Part 11

The Queen Dowager held a levée at the palace on the 12th of December, when all the officers were presented. The Earl Howe, Lord Chamberlain, having previously intimated Her Majesty’s desire to see the NINETY-SECOND HIGHLAND REGIMENT, whenever it might be convenient, the officers, immediately after the levée, repaired to their companies, and the regiment was formed in review-order on the Floriana Parade. After the regiment had marched past in slow and quick time, and performed several movements, Her Majesty expressed herself highly pleased with the appearance of the corps.

[Sidenote: 1839]

In January, 1839, the depôt companies proceeded from Limerick to Birr, where they were stationed during the year.

[Sidenote: 1840]

The depôt companies were removed from Birr to Mullingar in January, 1840; and in May proceeded to Glasgow, from whence in July they marched to Stirling.

[Sidenote: 1841]

The first division of the regiment, consisting of two companies, under the command of Brevet-Major Stephen Noel, embarked on board the “Somersetshire” transport, at Malta, on the morning of the 9th of January 1841, for _Barbadoes_, and arrived there on the 4th of April. The head-quarters, with four companies under the command of Brevet Lieut.-Colonel Robert Winchester, embarked on board the “Cornwall” transport, at Malta, on the morning of the 21st of January, for _Barbadoes_, and arrived there on the 4th of April with the first division.

The head-quarters and two companies were afterwards stationed at St. Vincent, two companies at St. Lucia and Pigeon Island, and two companies detached to Dominica. On the 24th of May, a requisition was received for military aid to suppress a serious disturbance at Kingstown, St. Vincent; the conduct of the NINETY-SECOND on this occasion received the thanks of the President of the Council and the House of Assembly of St. Vincent.

In May, 1841, the depôt companies were removed from Stirling to Fort George, near Inverness.

[Sidenote: 1842]

The service companies of the NINETY-SECOND regiment were concentrated at Barbadoes on the 6th of February, 1842, where they continued during the remainder of that year.

In June, 1842, the depôt companies proceeded from Fort George to Dundee.

[Sidenote: 1843]

On the 22nd of May, 1843, the head-quarters and one company of the regiment, under the command of Colonel McDonald, C.B., embarked in the “Crocodile” troop-ship for Trinidad; detachments were also stationed at Grenada and Tobago.

Her Majesty was pleased to appoint Lieut.-General Sir William Macbean, K.C.B., to be colonel of the NINETY-SECOND regiment on the 31st of May, in succession to General the Earl of Stair, who was removed to the forty-sixth regiment.

The company at Tobago embarked on board the “Java” transport on the 5th of December; the head-quarters and three companies at Trinidad embarked in the same ship on the 8th of December; the two companies at Grenada embarked also in the “Java” on the 15th of December, and the ship sailed for Portsmouth on the 25th of December.

[Sidenote: 1844]

The service companies disembarked at Aberdeen on the 16th, 17th, and 18th of February, 1844, and were joined by the depôt companies from Dundee.

The regiment proceeded from Aberdeen to Glasgow in September. On the 8th of October, the regiment formed part of the procession for the inauguration of an equestrian statue of Field Marshal the Duke of Wellington, erected in front of the Exchange at Glasgow.

[Sidenote: 1845]

In July, 1845, the regiment marched to Edinburgh Castle, where it was stationed during that year.

[Sidenote: 1846]

On the 6th of April, 1846, a letter of thanks was received from the Magistrates and Commissioners of Police of Edinburgh, for the promptness and efficiency with which a piquet of the regiment, under Captain Sutherland, attended, and assisted in saving property, and preserving order, during a calamitous fire at night in the New Town of Edinburgh.

The NINETY-SECOND regiment embarked for Belfast in April, 1846, and in August following was removed to Enniskillen.

Major John Alexander Forbes was promoted to the rank of lieut.-colonel in the NINETY-SECOND regiment on the 9th of November, 1846, in succession to Colonel John McDonald, C.B., who was promoted major-general on the same date.

[Sidenote: 1847]

In May, 1847, the regiment was removed from Enniskillen to Dublin, and in December it proceeded to Limerick.

[Sidenote: 1848]

The regiment proceeded in December, 1848, from Limerick to Clonmel, in the Kilkenny district, which was under the command of Major-General John McDonald; his former regiment thus became again under his orders.

[Sidenote: 1849]

The regiment remained at Clonmel during the year 1849.

[Sidenote: 1850]

On the 2nd of April, 1850, the NINETY-SECOND regiment marched from Clonmel to Kilkenny.

On the 9th of December, orders were given for the regiment to be formed into six service and four depôt companies, preparatory to the embarkation of the former for the Ionian Islands.

[Sidenote: 1851]

In February, 1851, the service companies proceeded from Kilkenny to Fermoy, and the depôt companies to Carlow: a complimentary address was received from the mayor and citizens of Kilkenny, on the NINETY-SECOND quitting that city, expressive of the regret they experienced in parting with the regiment, the conduct of which had gained the esteem of all classes.

The service companies embarked at Cork on the 14th of April, on board of Her Majesty’s troop-ship “Apollo” and the freight ship “Edmonstone” for Corfu, the head-quarters being under the command of Lieut.-Colonel Mark Kerr Atherley.

CONCLUSION.

The foregoing pages contain a detail of the services of the NINETY-SECOND HIGHLAND REGIMENT for fifty-eight years from the period of its formation in 1793, during which it has shared in the honors acquired in many of the arduous and distinguished actions, which have largely increased the fame of the British army.

The distinctions, which it has gained on active foreign service, are duly attested by the inscriptions on the regimental colour, and the national credit of the regiment has been maintained by its correct and orderly conduct, and its attention to the rules of discipline, in every station at which it has been employed, whether at home or abroad.

1851.

FOOTNOTES:

[6] The ninety-first, ninety-second, ninety-third, ninety-fourth, ninety-fifth, ninety-sixth, ninety-seventh, and ninety-ninth regiments, which were directed to be raised at the commencement of the war with France in 1793, were afterwards disbanded, so that the _ninety-eighth_ was numbered the _ninety-first_, and the _Hundredth_ became the NINETY-SECOND regiment.

[7] Lieut.-General Sir Ralph Abercromby, K.B., was promoted to the local rank of General on the Continent of Europe, on the 13th of August 1799.

[8] Colonel the Marquis of Huntly commanded the regiment in this memorable charge, which began and decided the action at Egmont-op-Zee: all the rest was a pursuit. The Marquis of Huntly, and Major-General (afterwards Sir John) Moore, were wounded, and the command of the regiment devolved upon Lieut.-Colonel Erskine.

Major-General Moore was carried to the surgeon by two soldiers of the regiment; and a few years afterwards, when writing for a drawing of the uniform, for the purpose of having a soldier of the NINETY-SECOND as one of the supporters to his coat of arms, on being made a Knight of the Bath, he mentioned the circumstance of their having remarked—“There is the General, we must take him to the doctor:” and then added, “We can do no more; we must join the lads, for every man is wanted!!” Major-General Moore, on his recovery, inquired for those men in order to reward them, and offered twenty pounds, but no one claimed it; and he remarked, that “it was a noble trait of the regiment, that no men in its ranks came forward to personate the parties, or to claim the reward.”—It was, therefore, supposed they were killed.

It may be observed, that this is one of the few instances on record of _crossing bayonets_ by large bodies. Even the supernumerary rank of the NINETY-SECOND on this occasion was bayoneted; among the number Lieutenant McCardy was killed, and Lieutenant Donald McDonald (who afterwards succeeded to the command of the regiment at Waterloo) received three bayonet wounds.

[9] List of regiments which served in Egypt in 1801, is inserted in the Appendix, page 139.

[10] _Vide_ General Order, dated Horse Guards, 16th of May, 1801, and List of regiments employed in Egypt, inserted in pages 137, &c. of the Appendix.

[11] Lieut.-General Burrard was created a Baronet in November 1807.

[12] A list of the regiments employed in the expedition to _Copenhagen_ it inserted in the Appendix, page 141.

[13] Vide General Orders of the 18th of January and 1st of February, 1809; also a list of regiments employed under Lieut.-General Sir John Moore at Corunna, inserted in pages 142, &c., of the Appendix.

[14] At Almaraz on the 19th of May, 1812, the individual merit and gallantry of Privates James Gall and John Somerville of the Grenadier Company of the NINETY-SECOND regiment, were brought under the notice of the Commander-in-Chief as having tended to forward, in a very considerable degree, the object of Lord Hill upon Fort Ragusa: his Lordship ordered two doubloons to be given to these soldiers on the field, being the first men who leaped into the river.

[15] “The hill this carried was called the Englishmen’s Hill, not, as some recent writers have supposed, in commemoration of a victory gained by the Black Prince, but because of a disaster which there befel a part of his army. His battle was fought between Navarrette and Najera, many leagues from Vittoria, and beyond the Ebro; but on this hill the two gallant knights, Sir Thomas and Sir William Felton, took post with two hundred companions, and being surrounded by Don Tello with six thousand, all died or were taken after a long, desperate, and heroic resistance.”—(History of the Peninsular War, by Major-General Sir William Napier, K.C.B.)

[16] On the 30th of September, 1815, His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, in the name and on the behalf of His Majesty, was pleased to grant the dignity of a baronet of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, to Ewen Cameron, Esq., of Fassifern and Callart, in the county of Argyll, and of Arthurstone, in the county of Angus, to commemorate the services of his son, Colonel Cameron, of the NINETY-SECOND regiment.

[17] Now Major-General McDonald, commanding the Kilkenny district in Ireland.

[18] Referring to an expression of thanks and approbation from the Lord Lieutenant to Lieut.-General the Right Honorable Sir John Byng, K.C.B., and from him to the regiment, for the spontaneous interference of some soldiers of the grenadier company in saving the life of a police constable, and retaking a prisoner, who had been rescued from him by a mob at Maryborough, on the 20th of May, 1830.

[19] Lieut.-General Sir John Byng, the present General the Earl of Strafford, and Colonel of the Coldstream Guards, in consideration of his gallantry in the action of the 13th of December, 1813,—wherein he led his troops, under a most galling fire, to the assault of a strong height occupied in great force by the enemy, and having himself ascended the hill first with the colour of the THIRTY-FIRST regiment of foot in his hand, he planted the colour upon the summit, and drove the enemy (far superior in numbers) down the ridge to the suburbs of _St. Pierre_,—received the Royal Authority, on the 7th of July, 1815, to bear the following honorable augmentation, namely, “Over the arms of the family of Byng, in bend sinister, a representation of the colour of the THIRTY-FIRST regiment,” and the following crest, namely, “Out of a mural crown an arm embowed, grasping the colour of the aforesaid THIRTY-FIRST regiment, and pendent from the wrist by a riband, the Gold Cross presented to him by His Majesty’s command, as a mark of his royal approbation of his distinguished services,” and in an escrol above the word “_Mouguerre_,” being the name of a height near the hamlet of _St. Pierre_.

[Illustration: 92^{ND} REGIMENT (GORDON HIGHLANDERS.)

_The Advanced Post at Sunrise.—The Sentry sees something suspicious and calls the Corporal._

_For Cannon’s Military Records._

_Madeley Lith. 3, Wellington St. Strand._]

SUCCESSION OF COLONELS

OF

THE NINETY-SECOND REGIMENT

(HIGHLANDERS).

GEORGE, MARQUIS OF HUNTLY.

_Appointed 3rd May, 1796._

George, Marquis of Huntly, son of Alexander, fourth Duke of Gordon, choosing the profession of arms, was appointed to a commission in the thirty-fifth regiment in 1790. In the same year he raised an independent company of Highlanders; and exchanging, in January, 1791, to the forty-second regiment, he brought with him a fine band of young Highlanders. On the 11th of July, 1792, he was promoted to captain-lieutenant and lieutenant-colonel in the third Foot Guards. He accompanied the detachment of Foot Guards to Flanders in the spring of 1793, was at the action of St. Amand on the 8th of May, and was engaged in driving the French from the position at the village of Famars on the 23rd of May. He was subsequently employed at the siege of Valenciennes, which fortress surrendered to the Duke of York in July. On the 18th of August he was engaged at Lincelles; and he afterwards served at the siege of Dunkirk. When the army went into winter quarters, the MARQUIS OF HUNTLY returned to England, and in the following year was raised a corps of Highlanders, which was numbered the _hundredth_ regiment, now the NINETY-SECOND, of which he was appointed lieutenant-colonel commandant on the 10th of February, 1794. He accompanied his regiment to Gibraltar; and on his return to England, he was captured by a French privateer. He afterwards rejoined his regiment at the island of Corsica, where he served upwards of a year; and on the 3rd of May, 1796, he was promoted to the rank of colonel. On the breaking out of the rebellion in Ireland, in 1798, he joined his regiment in that country, where he served as brigadier-general, and was actively employed against the rebels, particularly in Wexford. He accompanied the expedition to Holland in 1799, was at the landing at the Helder, and continued actively employed until the 2nd of October, when he was wounded at the battle of Egmont-op-Zee. On the 1st of January, 1801, he was promoted to the rank of major-general; and in 1803 he was appointed to the staff of North Britain, where he served three years. In January, 1806, he was appointed to the colonelcy of the forty-second, or the Royal Highlanders; and in April, 1808, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general. He commanded a division in the expedition to Holland in 1809; and in August, 1819, he was advanced to the rank of general. In 1820 he was removed to the first,—the Royal Regiment of Foot,—and in a few months afterwards he was nominated a Knight Grand Cross of the Most Honorable Military Order of the Bath. In 1827 he succeeded, on the decease of his father, to the dignity of DUKE OF GORDON: he was also appointed Governor of Edinburgh Castle, and Keeper of the Great Seal of Scotland. In 1834 he was removed to the Scots Fusilier Guards. He was distinguished as a kind-hearted and gallant nobleman and soldier,—contributing largely to many charitable institutions. His social, private, and public virtues, endeared him to his family and friends; and a succession of uninterrupted acts of philanthropy procured him universal esteem. He died on the 28th of May, 1836; and his remains, by especial command of his Majesty King William IV., were escorted by the first battalion of the Scots Fusilier Guards from London to Greenwich, where they were placed on board a steam-vessel, for the purpose of being conveyed to Scotland for interment in a mausoleum erected on the paternal estate. By his Grace’s decease the dukedom became extinct.

JOHN, EARL OF HOPETOUN, G.C.B.

_Appointed 3rd January, 1806._

The Honorable John Hope, son of John, second Earl of Hopetoun, evinced a predilection for the profession of arms from his youth, and served as a volunteer in his fifteenth year. On the 28th of May, 1784, he was appointed cornet in the tenth Light Dragoons; two years afterwards, he was nominated lieutenant in the twenty-seventh foot, and in 1789, captain in the seventeenth Light Dragoons; in 1792, he was promoted major in the first foot, and in the following year, lieutenant-colonel in the twenty-fifth regiment, with which corps he served in the West Indies, where he was appointed adjutant-general, and served the campaigns of 1794, 1795, 1796, and 1797, with great distinction, being particularly noticed in the orders and public despatches of Lieutenant-General Sir Ralph Abercromby, and other commanders. In 1796, he was elected a member of parliament for the county of Linlithgow. He was nominated deputy adjutant-general to the expedition to Holland in 1799, and was severely wounded at the landing in North Holland on the 27th of August. In 1800, he was appointed adjutant-general to the army in the Mediterranean, under Lieutenant-General Sir Ralph Abercromby, and served in the expedition to Egypt: he was at the actions of the 8th and 13th of March, 1801, and was wounded before Alexandria on the 21st of March, when Sir Ralph Abercromby received a wound, of which he died on the 28th of March. Brigadier-General Hope recovered, and requesting to have a brigade, was succeeded as adjutant-general by Colonel Abercromby. On the 16th of June, he joined the army before Cairo, with the twenty-eighth and forty-second regiments, and he afterwards evinced ability in conducting the negotiations for the surrender of the capital of Egypt by the French troops, under General Belliard. He continued in the command of a brigade until the deliverance of Egypt was accomplished, and received the second class of the Order of the Crescent established by the Grand Seignior. In 1802, his services were rewarded by the colonelcy of the North Lowland Fencible Infantry, and the rank of major-general; to which was added, in June, 1805, the appointment of deputy-governor of Portsmouth; but he resigned this appointment soon afterwards, to accompany the troops sent to Hanover under Lieutenant-General Lord Cathcart. In October, 1805, he was appointed colonel commandant of a battalion of the sixtieth regiment; and in 1806, he succeeded the Marquis of Huntly in the colonelcy of the NINETY-SECOND regiment. On the 25th of April, 1808, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general. He was nominated second in command of the expedition to the Baltic, under Lieutenant-General Sir John Moore, and afterwards accompanied the troops to Portugal. He commanded a division of the army which advanced into Spain, under Sir John Moore, and shared in that campaign; and in the battle of Corunna, when he succeeded to the command of the army,—Sir John Moore being killed, and Sir David Baird wounded—he was successful in repulsing the attack of the French under Marshal Soult. On the embarkation of the army, he took particular care to prevent any soldier being left behind, and was the last man who went on board the fleet. His despatch contains an interesting account of the battle.[20] He was thanked for his distinguished services by parliament, was honored with the approbation of his Sovereign, and the admiration and applause of his country; and was nominated a Knight of the Most Honorable Military Order of the Bath. After his return from Spain, he served with the Walcheren expedition, under General the Earl of Chatham, and was subsequently appointed commander-in-chief in Ireland, from which he was removed, in 1813, to the appointment of second in command in the peninsula. Lieutenant-General SIR JOHN HOPE, commanded the left wing of the army at the battle of the Nivelle on the 10th of November, and signalized himself at the battle of the Nive, in December; on which occasion the British commander stated in his public despatch—“I cannot sufficiently applaud the ability, coolness, and judgment, of Lieutenant-General Sir John Hope.” He passed the Adour with the left wing of the army in February, 1814, and blockaded the important fortress of Bayonne,—in which service he evinced great ability and perseverance: and he remained in the command of the blockading force until the termination of the war. After Napoleon had abdicated, the French commandant at Bayonne not believing the news, made a sortie on the night of the 14th of April, and gained some advantage. Lieutenant-General SIR JOHN HOPE coming up with some troops in the dark, encountered the enemy, when his horse being shot, fell upon him, and he was wounded and taken prisoner. The French were, however, repulsed. At the restoration of peace, he returned to England with a high reputation. He received the thanks of parliament; a medal and a clasp for the battles of Corunna and the Nive; was elevated to the peerage of the United Kingdom by the title of BARON NIDDRY, of Niddry, in the county of Linlithgow, and was nominated a Knight Grand Cross of the Most Honorable Military Order of the Bath. He afterwards succeeded to the dignity of EARL OF HOPETOUN. In 1819, he was promoted to the rank of General, and was appointed colonel of the forty-second, or the Royal Highlanders, in 1820. He died at Paris on the 27th of August, 1823.

SIR JOHN HOPE, G.C.H.

_Appointed 29th January, 1820._

John Hope entered the Dutch service, as a cadet, in one of the regiments of the _Scots Brigade_ (Houston’s) in the service of the United Provinces, in 1778, and served at Bergen-op-Zoom and Maestretcht, going through the subordinate ranks of corporal and serjeant. In 1779 he was appointed ensign, and in 1782 he was promoted captain of a company; but, being called upon to renounce his allegiance to the British monarch, he quitted the Dutch service, and in 1787 he was appointed captain in the sixtieth foot, but his company was soon afterwards reduced. On the 30th of June, 1788, he was appointed captain in the thirteenth Light Dragoons, and in 1792 he was nominated aide-de-camp to Lieut.-General Sir William Erskine, in which capacity he served the campaigns of 1793 and 1794, in Holland, and returned to England in 1795, when he was promoted to the majority of the twenty-eighth Light Dragoons, and in 1796 to the lieut.-colonelcy of the same corps, with which he embarked for the Cape of Good Hope in the same year. He served at the Cape until 1799, when his regiment was incorporated in other corps, and he returned to England. In April, 1799, he was appointed to the thirty-seventh foot, which corps he joined, in 1800, in the West Indies, where he remained until 1804, when he returned to England, and exchanged to the sixtieth regiment. In 1805 he was nominated assistant adjutant-general in Scotland, and in 1807 he served as deputy adjutant-general to the expedition to Copenhagen, under Lieut.-General Lord Cathcart. He was appointed brigadier-general on the staff of North Britain in 1808, and subsequently deputy adjutant-general in that part of the United Kingdom. He was promoted to the rank of major-general in 1810, and appointed to the staff of the Severn district, from whence he was removed to the staff of the Peninsula in 1812, and served with the army under the Duke of Wellington at the battle of Salamanca, for which he received a medal. He subsequently served on the staff of Ireland and North Britain until 1819, when he was promoted to the rank of lieut.-general. He was honored with the dignity of Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Hanoverian Guelphic Order. In 1820 he was appointed colonel of the NINETY-SECOND regiment, from which he was removed, in 1823, to the seventy-second Highlanders. He died in August 1836.

HONORABLE SIR ALEXANDER DUFF, G.C.H.

_Appointed 6th September, 1823._

Removed to the thirty-seventh regiment on the 20th of July, 1831.

JOHN EARL OF STAIR, K.T.

_Appointed 20th July, 1831._

Removed to the forty-sixth regiment on the 31st May, 1843.

SIR WILLIAM MACBEAN, K.C.B.

_Appointed 31st May, 1843._

Succession of LIEUTENANT-COLONELS in the NINETY-SECOND Regiment (HIGHLANDERS).