, military, and economical. In 1857 the university of Dublin conferred on him the honorary degree of LL.D., and he was also a doctor in philosophy of Berlin. He became a member of the Royal Asiatic Society, London, in 1872. ”

“ BLAND, HUMPHREY (1686?–1763) , of Bland's Fort, Queen's County, Ireland, general and colonel of the King's dragoon guards, and military writer, belonged to a family originally of Yorkshire, settled in Ireland about 1664. According to fragmentary notices in the published records of regiments of which he was colonel, he obtained his first commission on 4 Feb. 1704; made several campaigns under Marlborough as lieutenant and captain in some regiment of horse; and was wounded at the battle of Almanara in 1710, whilst serving in Spain with the Royal dragoons. ”

“ How the troops were shipped and landed and reshipped, how clerkdom was allowed to run riot in queries and surcharges and disallowances, while the sick were left without tents, tents issued without poles, and the like, read like parodies of the Crimean blunders of fifty years later. ”

“ The recent sieges of Copenhagen and in the Peninsula, where the mode of battering assumed a rapidity unknown on former occasions, strongly marked the confidence his brother officers had in the weapons placed in their hands, and surprised the enemy, who were known to declare that they could not have nut their own ordnance of the same description to so severe a test. The complete success of these objects of his most serious and careful pursuit will be duly appreciated by those capable of judging of their merits. ”

“ A motion in the House of Lords by the Marquis of Carmarthen that Germain, being still under sentence of court-martial, was an unfit person for a peerage, was rejected, as was a similar motion on the day he took his seat. Sackville's last years were spent chiefly in retirement on his estates. His health was latterly enfeebled by guttering of long standing from stone, and his death is said to have been hastened by his efforts to be in his place in the House of Lords at the discussion of certain 'propositions' sent up by the Irish parliament. ”

“ The King's German Legion was disbanded in 1816, and Count Alten, who was then placed on half-pay, was appointed to command the contingent of the reorganised Hanoverian army, serving with the allied army of occupation in France. After his return to Hanover in 1818, he became minister of war and of foreign affairs and inspector-general of the Hanoverian army, posts which he held up to his decease. He rose to the rank of field-marshal in the Hanoverian service, retaining his major-general's rank on the British half-pay list. ”

“ This was the date on which the ‘red’ regiment of Dorsetshire militia entered Bridport to oppose the Duke of Monmouth's advance (Macaulay, History, vol. i.) . Drax, Erle's successor in the Charborough estates, caused an inscription to be put up over an ice-house in the grounds recording that ‘under this roof, in the year 1686, a set of patriotic gentlemen of this neighbourhood concerted the great plan of the glorious revolution with the immortal King William ...’ (Hutchins, iii. 128) . ”

“ Colley was beloved by his comrades in arms, and looked up to, especially by the rising soldiers of the modern school, as a future leader. A high military authority speaks of him as 'the ablest soldier I have ever served with,' and attributes the disaster at Majuba to the fact that even the best troops are liable to panic.
Colley's capacity as an administrator was of a very high order. During his short government of Natal he effected improvements and initiated progressive undertakings which are still gratefully remembered by the colonists. ”

“ He was eldest son of Lieutenant-general Sir Alexander Kennedy Clark-Kennedy, K.C.B., K.H., a Peninsular and Waterloo officer, who, as Captain Clark, 1st royal dragoons, signalised himself at Waterloo, during one of the charges of his regiment, by capturing, single-handed, the ‘eagle’ of the French 105th of the line, afterwards in Chelsea Hospital. He subsequently commanded the 7th dragoon guards, and was full colonel of the Scots Greys at the time of his death. ”