Worth Their Colours (105th Foot. The Prince of Wales Own Wessex Regiment.)

by Martin McDowell

Change upon Change.

  It was the fourth Day of Christmas. The festivities had come and gone, but not yet the New Year. It was the evening of the last day of Christmas Leave and all Officers had returned and were assembling in the Mess for evening dinner. Carr and Drake were already established together at the table, sat at their usual place, the halfway point along one side. The Mess was quiet, despite being over half full, a “post holiday” atmosphere pervaded and conversation between the two was relaxed, but slow. Drake, as ever, sat up alert, whilst Carr lounged back in usual languid manner, subconsciously toying with a piece of cutlery. Everything changed with the entrance of Carravoy and D’Villiers, the latter with his left arm in a sling, splints on his forearm clearly making angles through the white cloth. Carravoy was clearly in very ebullient mood.

  “You may congratulate me, Gentleman, I am £250 richer, won yesterday at a Steeplechase. Not a bet, I wish you to know, but as the victor in that same race. On D’Villier’s horse; he fell off him the previous day, hence the broken wing. This evening the claret is on me,” and he turned to the Mess Room Orderly,

  “Rogers, this evening, the better stuff.”

  Inevitably, as if by magnetism, his gaze fell on Carr, who raised his hand in salute, forefinger upright.

  “Give you joy, Carravoy, on your splendid victory, and thanks from us all on your generously sharing the proceeds in the form of …er…improved claret. Do we take it that bad luck robbed Royston of the victory, or do you feel that your horsemanship brought some special quality to the performance?”

  “Modesty forbids, as I’m sure you understand, but I will say that he is a very spirited animal that does require a level of skill above and beyond. He unseated D’Villiers here at a plain fence. Simply flew over it, and, damn me, if he didn’t turn in the air and off came Royston.”

  “Oh, I say Carravoy, that’s putting it a bit steep. Could’ve happened to anyone and it’s not a break, just a sprain. I stayed on him well enough during the hunts; just a bit of bad luck, that’s all.”

  Carr sensed D’Villier’s embarrassment and raised his now filled glass in his direction.

  “Well, whatever. Royston! My congratulations on your owning so splendid a horse, and I’m sure that your previous horsemanship ensured that he was well broke in for the substitute jockey!”

  Carravoy’s face changed. He sensed an insult, intended or not.

  “And what, pray, did you two get up to over the holiday?”

  Drake looked at Carr and spoke.

  “Shall we tell him? Has he the level of sophistication to permit appreciation, do you think?”

  Carravoy bridled further at the notion that he was being toyed with. Carr smiled slightly and answered.

  “Yes, I believe so. Yes, of course. We….” he said, turning to Carravoy, “…had a very pleasant and uplifting Christmas, singing in the Choral Ensemble of Lady Constance Fynings. Carols, good food, and good company.”

  Carravoy sensed an opening.

  “Carols? Singing in a choir? You two? Hardly an activity for two Princes of Mars; whom being vigorous and enterprising Officers of the King.”

  Drake and Carr looked at each other and Carr soon mirrored Drake’s look of astonishment, which carried over into Drake’s voice.

  “He doesn’t believe us!”

  “Oh I believe you, well enough. Now I think of it, it fits perfectly. Off tune pianos and descants and whatnot. I trust that neither of you let the side down and gave vent to any “bum notes”?

  Carr took up the verbal jousting. So far, it had remained just on the right side of Mess Room banter. Grins and sniggers could be seen and heard elsewhere around the table.

  “Bum notes! Dear me, the very idea. No indeed, it was a choir of the very highest accomplishment, well schooled and tutored by Lady Constance herself, a lady of estimable quality in the musical line of things. Would you not say, Drake?”

  “I would, and I would go further by saying that our performances were appreciated by the highest echelons of local society, including that of our Regional General, no less.”

  Carr nodded and inclined his head towards Carravoy, his expression making the silent question, “So what do you think of that?”

  Carravoy was indeed struck by the fact of the pair circulating in the same society as the Regional General, but he quickly recovered.

  “Well, as long as you didn’t let the side down with anything too discordant or off the beat. If that is the case, then I pronounce myself untroubled. Gentlemen, I propose a toast, to our two choirboys. May their notes come in the right place, fivers preferred, and their keys be never off, always safely in the lock,” and he drank to his own toast.

  Carr replied.

  “And here’s to our noble horsemen. May they have a long rein in the saddle,” groans at the awful pun, “but their stirrups short, and their gallops fast and fruitful, at least in proportion to their prize money,” and he and Drake drank to this toast. Laughter sounded from around the room, accompanied by good-natured rapping on the table. The banter stopped. Colonel Lacey and Major O’Hare had entered the room, timing their entrance until all were assembled and all Officers rose. Lacey and O’Hare reached their places and Lacey addressed the table.

  “Gentlemen, good evening. I wish to welcome you back, and I trust that you all had an enjoyable leave over the festive season. Please be seated.”

  Carravoy bit back the temptation to add a comment about “festive singing in the sweet choir”. To make such a quip as an addition to the Colonel’s greeting would be gravely ill mannered. Throughout the meal, he and Carr exchanged glances, but Carr, more than Carravoy, was grateful that he had “fought a draw”. However, Carravoy’s repeated humming of several well known carols as the various courses came and went was not lost on him. Meanwhile, Drake had forgotten the whole thing and was busy extolling the virtues of tarpaulin over waxed cloth as cover in a rainstorm.

  oOo

  Their entrance was fierce and loud, both violent and shrill, such that all in the room turned to see a Corporal in the Grenadiers, dragging Molly Dixon, plus child, into the barrack room, he shouting at her, she shouting back, and the child the loudest, screaming wails of distress. However, it was the shouts of the Corporal that drew the watchers attention, here was domestic drama, which always presented worthwhile entertainment.

  “Where is the bastard, where is he? You point him out. I knows you ‘bin comin’ ‘ere, so now you show me.”

  Molly wrenched herself free and adjusted the child in its shawl on her hip. She looked over to the cubicle that she had visited so often and saw Davey. No words were exchanged and she made no indication that he was the one, but that changed when Davey looked steadily at her and nodded, twice.

  “It’s him, there, John Davey.”

  The room fell totally silent and Sedgwicke, in the midst of tidying, instinctively took a step back to feel the boards that defined their space in the room. He expected violence, a premonition that seemed accurate, for the Grenadier Corporal, with Grenadier strides, was heading straight for Davey; stools, buckets, and people being ploughed aside to create a direct path to his quarry. No more words were said, the anger on his face and the fierce hatred in his eyes told all of what was about to happen.

  Davey stood his ground, but his feet had shifted, poised to give him purchase for any required move. The Corporal came up to Davey and reached out with his left hand to seize Davey’s shirt, whilst drawing back a huge right fist, but Davey shifted left, then right, ducking under the outstretched hand. The Corporal released the punch anyway, but Davey swung his body back and ducked again. A haymaking left met only thin air as Davey again bobbed and weaved his head away from danger.

  Meanwhile, many men were closing in on the Corporal. Two seized his arms and one held him from behind, arms looping around his shoulder and waist, but the Corporal continued to struggle, driving himself forward to reach Davey.

  “Let I go, the bastard’s takin’ my Molly. Let I go!” but none
obeyed. Instead the Room Sergeant, Obediah Hill, had reached the scene and placed himself between Davey and the Corporal.

  “Now hold hard, Corporal. You touch me and it’s your stripes and the lash. Hold hard and stay.”

  The Corporal, chest heaving and still wild eyed, did cease his struggling. Hill motioned to those holding him and the Corporal was released.

  “Now, what’s all this about?”

  The Corporal took two deep breaths and then spoke, through clenched teeth. He pointed at Davey.

  “He’s takin’ my Molly, took her away, stole her from me.”

  He paused and breathed again.

  “I’m here to do something about it. I b’aint letting this go.”

  Hill stood for a moment regarding the Corporal, then looked past him at Molly. His authority in the room was absolute, all were waiting for him to pronounce on what should happen next.

  “If he stole her, like you say, he must’ve come into your room, to start things off, like. Is that what he did? Have you seen him in your barrack room?”

  “No, but he got to her somehow,” and his anger reasserted itself, “Gypsy bastard!” and he moved forward to be halted both by his escort regaining their grip on his arms and the raised hand of Hill. With all still, Hill gave his verdict.

  “Now you listen. We’ve all seen her in here, she comes straight in and goes straight over, to him,” jerking a thumb in Davey’s direction. “She’s not forced, she comes as she pleases and goes the same. In other words, she comes by choice. Now, listen some more, and I knows I be makin’ sense. You b’aint the first man as has failed to hold onto Molly Dixon. We all knows her story.”

  Molly leaned forward, nearly as angry as the Corporal.

  “Now just a minute, I’ve……”

  “You keep your gob shut! This b’aint the first time you’re wandering ways has caused ructions in this barracks. So keep shut!”

  Molly shrunk back and Hill turned to the Corporal.

  “She’s gone! Her wandering nature has took her elsewhere. You had your time, but now she’s gone. Be this child thine?”

  The Corporal shook his head and Hill nodded.

  “There, ‘twer there for ‘ee to see from the onset. She’s now gone, gone from ‘ee. Mother!” shouting to his own wife, “Fetch a piece of rope.”

  All was quiet, save the subsiding, but still audible, breathing of the Corporal. Hill looked from the Corporal, to Molly and then to Davey, standing behind and to one side. He regarded Davey for the longest. The rope arrived. Molly knew what the rope meant.

  “I b’aint one to be swapped about by a piece of rope!”

  For the first time Hill raised his voice.

  “We all knows what you be, and the list of men you called husband. Now, shut you’re rattle, and we’ll get this settled.”

  He presented one end to Molly, who reluctantly took it, the other he gave to the Corporal.

  “You’ve lost her. ‘Tis up to another to take her, so’s you be no longer responsible, not for her nor for the child. You has to offer that rope to him, Davey here, and if he takes it, she’s away from you.”

  The Corporal looked pained and distraught, but the violence was gone. He looked in anguish at Molly, but could see only the curtain of her chestnut hair hiding her left cheek. She had eyes only for John Davey. Hill turned to Davey.

  “If you wants her, take the rope. That makes her your wife, your woman and in your keeping. The child too.”

  All eyes were focused on Davey, studying either his face or looking for movement from his right hand. Davey looked carefully at Molly, her eyes wide open and the anxiety in her face plain and painful. She nodded, hope and apprehension still in her eyes and face, but Davey decided. He reached out and took the rope; it wasn’t offered but it came easily from the Corporal’s fingers. Davey smiled; Molly was overjoyed, but her look was cut short by Hill.

  “Now try to make this one last more’n the others. I think you’ve got a good man there, better than you know.”

  The crowd thinned, the matter settled, the diversion was ended. Davey moved forward.

  “Now then, Sergeant, you are speaking to my wife, and didn’t you say she was now in my keeping?”

  Hill turned to Davey and nodded. He started to turn away, but paused, to regard Davey carefully.

  “I’d say, from what I’ve just seen, you’ve seen the inside of a ring.”

  “You’re not wrong, Sergeant. Fairgrounds and such brought a bit of prize money that never did no harm.”

  Hill nodded again.

  “I’d keep that to yourself, if I was you. In my time, that, as common knowledge, does more harm than good.”

  Hill was the last to move off, but he did, his part in the settlement complete. Davey looked at Molly.

  “You’d best off and get your things.”

  Her face exploded into a radiant grin; she nodded, turned and hurried away. Davey and the Grenadier Corporal remained facing each other, each studying the other’s face. Davey spoke.

  “I swear to you, I did nothing to start this. One day she came, and it went on from there. I promise I’ll take care of her, and I’ll take care of the child.”

  The Corporal nodded, released a huge breath and then turned for the door. His time of leaving sketched a forlorn figure and inevitable sympathy attached to him, but his sadness was too deep for him to notice the compassionate looks that followed his passage. However, he didn’t reach the door, a table of fellow Grenadiers called him over and shared some beer with him and he sat with them, while they explained why it was “really all for the best”.

  Molly returned, child on one hip, possessions on the other. She moved straight into the cubicle and began arranging, joy unconfined and obvious to see. Sedgwicke was at a loss. Was it this simple? What would happen to him? He moved closer to Davey.

  “How now, Parson? I’d like you to meet my wife. Perhaps one day you can do the full jig for us in a church.”

  Sedgwicke grinned but still looked confused, adding to the impression by both nodding and shaking his head.

  “Molly, this is the Parson. He’s an educated man, so stick to talking about things that you know something about.”

  Molly extended her hand and bestowed upon Sedgwicke her warmest smile; he took her hand then released it, but said nothing, still too confused. He turned to Davey.

  “What happens to me? Do I move out? If so, where?”

  “I don’t see why, Parson. We’ve gotten used to each other, haven’t we? All we needs is another mattress, next to mine for Molly, then we goes on as before, although it would be nice if you could start educating ‘Tilly here,” placing his hand on the child’s head, the same chestnut brown as her Mother’s. “She turned five a while back, bit young perhaps, but bright as a button. It’s time, I’d say, that she started learning her letters and scripture. She may not get a better chance.”

  Sedgwicke nodded, although inside he wasn’t sure. Would such a child, sprung from such a spring have any capacity for learning? However, he held his peace. An extra mattress was found, and a small one for Tilly. Domesticity soon settled in, Molly began cleaning and tidying and “Tilly ran off to find new playmates from within the room. Their first mealtime together proved to be more than pleasant, Sedgwicke sat with the new “family”, saying little, but Molly and ‘Tilly chatted away, with Davey acting as the calm but genial Father figure, joining in as and when. Lights out came and all settled down. Sedgwicke slept in his usual place, but this time with a blanket pulled tight around his ears to block out what he didn’t want to hear. Not only did he have a rustling child not two yards from his own bed, but also he knew and expected the sounds that would come from Davey and Molly sharing their first night together. So intimate, and yet so public. Deeply tender and caring, but, he knew, so much not for him.

  oOo

  The next day was New Year’s Eve, but it would not be wasted. The whole battalion was assembled to march off for battalion exercise. No soldier was to r
emain in the barracks, this was battle drill and each man in the battalion had a part to play. All companies were paraded in marching order in four ranks, each with their Captain and two or three of each of Lieutenants and Sergeants. Sergeant Major Gibney marched up the long ranks of those assembled, but the verb “to walk” could never be applied to him, he would be insulted and puzzled, him examining and judging all that he saw. Finally, he marched up to Colonel Lacey, saluted and pronounced the parade ready to march off. With that, Lacey with his Battalion Staff and two Junior Majors, turned their mounts for the gate and walked their horses forward, leaving Major O’Hare in charge of the parade. O’Hare placed his horse before the centre, at the junction of number four and number five company. He issued his orders, all satisfactorily obeyed, that achieved the whole battalion at attention, with sloped arms, facing the gate. He gave the final order,

  “Battalion, quick march.”

  892 left feet lifted and fell as one and the 5th Detachments, for the first time, marched out of their barracks as a whole unit, drummers between each company hitting a marching beat. Their progress took them out onto the flat plain to the South East of the town, slightly higher than the moor and better drained, with no deep, water filled rhynes to interfere with their battalion manoeuvres. It was a clear, mild day, unseasonable for the final day of 1805, enough clouds that could perhaps gang up and cause rain, but also enough bright light from the low sun to pick out the dull winter greens and browns of this winter barren moor land. However, the sun chose to alight, not on the common scrub and grassland but the bright scarlet coats and badges of the impressive marching column of King’s Redcoats, their Colonel leading them on. When the track gave out onto a wide-open area of rough grassland, the column halted. Lacey turned to O’Hare,

  “We’ll start by advancing in column of companies. About half a mile up and back should do it. I want to see how they perform in ‘open’, ‘closed’ and “half distance” between companies.”

  “Sir.”

  O’Hare rode down the column.