Close to the Colours (105th Foot. The Prince of Wales Own Wessex Regimen Book 2)

by Martin McDowell

  “Halt! I order you. I am both an Officer and a Man of God. I order you to halt.”

  As an answer he was bowled over and the men ran on to cut the traces of the mules and drag them off. Then, others arrived to ransack the wagon. Within minutes all was scattered on the frozen ground, books, papers and the slates used by Bridie’s children, their letters still visible, perfectly formed. Sedgwicke stood looking at the disaster, also Beatrice Prudoe, stood at the church door, her hands beside her face in horror whilst her husband sat shocked and astonished. Unwounded, but heavily bruised in his pride and self-esteem. As Sedgwicke walked to the nearest drunks to gain backpacks and knapsacks, he heard two shots as the mules were slaughtered. He returned to the wagon to gather such of his own possessions as he could find, after handing a knapsack and haversack to Mrs. Prudoe to enable her to do the same. He had but brief words of consolation.

  “It was inevitable, Mrs. Prudoe. Sooner or later the mules would have died anyway, of starvation and work; in this cold.”

  She nodded dumbly, but he had more to say.

  “We should now get ourselves amongst the followers. They are probably better able to care for us than we are for ourselves. I do think that best.”

  She nodded, then she did her own packing, making tortured selections regarding what to take, then she helped her stunned husband to his feet.

  ***

  Bembribre held no fond memories for any of the 105th. Those stood on guard had to spend every minute of the first night on careful watch, each, several times, being required to fend off deserters with the threat of their bayonets or even the discharge from a musket. However, the threatening figures of Gibney, Hill and Saunders kept many at bay. The various messes, united with their followers, were sat huddled in the wreckage of buildings, but at least they had better fires, using wood gathered from the wrecked wagons, which eventually included The Chaplain’s. The morning and the rest of the day brought small comfort and even less to their Colonel. An Aide-de-Camp came riding back with a strong cavalry escort and went straight up to Lacey and handed him a note. Lacey immediately took umbrage.

  “Captain. This army of ours has not yet been brought to so parlous a state that Captains fail to salute a superior Officer!”

  The Captain jumped to the attention and saluted.

  “Yes Sir. Sorry, Sir.”

  Lacey glowered at him and opened the note. Having read it, he looked at the messenger.

  “No reply.”

  The Captain saluted and remounted his horse to ride off, continuing down the road, seemingly to reach the final rearguard.

  Lacey looked at O’Hare.

  “I want to see all Officers, in there, in fifteen minutes.”

  He was pointing to the church, with his Chaplain’s possessions now even more scattered and blowing in the icy wind. Within ten minutes all Officers were in place, sat under the one section of roof remaining. Holding the note delivered to him, Lacey stood up, within the silence already there.

  “We have been re-assigned to the rearguard, now called the “Reserve Division’. That’s us, our old friends the 20th, the 52nd, 91st, 95th and 15th Hussars. All led by Lord Paget. It would seem that he has asked for us specifically. Crauford’s Lights are leaving the army to be embarked at Vigo, not Corunna. Once they were the rearguard, now we are.”

  Having read what it contained, he lowered the note.

  “I am not going to speak grandiloquently about honour and privilege. To be part of the rearguard for this retreat will be the toughest trial that any of us have faced, including Major O’Hare and me. In addition, we will have the followers with us, I cannot send them on, there is now too big a gap between ourselves and the 42nd, thus there is too great a risk that they will be robbed and murdered and left to freeze and starve.”

  He took a deep breath.

  “Which brings me to my major point. This army is falling to pieces. On top, we are being pursued by an army of considerably larger size. I, for one, want to get home, I do not wish for my bones to remain here, to be scattered to the Four Corners when the snows melt. If we are to get home, we must hold together, as a Regiment, able to take care of both ourselves and our own, and fight out way out. So far we have held together; our losses have been minimal, but morale is low, I don’t need to tell you that. Whether or not this Regiment gets back to England lies in your hands.

  He paused, then continued, with each “you”, when spoken, being significantly louder, to convey the added responsibility.

  “I speak of how you treat and how you deal with your men. If they see you enduring what they must, if they know that you are concerned for their welfare and that it has your highest priority, they will stay with The Colours and we will reach Corunna. So, let that be your watchword: “First, Your Men”. They come first, you second. Look to their needs before your own. Join their campfires, share their worries, advise where you can. If we fall apart, then fall indeed we will. Together; we may just stand.”

  He stood for a second, studying the blank but serious faces.

  “Dismiss.”

  All left the church and dispersed through the growing gloom with a different mood to that which they had harboured when they entered it. To those such as Carr, Drake, Ameshurst, Shakeshaft and Heaviside, such instruction was plain and obvious. In fact Heaviside went straight to the fireside of Deakin and Bridie, his Colour Party, with his Bible, and then read from heroic passages, having passed out tea from his own meagre stock. He needed no light to see the words, he knew them by heart anyway, and he needed to finish what he had begun the previous evening. His audience sat listening intently, as the deep, sepulchral, and cultured thespian tones of Heaviside rolled around the bare walls of their meagre dwelling, and all fully appreciated the gesture of his joining them in such a concerned and comradely manner.

  However, for such as Carravoy and D’Villiers, such was almost beyond countenance, certainly beyond experience. They had performed their duty at affairs laid on for the tenants of their Estates, but to actually socialise, in conviviality, with their men, all being both their social and military inferiors, would be something entirely new in their privileged lives, if it were to happen at all. D’Villiers fully appreciated the dilemma that dwelt within his Company Commander and tried to make light of it by describing what they were being asked to do in terms that were not too onerous.

  “Well, I see no problem in walking around and asking how things are, sort of thing.”

  Carravoy turned on him

  “And if they say, “bloody awful”, what then? Do you give them your own shoes and blanket? A drink from your own spirits? What power do we have to put things right? Moore has got us into this God Awful mess, let him get us out of it. Let him provide the men with what they need. I’ve nothing spare, even if you have.”

  He turned to walk away and gave his parting shot.

  “I don’t know what Lacey is talking about!”

  With that he stomped off, calling for their servant. D’Villiers stood for a while, enveloped in the cold silence of the chill evening, broken but sparsely by the sounds of the camp around him, mostly the crackling of campfires. He sucked in a deep breath and studied the desolation, so obvious even in the weak glow of the same meagre sources of light and comfort. What Lacey had said was as pure and obvious a truth as any he had heard; they came out as a whole Battalion or they would not come out at all, and that depended on the men. He drew another deep breath and sent it out into the darkness as a white cloud that hung long in the air, similar to the conclusion that now hung in his mind. He went to the ruined houses occupied by his section and up to the first campfire.

  “Hello men. Can I get a bit of a warm from your fire?”

  Two immediately made room for him and one cleaned out a beaker for some tea.

  ***

  The following day saw two arrivals, one welcome, the other decidedly not so. Paget came in with the Reserve Division, this being welcome; whilst arriving from all points and routes came a ho
st of stragglers, some sober, but many staggering drunk. Where they still managed to obtain supplies of drink remained a mystery. Paget paid them no attention, but immediately called a conference of his Colonels, using the church that Lacey had used the previous day. Paget came in last and, as all stood, Lacey saw the change in his new Commanding Officer. The strain was telling. He stood erect, looking every inch a cavalry commander, tall and slim, and fine featured with dark hair, slightly thinning at the front, but his eyes and cheeks were deep sunk, from worry, cold, lack of sleep and poor food. He stood before his Colonels, intending to be brief.

  “All followers are to be sent on, from all Regiments. We are the rearguard, we cannot be slowed in any way. They can wait at Villafranca, two days on from here. It is a major depot containing fourteen days rations of biscuit, flour and salt beef and pork, also hundreds of barrels of rum and ammunition. Secondly, I intend to make a stand beyond this town. I am informed that there is a more that halfway decent position not a mile beyond us, and I intend to give M’sieu a reverse to buy ourselves some time. Prepare your men. Those are your orders. Dismiss.”

  However, Lacey stood, greatly concerned.

  “Sir. The followers will be exposed, alone on the road, prey to any group of deserters who see them. It could cause desertions from our own men, deeply concerned for their safety. They should at least see them depart with some form of escort. Sir.”

  Paget looked at him, a level gaze from the tired eyes, but not unreceptive.

  “I hear you, Colonel.”

  He thought for some seconds.

  “I will detach two squadrons of Hussars, to escort them for one day. That should get them over Cacabelos bridge and not too far from Villafranca. How does that sound?”

  Lacey nodded.

  “Thank you, Sir. The best that can be done in the circumstances.”

  Within an hour the followers were all assembled, a long column from the five Regiments. Prudoe, as an Officer, and Sedgwick, as a non-combatant, were to go with them. For the very brief time they were allowed together, sadness and worry were the common emotions, not least from Jed Deakin, but Bridie scolded him for yet more of his continued fretting. He watched them move off, him slightly less concerned by what Bridie had said, but not so Joe Pike studying Mary. She was still on the mule, but her condition meant that she could barely keep any food down, thus she departed with little inside to sustain her.

  The 105th, having rested, were the last to leave Bembribre. There were now hundreds of drunks in the town, for those who had already been there when the 105th first entered, had now been joined by as many again. Perhaps it had entered their befuddled minds that the presence of the rearguard meant that there were no more of their army between them and the pursuing French. Knowing that they were the last to leave, Lacey sent his Lights and Grenadiers on first, to push out of the town any that could walk, but few were gathered up. Within an hour the 105th took their place on the very far right of Paget’s battle line on a steep ridge, 15 minutes march out of the town, with the 52nd inside them on their left.

  For the whole of the morning they had nothing to contend with but the wind and the cold, but at midday they saw three columns of cavalry, the first of the pursuing French. Their entry at one end of the town saw the rapid exit of many of the inebriated from the other, soon to be pursued across the open ground by the French cavalry, who were seen not to be Light Cavalry, but instead the feared Heavy Cuirassiers, their steel breastplates obvious, even in the weak light. The next act of the drama was wholly sickening to those watching from the British positions, made more so by the watchers being so utterly helpless to intervene. The Cuirassiers were plainly veteran at pursuing broken infantry and each cavalryman took their time to carefully overtake each victim, to strike, not at their back or even their neck, but to deliver a downward stroke back into the face. Time after time, man after man was felled to roll writhing in the snow, clutching the wound. However, such a blow was rarely fatal and many rose to run to the shelter of Paget’s line, blood streaming from a deep cut that had in some cases destroyed eyes and removed teeth. The Cuirassiers never took themselves within range of Paget’s line and, being content with the damage they had done, immediately returned to Bembribre. The 105th, as did the other Regiments, stood looking at the tens of bodies lying prone and dead in the snow and listening to the collection of moaning wounded, now sat behind the British line, but they could do no more than shout insults and curses across the acres of red stained snow. As the evening gloom closed in, Paget, face even darker with anger, had the wounded collected and marched off into the growing twilight, while his men held their allotted ground through that evening until the deepest darkness, then they too marched off, leaving meagre campfires to deceive the French, now thoroughly in possession of Bembribre.

  On the road Carr and Drake marched side by side, each with heads held deep within turned up collars, each thinking if the cold they could feel in their feet, was just cold or, more worryingly, seeping water. However, Drake’s character, as usual the more cheerful of the two, found something to say.

  “I feel moved to wish you a Happy New Year. A very healthy and prosperous 1809.”

  The sound of a strangled laugh came out from behind Carr’s deep collar.

  “I thank you for that, and will banish any thoughts I may harbour of sarcasm and irony. In return, I wish the same to you.”

  Sharing the humour brought the face of each up from within its protection, as Carr continued.

  “Have you made any plans between you? You and your Cecily?”

  Drake opened his jaw and held it open as if thinking of something to say.

  “Well. Waiting for my Captaincy may well appear to be a little superfluous. We could well set a date on our returning home from this little sojourn. This Peninsular War, as some are now calling it, looks set to last for some time, so, the idea of a wife at home, building the nest as it were, appeals more and more with every day spent within this burnt or freezing country.”

  He took a deep breath.

  “When we get home, I feel sure we’ll be sent out here again, after not too long a time. I like the idea of calling myself a married Officer. Also, I’ll have the right for her to accompany me, should we choose!”

  Carr nodded and this time his reply was heavily ironic.

  “Oh what larks indeed! I feel sure that Cecily will be overwhelming in her thanks to you for bringing her to such a welcoming clime as this!”

  At that, both laughed and trudged on, then their attention was drawn to their left. The Lights and Grenadiers of the 91st were hurrying past, on to Villafranca, as the Light Company Captain informed them as he came up to them, to try and secure some much needed stores from what were there and then await the arrival of the Reserve Division to claim them.

  The morning of the 2nd January saw the Reserve Division passing over the bridge at Cacabellos and it was not long before it was clear that Paget was going to offer combat yet again to the French. All his command were over the bridge that spanned the river, the Cua, except half the 95th Rifles and a squadron of the 15th Hussars. Paget sat the road on his horse, ordering his battalions to their places as they came to him off the bridge.

  “Lacey. Get yours to cover the guns up there, and send your Lights back over. The 95th need some support.”

  Lacey looked at Carr, who had heard all, and was immediately wheeling his Company off the road for them to turn and retrace their steps. With the 91st completely over, Carr led his men back up the road, to a low defile that was being held by the 95th, with the 15th on their horses some way forward, which placed them closest to any arriving French. He positioned a section each side of the road, where it emerged from the defile, in reserve of the 95th. He looked behind, over the Cua, and was within sufficient distance to see the six blank muzzles of the battery, covering the bridge, and also to pick out the green facings of his own Regiment in place beside them. All along the far bank he saw the red of their supporting battalions, but before
him, he could see nothing of an Officer in command of the advanced guard of the 95th, he could only assume that one would either arrive, or present himself. That created a small worry, but he held it in check and instead he continued to look forward down the road, standing with Shakeshaft beside him.

  “Well, that’s set, then. All we need now is the French!”

  The same thoughts were in the mind of Jed Deakin as he stood beside Ensign Rushby in the Colour Party; Halfway, Stiles and Peters, beside and behind. The cold seemed to silence all sound, save the jingling of the bits of the gun horse-teams, stood waiting patiently behind and gnawing hopefully on some dirty straw. Deakin looked at the narrowness of the bridge, then at the number of British on the far side, including cavalry, and felt some unease, but he was comforted. He could say, at least, that he was on the right side and so he rubbed his hands up and down the wood of his musket to gain some warmth. Across the other side, Drake was looking at his watch, having lifted up the cover to fondly look at the inscription therein. As the watch tinkled 1 o’ clock, he had urgent cause to snap the cover shut and thrust it into his pocket.

  “Stand to! Stand to!”

  The shout was coming from somewhere ahead, but what mattered now was obedience and, all around, his own men were unslinging their weapons to hold them “at the ready”. Further up the defile, events were happening quickly; and for the worse. French cavalry had arrived, seemingly in strength, and they had wasted no time in charging the single squadron of the 15th Hussars. Rapidly, all was descending into chaos. For the 15th, far ahead, to remain was suicidal, and they were withdrawing at the gallop. The Commander of the 95th, finding his targets masked by the retreating 15th, felt no confidence in the ability of his own men to hold such a large body of horsemen and he was also withdrawing down the defile, chased by both the 15th and the French cavalry. From the other side of the road, Carr was now shouting himself, his voice desperate!