Hungry Harry: An Orphan in the Ranks

by Andrew Wareham

  “Daft buggers!”

  The corporal nodded across to the malingerers, shook his head pityingly.

  “They must think we’re too bloody stupid to ‘ave seen their sort before! We seen every-bloody-thing in the Army! You wait, Harry, just you bloody wait and see what ‘appens to them!”

  Harry had listened to the platoon talking and had seen Billy’s back. Billy was thirty or so, had served through the whole of the American War and had ‘made a mistake’ as a young soldier and been awarded two hundred and fifty lashes – ‘twenty dozens and ten to round it up’ – to teach him military right from wrong. The upper part of his back was heavily scarred, weals crossing each other in a herring-bone pattern from shoulders to the bottom of the rib cage.

  “Stung a bit at the time. Serves as a reminder, don’t it!”

  It was all part of the mystique of the old soldier – a real man took his lashes in silence and laughed about them afterwards.

  “You think they’ll get flogged, corp?”

  “Bound to, ain’t they! Can’t just give ‘em a discharge – ‘alf the other buggers would be falling over their own feet within a day to get the same. Couple of dozen to ginger ‘em up, that’s the first dose for blokes like that.”

  “What about the daft one, corp?”

  “They shouldn’t never ‘ave sworn ‘im in. They got any sense then they’ll put ‘im as groom to the officers’ ‘osses, only they can’t with us, acos of the officers ain’t got no nags acos of where we’re goin’. But they could do it, and give him across to another regiment what’s close to ‘and, like. But… the Adjutant don’t know about ‘im and the captain don’t care, so Christ knows what’s goin’ to ‘appen to the poor sod!”

  Harry had seen the captain of the Grenadier Company from a distance when he had watched the parade on his first Friday. Like every other officer in the battalion, the captain was old for his rank, forty at least; he must have been ancient as a lieutenant. He was lean and drawn in the face, tight-lipped and disappointed, looking for fault and finding it very easily; he was one of the very few officers who was not a drunk – they presumed he had other problems. With only thirty men drawn up before him he had the time to watch each closely and to shout his displeasure to his sergeant.

  The entire company had been awarded extra drill, to take place throughout the following day. It had rained and they had been forced to spend almost the whole of Sunday working up their uniforms so that they would be smart for Monday.

  Due to the general inefficiency that prevailed in the Army, and especially in their particular battalion, they had not been issued with muskets in their first few weeks of existence, and when they had finally arrived there had been no powder and ball for longer still. Harry was little behind the others in his drill with the Brown Bess.

  The weapon was heavy and clumsy, unbalanced and difficult to hold steady until the knack was learned. Nearly five feet long and weighing more than ten pounds it was awkward to carry and for a smaller man balancing the forty-two-inch barrel was a difficult task, but the Grenadier Company was to set the example to them all, expected to be more expert especially in bayonet and butt at close quarters. The Grenadiers were to lead in the charge and hold to the last in defence; they had not actually carried grenadoes for half a century but carried themselves with the extra swagger of the toughest men of the battalion, or so they believed.

  Swinging a shovel and pushing laden coal trucks from early childhood had built muscle on Harry and he quickly mastered the essentially simple, inaccurate smoothbore. The concept of ‘aim’ did not exist, there were no sights; the soldier was to point his musket in company with the others in his rank and was to deliver a volley in exact time. The rule was to be slow and steady, to produce three volleys a minutes for perhaps five minutes in succession; a fight that lasted more than five minutes at close quarters was rare indeed. A battalion of ordinary size would fire some ten thousand rounds in five minutes and if only one in twenty hit home, even at ranges of less than one hundred yards, that should still be sufficient to cause massive damage to an enemy.

  Where the enemy was visible and cooperative, standing in ranks and firing back in the open field, then the theory worked. The Americans had hidden in the trees and fired with accurate rifles, which was regarded by many of the British as cheating and dishonourable, even if regrettably efficient.

  Britain was rich and owned India, the greatest and cheapest source of saltpetre in the world; the Army had powder, and ball from the lead mines of the Pennines. British soldiers used their muskets in practice every week and learned the skills of live firing; no other European army could afford to do so. Provided its officers were able to bring their battalions to the field and point them in the correct direction – which was not necessarily always the case – the British infantry could be relied upon to win any musketry exchange.

  Harry learned the simple loading, the sequence of commands to be followed unthinkingly, his hands moving without conscious instruction from his brain, and, importantly, without him watching. He could load in the dark as well as he could at noon.

  Powder, ball, ram; lift the musket and prime the pan; close the pan and pull the hammer to half cock; raise to the shoulder and bring to full cock. All done in precise time, each man in the rank performing the same action in the same second. For inspections they would prime the pan first so that the cartridge could be used as a wad, ramming twice as the rule book demanded. The spring to the lock was not always of the best and it was not impossible for the flint to rattle and spark when ramming; if the pan was already primed then the result was a soldier with his head blown off, which was an undesirable waste of men who were in short supply. It was only rarely that they went by the book, never on active service, as far as priming was concerned.

  The next stages followed the official order.

  Wait the command, holding the musket perfectly horizontally and tight to the shoulder, cheek to the stock.

  Fire on the word, right eye squeezing closed against the flame and powder smoke from the pan which added its little blue scars to the right cheek with every discharge. Old soldiers were easy to identify because of the tattooing on the cheek.

  Then drop the butt to the vertical and take the next made cartridge from the pouch and bite the sealed top open, ball into the mouth while the bulk of the powder was tipped in…

  The bitter powder made for dry thirsty mouths and Harry learned always to keep his water bottle full.

  The infantryman carried sixty rounds as standard issue and none of the men in the platoon had ever fired them all off in the open field. A siege was a different matter, they said, whichever side of the ramparts you were; dealing with a wall was a long process and could demand hours of firing over many days, but that was not really their business – that was for the gunners and pioneers and suchlike.

  It took six weeks for Harry to look like a soldier, which the others said was well done – most took longer before they could fade into the ranks unnoticed.

  Harry attended his first punishment parade at that time; it was the first time as well that he had seen Colonel Roberts, the battalion commander. Apparently the colonel spent most of his days in London, far more amusing a place than Bedford. The single major did the same, though not normally in Roberts’ company; Sergeant Hollis was not even certain of the major’s name.

  The Grenadier Company’s sole lieutenant had finally reported for duty and made his appearance as well. Sergeant Hollis looked at him and swore, whispered to the corporal stood behind him.

  “That’s bloody Atkins!”

  Corporal Smith was none the wiser, but was fairly sure it was not good news. He glanced swiftly at the military figure that had appeared at the front of the company.

  Well into his thirties with bright red and pendulous cheeks and bloodshot eyes and a cherry nose; the face of a hard drinking man. Of less than medium height, perhaps two inches over the five feet, but weighing the better part of fourteen stone, at a glance – da
mned near two hundred pounds of the man and the bulk of it in his belly which bulged over and under his tight belt.

  ‘Not much to worry about there’, Smith thought. ‘A month on the Fever Coast and the apoplexy will get him if Yellow Jack don’t.”

  Smith was reasonably happy about his own chances – he expected to return as a sergeant as he had served in the Sugar Islands during the American War and had survived the intermittent fever and the typhoid. He was salted against disease, in his opinion.

  The battalion, not quite four hundred strong still, the Assizes having been delayed by an outbreak of goal fever at Bedford, formed three parts of a hollow square and watched as a traditional triangle was erected, all very formally. Three of the sergeants’ spontoons, ceremonial pikes of about ten feet length, were tied together at their tops and a fourth was bound across two at waist height, all done to the beating of a slow drum.

  Seven men were led out to stand in front of the triangle and the senior sergeant shouted their names and companies and offences and sentences.

  Drunkenness on duty; malingering; theft; insulting words to an officer – two for one dozen; three for two dozens; one for one hundred; the last for three hundred.

  Corporal Smith thought they were within reason light; he glanced at the new men on parade, wondering if any would faint or throw up. He hoped not, he would not wish to draw the lieutenant’s attention to them. All three of the Awkward Squad were for two dozens as malingerers, which was a pity for the idiot but no more than the other two deserved. The thief should have received five hundred in Corporal Smith’s opinion – he had no time for any man who stole from his mates in the barracks; a hundred with the knotted cat was a severe punishment, he supposed, but it would not break the man, except there was unusual bad luck. The man who had answered back was a fool; if a soldier could not keep his mouth shut then he deserved all that he would certainly get. He did not know the fellow, and really cared very little for him, but three hundred would lead to a tedious long parade.

  The pair of drunks were dealt with very quickly – it took longer to trice them up to the triangle than to administer their beating; both were old soldiers who had signed on again to the familiar life and each showed a scarred back – the lash nothing new to them and treated with contempt. Both made a performance of pulling on their shirts and waistcoats and coats and tying their stocks before resuming their places in the ranks, showing themselves wholly unmoved by a mere dozen – they were not to accept aid from the Surgeon. Smith observed their arrogance; so he noted did the bulk of the officers, those who were sober and interested enough to see anything. They were asking for trouble, that pair, might very easily get it.

  The idiot started to wail before the lash touched his back, having seen what was about to happen to him; he screamed continuously for the whole of his two dozen, collapsed howling on the turf as he was cut down. The Surgeon and his helpers took him away, embarrassed and ashamed by the whole business. The colonel was most irritated and enquired who the fool was, making such a noise over two dozen! He ordered that the idiot be dismissed from his battalion; he could not be putting up with that sort of nonsense! They gave the simpleton a shilling to be going on with and pushed him out of the gate that afternoon, their responsibility to him fully discharged.

  Harry stood quite still and utterly silent; he did not like this aspect of military life, but he, like nine out of ten of the other private soldiers, did not intend ever to be flogged himself.

  The malingerers were silent under their doses and discovered exactly how to stand to attention when the colonel stalked across to them and informed them that he would, personally, inspect their drill on the following Friday, and every one thereafter, and he would double the punishment each time if he was not satisfied with them. The colonel showed every evidence of extreme bad temper and they believed him utterly.

  Harry peered sideways at the colonel, keeping his head firmly facing forward; every other man in the company did the same, this being the first time they had seen the man at close quarters. He was another drinker; in common with almost all of the officers he showed the red face and scarlet nose and bloodshot eyes coupled with a substantial belly; his expression suggested a man with a headache.

  The provosts turned to the pile of little bags behind them and picked out the thieves’ cats – identical to the ordinary variety except that each tail had been made a few inches longer to allow it to be twice knotted towards the end. Most men would be bruised and reddened by the ordinary cat, needing at least fifty to be scarred, but the thieves’ knots always broke the skin and commonly dug gobbets of flesh out of the back. Any thief could be identified for life – one glance without his shirt on told the tale.

  Most soldiers sentenced to a hundred or more could expect some degree of mercy; the officer commanding the parade would normally call a halt to the punishment before it could do lasting damage. Recruiting could be difficult and it was wise not to be wasteful of trained men. Thieves, however, could expect to receive every one of the lashes they were sentenced to, with an extra ration if they were so unwise as to show defiant. This thief had nothing left in him after the first dozen, moaning and then sobbing and finally crying aloud with each of the last fifty or so. Blood ran down his back and pooled on the turf about him and the provosts were liberally bespattered each time they flicked the cat back over their shoulders, but there was no mercy for a man who stole from his own. They dragged him away after throwing the buckets of salted water over his back, tossing him into the sick room to lie on his belly for a week or two. If he lived, which was probable, he would be sent back to his own platoon, to a very uncertain welcome; they might forgive him, he might become a pariah – all a matter of luck and how much tolerance they possessed between them. He could be quite sure that it would be many years before they forgot what he was and treated him as a mate, another swaddy.

  The fool with the big mouth was brought forward, stepping proud and arrogant under the cold stare of the officers; his words had undoubtedly been correct, they were ‘drunken no-hopers who could not make a living except in a battalion on the Fever Coast’, but he had been very foolish to say what all knew. A sentence of three hundred was the absolute most the colonel could stretch Army law to without a court-martial and its attendant publicity, but he was determined that he would have every lash laid on hard. The provosts who had dealt out the previous punishments were retired and twelve new men were brought forward to lay on their dozens in rotation, their arms having no chance to tire, to ease up on the force of the blows; the last of his three hundred would be as painful as the first.

  The old soldiers in the battalion had seen it before, knew that the big mouth was to be crippled, the flesh and muscle of his back shredded. They whispered to the men on either side to stand still, to say nothing – this colonel was a real bastard!

  They watched for more than half an hour as the defiance was beaten from the man, all in dead silence. The Surgeon confirmed at intervals that he was still alive, palming a swig from his little pocket flask as he turned away, his back to the colonel.

  The beating ended and the big-mouthed fool was cut down, unable to stand, hands and knees on the turf, weeping silently, body racked by shudders; a broken man. They did not expect to see him in the ranks again.

  The parade was dismissed, still absolutely quiet.

  Harry returned to the barracks room, discovered the teapot to be hot and slices of bread cut for them all. To his surprise, he was hungry, had no difficulty in squatting down with the others to eat and drink. Corporal Smith joined them after a few minutes.

  “Sergeant says ‘e knows the lieutenant, was in ‘is company in America when ‘e was just a bloody ensign, what ‘e was for always, never getting promoted for not ‘aving the money and not being liked by the colonel. Likes ‘urting people, that one – took a knife to a couple of prisoners they ‘ad and cut ‘em up slow, just for fun. Watch ‘im! He really ‘ad a good time today watching the lash and the blood. Not a wo
rd; real quick to obey command, every time.”

  “We ain’t goin’ to see much of ‘im, though, do you reckon, corp? Too much on the bottle to bother us on the drill square or in the butts.”

  “Sergeant says that the only time we’ll be near ‘im will be when we gets aboard ship. Then ‘e won’t ‘ave anything else to do, maybe. You youngsters need to keep an eye out for ‘im, acos of ‘e likes boys, so the sergeant says.”

  Paddy and Patrick shook their heads; they knew that to be very wrong.

  “Just you tell us, me dears. It’ll be over the side with that little fellow, you may be sure of that!”

  Harry was not at all certain he knew what they were talking about – he had never heard of the man’s habits.

  Harry’s feet began to adjust to the hard and clumsy shoes; the blisters healed over and became callouses and he walked more freely, just in time for the first of a series of route-marches. The battalion was to transfer to Bristol within a few weeks and the men must be able to make their fifteen miles a day. The knapsacks had arrived and they were made to practice under a full load, more than sixty-five pounds on their backs.

  Fifteen miles did not sound too much, just five hours on the march with ten minutes break to each hour. It was amazing just how demanding it was, even on the flat lands surrounding Bedford. There would be hills to cross on the route to Bristol, some of them steep and tall.

  Marching for any distance was a skill in itself, utterly different from the performance on the drill square. The young soldier needed to learn how to strap the knapsack so that it sat comfortably across his shoulders and did not dig into the small of his back, crippling him with cramps in half a day. There was a right way of doing everything, and it was almost the same as the parade ground method, but not quite, not wholly so. Harry had fewer problems than many because he was willing to listen and liberal with his beer and his pennies; nothing came for free in the Army, but good advice from his swaddies came very cheap.