Salamanca 1812: Some Eyewitness Accounts

by Jacqueline Reiter

The Peninsular War is somewhat out of my remit. My research interest, the 2nd Earl of Chatham, did not serve there (having irretrievably blotted his copybook at Walcheren in 1809: he was never employed again). Several of his former aides-de-camp, however, did go to the Peninsula and kept their former superior officer up to date with behind-the-scenes information on the campaign.

Battle of Salamanca from Wikimedia Commons

On 22 July 1812, Arthur Wellesley, Lord Wellington fought a battle against French Marshal Marmont in the vicinity of Salamanca. The extremely bloody battle (more than 5000 casualties on the British and Portuguese side, and about 13,000 on the French side) was a resounding victory for Wellington, although, for a variety of reasons, that victory was not immediately followed up.

Three officers connected with Chatham were heavily involved in the campaign of 1812. Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Hollis Bradford had been Chatham's aide in the Eastern District and at Walcheren, and Colonel Andrew Francis Barnard of the 95th Rifles had been with Chatham in the Southern District. General William Henry Pringle, who took command of General Leith's division during the battle, was married to Chatham's favourite niece, Harriot Hester. The three of them all left interesting accounts of the famous battle and its aftermath.

1. Lieutenant-Colonel Henry Bradford

 Lieutenant-Colonel Bradford (1781-1816) was an Assistant Adjutant-General at Salamanca. On 10 September 1812 he wrote a very long letter to Lord Chatham reporting on the battle and its immediate aftermath.[1] Bradford was obviously impressed by the British efforts and rather less so by those of the Portuguese. Of the Spanish, the less said the better.

My dear Lord,

You will have received with March's dispatch [2] the account of our late operations which have been attended with more success than the most sanguine could have expected, & have been more interesting & instructive than any thing this army had before witnessed in the Peninsula.

... No-one ever doubted that an English army could fight, & now it must be admitted they can also manoeuvre, & may be trusted to attack as well as defend. I never saw more coolness & obedience to orders than was shewn by that part of the Army with which I was engaged on the 22d of July, & the Portuguese, animated by the example of the British, did all that could be expected of them ... Whenever the Portuguese met with a check which on some point was the case, they rallied in a very creditable manner.

... Our late successes & rapid advance to the Capital, (so unexpected) really appeared like a dream. Had Marmont contented himself at Salamanca, with turning us at a respectful distance which would have answered his purpose quite as well (as he never wish'd to fight), we shou'd have had no Battle, & Lord Wellington would have retired beyond the Agueda, & at this moment we might have been at the old work of guarding the Frontier.

... After looking at each other across the River for several days, during which time Marmont was amusing himself with various manoeuvres which appear'd to have no effect, he at length play'd us a trick which compleatly succeeded. After being join'd by Bonnet ... & his Army being encreased, to about 45,000 men, he prepared to recross the River. ... About 2000 Men as it afterwards appeared cross'd ... & by lengthening out their Column made the appearance of a considerable Body. This Feint had compleat success & induced Lord Wellington who was of course extremely jealous of his Communication with Salamanca, to put the whole Army in motion to its left. Marmont was prepared for this, & the moment our Troops were withdrawn from before Tordelalosa he cross'd his Army at that Place, & moved by Narva del Rey to Castrejon where he came up on the 18th of July with your 4th [3] & Light Division & Cavalry, with which Lord Wellington made a stand to see whether the enemy was bringing up all his Force. This brought on an affair which terminated very creditably to us.

... On the morning of the 20th ... the Enemy moved off to his Left to turn our Right & gain the great Road to Salamanca at Cantalpino. The moment Lord W[ellington] perceived their object he moved us by a short Line to Cantalpino. During this movement the two Armies were within range of Cannon, & perfectly in sight of each other, the French marching along a ridge of Hills & we in the Plain ... This parallel Movement was extremely well conducted on both sides and was as fine a military Spectacle as can be imagined.

... Early the next morning (the 21st) their [the French] Army appeared on the Right of Babillafuente about a League & a half from us & shortly after were seen moving to their Left & crossing the Tormes at the Ford of La Huerta.

When about half their Columns had passed the River we began to move & cross'd the Tormes at the Ford of El Canto & S[an]ta Martha. ... On the 22nd we were brought up in a Position, as soon as the Enemy appeared in Motion. The Event of this most glorious day Your Lordship must by this time be so well acquainted with, that I can have very little to add to the information you have already received. Lord Wellington's dispatch has not quite explained the cause of the check the 4th Division met with nor has he, I think, done justice to that part of the 6th Divn which came up to their support, particularly Genl Hulse Brigade whose Conduct as well as that of its General was most distinguish'd. The attack made by the 3rd & 5th Divisions was completely successful & they carried every thing before them, but the 4th had greater difficulties to encounter, their left Flank, where was station'd a Portuguese Brigade, being quite en l'air in consequence of the failure of Genl Pack's attack on one of the Hills call'd the Arepiles [sic - Arapiles].

... Lord Wellington left Madrid about a fortnight since & by our last accouonts the 4th he was at Valladolid from whence Bonnet with about 15,000 men had retired in the direction of Burgos, where our Army were preparing to follow him. It is said that the remains of Marmont's Army does not exceed altogether 23,000 men.

... You will expect to hear of great Exertions making by the Spaniards but I am sorry to say they are as slothful as ever. The specimen we have had of the much talked of Gallician Army does not lead us to expect a great deal from them.

I have lately changed my Divn and am now with the 4th.[4] ... The 3rd Light Divn are at Madrid, where [Andrew Francis] Barnard is the gayest of the gay. ... I have seen a great deal of Pringle since he join'd the army. He had a most fortunate Escape on the 22nd July. His horse was kill'd under him & before he fell received 7 Balls.

... Should your Lordship have had patience to get to the conclusion of this tremendous long Letter pray have the goodness to give my kindest regards to Lady Chatham & to thank her for the present which Lord Charles Manners delivered to me.

Believe me to be ever
My dear Lord
Your most faithful & obliged
HH Bradford

2. Major-General William Henry Pringle

Pringle (ca 1771 - 1844) had more to say on the subject of his "fortunate Escape" in a letter home to his wife, Harriot Hester, written on 23 July 1812, the day after the Battle of Salamanca. Pringle's Brigade was one of the two that were lucky enough to capture an Eagle from the French.

Those of you of a squeamish disposition, or those of you against violence committed upon animals, would probably do best to look away now.[5]

Alba de Tormes, 23 July 1812

I write you these few lines my adored Harriet in hopes of being able to send them with Lord Wellingtons dispatches, to tell you that I am perfectly well, & have escaped unhurt from a severe & bloody Action we had yesterday, in which my Brigade was much engaged. The Action ... ended most gloriously for us, [and] in the entire rout of the French, who now I think will be quiet for some time ...

From Gen[era]l Leith [6] being wounded early in the Action, I succeeded to the command of the Division ... The fortune de la Guerre was particularly favourable to me, as I had some narrow escapes. My Horse was shot under me, in seven places, & my sword shot from my side, without my being in the least hurt. Your Bay Mare met with an honorable death in the field of Battle, but I cannot tell you how much I regret the poor animal, both from her being your property, & from the suffering & exertions she made for me. After having her Eyes shot out, & seven Bullets in different parts of her body, she continued to carry me for near an hour, before she died ...

My Brigade took an Eagle, among other Trophys [sic] from the French, & I was very well satisfied with their conduct. If you should see Lord Chatham tell him his two battalions behaved extremely well, & fortunately have not met with much loss.[7]

... You may be now perfectly at ease, as the French have got such a drubbing they are retiring as fast as they can. ... Give my love to the dear Children, & I am for ever, your faithful & affectionate Husband WH Pringle.

3. Lieutenant-Colonel Andrew Francis Barnard

Barnard (1773 - 1855) commanded a light brigade at Salamanca. He wrote to Chatham on 28 November 1812 to explain why very little had happened, and why the British army had retreated back into Portugal as a result of a subsequent meeting between portions of the French army. The Spanish forces do not seem to have impressed Barnard any more than they did Bradford.[8]

Sir Andrew Francis Barnard in later years
from Wikimedia Commons

My dear Lord,

The campaign has closed for the winter and we are once more in our quarters behind the Ajueda. The hardships which we have undergone during the latter part of our retreat has [sic] served to reconcile us to the Cottages of the frontier of old Castile which we might otherwise have felt uncomfortable after inhabiting the palaces of Madrid.

I have no doubt but what our retreat which is the necessary consequence of the union of the French armys [sic] will by some be magnifyed [sic] into a disaster, but the country which we occupied is such an open plain that no part of it affords a position which will delay the advance of an enemy very superior in numbers and particularly in cavalry for a day.

It is true the Tormes had fortune favored us might for some time have afforded a considerable obstacle, but unluckily for us the weather was obstinately fine for some days during our stay at Salamanca by which it became fordable in every point, and with equal bad fortune the sky began to pour torrents the very hour that we commenced our retreat and continued so till we arrived in the neighborhood of Ciudad de Rodrigo.

... Notwithstanding our [cause?] has not the same brilliant effect that it had when Lord Wellington dated his dispatches from Madrid yet on the whole more has been effected during the campaign than was expected at the commencement of it and our late retreat has been the consequence of our success. ...

The greatest part of Spain has been abandoned by the French and all their ports of communication destroyed but in consequence of these circumstances the whole of their force is united and we are obliged to retire, and unfortunately we cannot resume the offensive untill spring for want of forage. Soult and King Joseph [9] are now on their way to Madrid, which hitherto the French have not ventured to retain. ... The Spaniards get worse and worse little assistance can be expected from them. The French hold their armys [sic] in such contempt that they cannot even make a diversion in our favor ...

I have many thanks to return for your kind letter which was transmitted to me by Hood, it makes me blush for having been so idle a correspondent but Madrid is of all places the most seducing and most calculated to employ every moment of the 24 hours in doing nothing. ... I beg to be most kindly remembered to Lady Chatham and remain with the greatest regard and respect.

My dear Lord
Your faithfull & Obliged Humble Servant
A F Barnard

Notes and References

[1] Henry Hollis Bradford to Lord Chatham, 10 September 1812, National Archives Chatham MSS PRO 30/8/365 f 227
[2] Lord March, later 5th Duke of Richmond, was one of Wellington's ADCs
[3] Chatham was Colonel of the 4th "King's Own" Regiment of Foot
[4] Commanded by Sir Galbraith Lowry Cole, who had been wounded at Salamanca, temporarily commanded by Major-General William Anson
[5] William Henry Pringle to Harriot Hester Pringle, 23 July 1812, John Rylands Library Pringle MSS Eng MS 1273 f 5
[6] Lieutenant General James Leith was in command of the 5th Division. Pringle took over command when he was wounded
[7] A reference to the two battalions of the 4th "King's Own", who formed a significant part of the brigade under Pringle's command
[8] Andrew Francis Barnard to Lord Chatham, 28 November 1812, National Archives Chatham MSS PRO 30/8/365 f 174
[9] Napoleon's brother Joseph Bonaparte, King of Spain

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Jacqueline Reiter has a Phd in 18th century political history. She is currently working on the first ever biography of John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham, due to be released by Pen & Sword Books in September 2016. When she finds time she blogs about her historical discoveries at http://alwayswantedtobeareiter.wordpress.com/, and can be found on Twitter as https://twitter.com/latelordchatham.

A 19th century Check-out Inventory: Lord Chatham and Abington Hall

by Jacqueline Reiter

I moved house rather less than two weeks ago, never a stress-free experience. One of the most stressful aspects of moving is the compiling of the “check-out inventory”. Essentially, the landlord hires a company to go through the house, peer with a magnifying glass at the floors and walls and note where damage has occurred and needs to be “made good”.

Abington Hall around the turn of the 19th century

We have hopefully escaped with our deposit intact, but the same cannot be said for John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham's renting of Abington Hall in Cambridgeshire. Chatham, the elder brother of William Pitt the Younger, had sold all his inherited estates and therefore tended to rent his country retreats. On 15 March 1816 he signed a lease with the banker John Mortlock, undertaking to rent Abington Hall and 40 acres of parkland. The rent was £300 a year for a period of ten years in the first instance (with a 12-month break clause after the first five years).[1]

After his wife died in May 1821, Chatham went out to Gibraltar to take up his appointment as Governor there. He did not return until July 1825, but sublet Abington to William Wellesley-Pole, Lord Maryborough (another famous man's elder brother: his younger sibling was the Duke of Wellington). Maryborough moved into Abington Hall in the autumn of 1821 and, as Chatham had done before him, used it as a hunting retreat.[2]

Abington Hall today (now the headquarters of TWI)

Perhaps Mortlock should have thought twice before renting his house to Chatham. Quite apart from his notoriously straitened finances (I did not manage to discover whether his £300 rent was “well and truly paid or caused to be paid unto the said John Mortlock his Heirs or Assigns” as per the terms of his contract), Chatham had not been the best tenant in the past. According to Earl St Vincent, who moved into Admiralty House in London in 1801, seven years after Chatham had moved out following a six-year stint as First Lord of the Admiralty:

I have every comfort and rooms sufficient for my purpose, insomuch as I mean not to go into the Admiralty House until it has gone through a complete scouring and painting, very much wanted, for the servants of Lord and Lady Chatham were very sluttish...[3]

In the case of Abington Hall, Lord and Lady Chatham suffered a fair few private problems during their tenancy, and it's possible Lady Chatham was frequently unable to exert much control over her servants due to ill-health. It's also possible that Maryborough trashed the joint, and possible, too, that the property stood empty for some time prior to the end of Chatham's ten-year contract. But looking over the two “Surveys of Dilapidations” compiled for Abington Hall in January 1824 and May 1826, Chatham seems not to have lost his habit of taking poor care of his rented houses.

The house was roomy but not especially large, consisting of three storeys: a basement with cellars and a kitchen; the entrance hallway and the grand rooms – a library or study, drawing room, dining room, and breakfast parlour on the ground floor; a first floor with the main bedrooms and the servants' quarters. 

One of Abington's formal rooms

The 1824 dilapidation survey counted nearly 40 rooms, including the kitchen, servants' quarters, scullery, pantry, and “meat larder”.[4] Mostly this survey focused on the physical works that needed to be done to the house, which were extensive. Many rooms suffered from damp, suggesting that Maryborough had moved out some time before. Most of the doors needed their mechanisms oiling and the sashes nearly all needed “easing”. Alarmingly, a number of windows were broken, or even just missing. The housekeeper seems to have made off with all the keys, although only the door to one of the wine cellars was left locked.

Plasterwork throughout needed repairing; the staircase walls needed repapering; the ice house casing “appears decayed, and probably the Ice House itself which must be examined & reinstated accordingly”. The roof needed to be relined with lead; the brickwork (which had been whitewashed by Chatham[5]) needed repointing. 

Abington Hall's whitewashed exterior

Many rooms had cracked marble hearths (no idea what happened... maybe poor quality marble?). The floor in the pillared entrance hallway was “settling” and the “enrichment” of the cornices needed reinstating. 

Some original plasterwork at Abington Hall

All the privies needed their cesspools emptying and a number of the outhouses – the dairy, coachhouse, harness room, and beerhouse, for example – needed new paving and interior flooring.

Two years later, in May 1826, Mr Elliot Smith was hired by Thomas Mortlock to compile a “Statement of Delapidations [sic] in the Furniture &c at Abingdon [sic] Hall … late in the possession of Lord Chatham”.[6] The survey went through each room in the house and offices, noting the condition of the furnishings. The findings were interesting. The chairs seem to have taken the brunt of Chatham's tenancy: ten mahogany chairs needed recovering and nailing together again in the study, along with three more in the dining room, “some painted warm[ing] chairs” in the breakfast parlour, and several more in the bedrooms and servants' quarters. Many fire screens needed recovering, and a number of “rolling sunblinds” had been pulled off their mechanisms.

Some of this damage was due to bad maintenance: the cotton curtains in the “nursery” were described as “quite worn out from neglect” (unsurprisingly, as the Chathams had no children), and a leather sofa in the butler's bedroom was “quite destroyed by moth or Rats”. The bedhangings in the servants' quarters, and their blankets, all had to be replaced wholesale, “having gone much to decay”. The entire “patent cooking apparatus” in the kitchen was ruined and had to be replaced. Chatham's “sluttish” servants from the Admiralty had clearly followed him to Abington.

Not only were the servants “sluttish” – they were also thieving. “Gone” appears as a comment in nearly every room. Fire screens and bellows appear to have been irrestible. A “Wedgwood ink stand” was taken from the study. Five chairs were missing from the nursery, along with the coal scoop and tinderbox. Every bedroom was missing its blue and white basins, ewers and even “chamber [pot]”. A picture of Boston Harbour was taken from the butler's room. Carpeting was taken from several attic bedrooms, along with “1 ½ yards of 4/4 figured floor cloth” in the attic passage. One of the servants was clearly a bird fancier: “six stands and a breeding bird cage” disappeared from the “Dark Room next to Roof of House”. 

The dining room

Anything that looked like it might be brass also disappeared: hooks in the maidservants' room; candlesticks and hearth equipment, teapots, bellows, and bottles of all sizes in the kitchen. Two “japanned spittoons” went missing from the “China Closet”, which seems an odd thing to steal (perhaps Chatham didn't like the pattern and threw them out?). In the basement, ironing boards went missing from the scullery and laundry room, along with an assortment of odd items: a copper hand bowl; a coal scoop; seven tin saucepans; a warming pot; a dripping pan stand and pair of tongs; and two shelves.

Outside the story wasn't much better. “Dig, clean and cultivate the whole of the Garden Ground which is in a bad state & entirely without Cupping, also prune & train the present Trees and plant new ones when wanted,” the survey noted, adding: “There has [sic] been 5 men doing this near a month”.

Part of Abington's walled garden, near the house

In his favour, Chatham had had some work done to the house, particularly to the stables – he was a keen rider – and this was deducted from the final bill. Smith and his assistant Thomas Cockett calculated, overall, that Lord Chatham owed £109 15s 6d for everything that had been done to (and removed from) the house during his ten-year tenancy.

It doesn't seem like much, but given the yearly rent was £300 it was a sizeable enough sum. I wonder whether the Mortlocks would have agreed to rent to Chatham again!

Below is a list of the main rooms and outbuildings listed by the two Dilapidations Surveys. Now the headquarters of The Welding Institute (TWI), Abington's ground floor retains many of its original features, but the bedrooms and attic quarters have been converted into open-plan offices and changed beyond recognition.

Ground Floor:

Housekeeper's room and store room

Library/Study

Drawing room

Dining Room

Breakfast Parlour

“Billiard Room”

Hall and Principal Staircase

Attic rooms (bedrooms):

Recessed room (and dressing room)

Checked Bedroom

Nursery

Butler's room

Men and maidservants' rooms

Housekeeper's bedroom

“Miss Mortlock's Room”

Striped Bedroom

Chintz Bedroom and dressing room

Green Recessed Bedroom

“Mr Mortlock's Bedroom”

“Mr William Mortlock's Bedroom”

South Angle bedroom

North Angle bedroom

Three further bedrooms

Basement:

Coal Cellar and two wine vaults and a beer cellar

Larder and Meat Larder

Scullery

Kitchen

Pantry

Housemaid's room

Vault

Laundry and Mangle Room

Servants' Hall

China Closet

Butler's Pantry

“Shoe House”

Outhouses:

Dairy

Bakehouse

Coachhouse, chaise-house and stables, with separate harness room, “nag stable”, and straw house

Brewhouse

Cowhouse, pigsties and henouses (complete with “turkies” and “fowls” [sic])

Dog kennels

Keeper's House

References

Many thanks to Lee Pretlove and Hazel Jackson of TWI for showing me around Abington Hall in July 2014.

[1] The lease is in the Mortlock Papers at Cambridgeshire Record Office (many thanks to the staff for unearthing it for me): ref 509/T158

[2] Lord Maryborough to Lord Chatham, 6 September 1822, National Archives Chatham MSS PRO 30/8/368 f 17

[3] Letters of Lord St Vincent I (Naval Records Society Vol LV), 376: St Vincent to his sister, 16 Feb 1801

[4] “Survey of Dilapidations committed on the Mansion House, Offices, Buildings & Premises at Abington, Cambridge, on lease from Jno. Mortlock Esq. deceased to Jno. Earl of Chatham, Surveyed January 1824”: Cambridgeshire Record Office 296/B29

[5] David Brown, “Heritage Assessment of effects on the historic landscape associated with Abington Hall”, July 2010, paragraph 2.12

[6] Cambridgeshire Record Office, 296/B60 ff 46-56

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Jacqueline Reiter has a Phd in 18th century political history. She is currently working on the first ever biography of John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham, due to be released by Pen & Sword Books in September 2016. When she finds time she blogs about her historical discoveries at http://alwayswantedtobeareiter.wordpress.com/, and can be found on Twitter as https://twitter.com/latelordchatham.

The Siege of Flushing, August 1809

by Jacqueline Reiter

At 1 PM on the 13^th of August 1809, about fifty British cannons and mortars of different sizes opened at once on the French territory of Flushing (Vlissingen) from five batteries. Several gunboats bombarded the town simultaneously from the Scheldt river. Early in the morning of the 14^th a sixth battery opened fire, joined a little later by the deafening roar of six warships of the line giving their all. William Congreve's rockets added to the terror the town must have experienced, setting it on fire in several different places.

The Bombardment of Flushing (Wikimedia Commons)

A brief cease-fire between 4 pm and 9:30 pm on the 14^th was all the respite the townspeople of Flushing received. When the bombardment resumed, it continued throughout the night until the French general in command of Flushing's garrison, Monnet, surrendered at 2:30 am on 15 August.

The siege of Flushing provided the main action of the Walcheren campaign of 1809, intended to provide a distraction for Britain's ally, Austria, which had been at war with France since April. (More about the background to the expedition can be found in a previous EHFA post on thesubject). The British were to capture the French harbour of Flushing on the island of Walcheren, destroy the French and Dutch fleet at Antwerp, and ruin the navigation of the Scheldt River. To achieve this 40,000 soldiers and more than 600 ships sailed on 28 July – even though Austria had been defeated at Wagram at the beginning of the month.

The military commander of the expedition was John Pitt, 2^nd Earl of Chatham, the notoriously lazy elder brother of former prime minister William Pitt. The naval command was entrusted to Sir Richard Strachan, a brave but hot-blooded admiral who had contributed to the Trafalgar campaign. Neither was ideal for the task, but intelligence had been gathered for months that the French, distracted by war with Austria, had stripped the area around Antwerp of troops. Lord Castlereagh, the Secretary of State for War, described the campaign as a “coup de main”, a lightning action designed to take the French unawares before they had time to strengthen their defences.

Walcheren (1660) (Wikimedia Commons)

The expedition, divided into four parts, would secure the island of Walcheren by investing Flushing and disabling the French batteries on the opposite coast at Cadsand, allowing the fleet access to the West Scheldt. Another division would land on the adjacent island of South Beveland and secure the approach to Antwerp. Once this was done, the main part of the army would land opposite Batz at the southernmost tip of South Beveland and march for fifteen miles to Antwerp. What would happen when they got to Antwerp remained something of a mystery, but ministers were confident that the town hadn't been strengthened in, oh, ages, or at least since the last source with which they provided Lord Chatham had been published (about 1794).

Unfortunately for the British politicians, things began to go wrong for the expedition before it even sailed. First came the news of Wagram, then adverse winds delayed the expedition's start. The newspapers had been gossiping loosely about the “grand expedition” for months, as a result of which the French, who could read just as well as the British, knew nearly as much about the expedition as the government did. Persistent adverse winds drove the fleet off course almost immediately, and the ships were nearly all forced to take shelter in a natural basin called the Roompot – which was, unfortunately, on the wrong side of Walcheren. Sir John Hope and his reserve force went through South Beveland like a knife through butter, but the Cadsand landing failed because of bad weather and poor communication.

The loss of Cadsand meant that the fleet could not get up the West Scheldt with the main force for Antwerp until Flushing fell. Flushing's commander, Monnet, apparently only had between two and three thousand motley troops of various nations and states of discipline, so taking Flushing should have been simplicity itself. Once again, however, the British were hampered by disastrous weather. Instead of landing somewhere sensible near Flushing, the soldiers landed at the opposite end of the island. Marching troops across land was bad enough, but dragging the ordnance and siege supplies across boggy land was an entirely different proposition.

More seriously, because Cadsand had not been taken, the French garrison there was able to throw as many reinforcements into Flushing as it liked. Obviously the British navy tried to stop them, but the weather pinned the British fleet too high or too low every time they tried to establish a blockade. The British could only watch as boat after boat of French soldiers crossed the Scheldt. By the time the fleet finally managed to complete the investment on the 7^th of August, Flushing's garrison had nearly tripled, and Lord Chatham was forced to disembark one of the brigades intended for Antwerp to reinforce the besiegers at Flushing.

Chatham had hoped to get to Antwerp while Flushing was investing, but he now had too few men to proceed. Nor could the navy bring the siege equipment for Antwerp round South Beveland until Flushing fell. Strachan could not understand why Chatham did not want to embrace the “simple” solution of marching across South Beveland to get to Antwerp, disembarking, re-embarking, and re-disembarking thousands of troops and cavalry. Chatham, for his part, could not understand why Strachan wasn't able to sail up to Batz with the siege supplies, or – for that matter – stop the French getting over from Cadsand to Flushing. Meanwhile, Sir Eyre Coote, Chatham's second-in-command in charge of the Flushing operations, was convinced his superior was staying on Walcheren deliberately to spite him.

Once the siege artillery arrived at Flushing, tugged laboriously across the entire breadth of Walcheren, the batteries took days to construct. The army blamed the engineers, and the engineers blamed the weather, which was about as unfavourable as it was possible to get, with torrential all-night-long downpours that flooded the trenches and stopped work. Chatham was comfortably ensconced in a “palace” in Middelburg, with as much turtle soup as he could eat, but his men, up to their ankles, then knees, then hips in water – Monnet had cut the dykes in an attempt to flood out the besiegers – weren't happy.

The British in Middelburg, 1809 (Dutch print)

On the 7^th there was a brief, confused sortie by the French, which resulted in the British gaining more ground towards the town, but the batteries were taking so long even Chatham was getting twitchy. He badgered Strachan about getting the ships to participate in the bombardment, but Strachan still hadn't managed to get the ships round yet. He finally did so on 11^th August, but the batteries still weren't ready for another two days. When they did open, the ships of the line weren't able to get underway for a further twenty-four hours, again due to the weather.

By the time Flushing capitulated on the 15^th, the campaign was effectively over. Reducing Flushing was meant to have made the march on Antwerp possible, but in fact it delayed further operations. Far from being Castlereagh's coup de main, more than two weeks had elapsed since the British sailed. The Flushing garrison did not march out till 18 August, and it took a further week for the fleet, beset by bad weather and navigational problems, to get the troops and siege supplies to Batz.

Chatham, meanwhile, was also inching towards Batz. He seems to have given up on Antwerp the moment he set foot on South Beveland. He went through the motions of preparing to continue, but intelligence put enemy forces around Antwerp at 35,000 men, the town's defences had been strengthened, and the French fleet was well out of reach.

Most seriously of all, however, was the mysterious fever sweeping through the troops. “Zealand fever”, or “Walcheren fever” as it became known, was probably a toxic combination of malaria, dysentery, typhoid, and typhus. It started virtually overnight in mid-August and raced through the army at a terrifying rate. Chatham's lieutenant-generals advised him to call off the campaign, and at the beginning of September the British fell back on Walcheren. In mid-September Chatham sailed with the bulk of his army, including thousands of sick, leaving Sir Eyre Coote with a holding garrison of sixteen thousand men. Within days even this was two-thirds out of action.

Cruikshank on "The Grand Expedition" (Wikimedia Commons)

The recriminations at home were terrible. Chatham and Strachan blamed each other for the disaster, and many doubted whether the expedition should ever have been sent in the first place. There was a lengthy parliamentary enquiry which cleared the government of incapacity, but Chatham was forced to resign his cabinet post as Master-General of the Ordnance. Neither he nor Strachan were ever employed again.

The real victims, however, were the thousands of soldiers crippled or killed by “Walcheren fever”, and the civilians of Flushing, ruthlessly bombarded in an attempt to cut short a siege and win an unwinnable campaign.

References

There are three major studies of the Walcheren campaign:
Gordon Bond, The Grand Expedition (Athens, GA, 1979)
Martin A. Howard, Walcheren 1809: the scandalous destruction of a British army (Barnsley, 2011)Carl A. Christie, “The Walcheren Expedition of 1809” (University of Dundee PhD thesis, 1975)
Sir John Fortescue also devotes fifty pages or so to it in his History of the British Army (volume 7). There is also a short treatment of the campaign from a Dutch perspective, particularly dwelling on the serious damage done to the town of Flushing: Tobias Gent, De Engelse invasie van Walcheren in 1809 (Nijmegen, 2009)

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Jacqueline Reiter has a Phd in 18th century political history. She is currently working on the first ever biography of John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham, due to be released by Pen & Sword Books in September 2016. When she finds time she blogs about her historical discoveries at http://alwayswantedtobeareiter.wordpress.com/, and can be found on Twitter as https://twitter.com/latelordchatham.

Gibraltar: The Perks of Location Research

by Jacqueline Reiter

I am very fond of tramping the ground trodden by my characters and research interests. Until now this has meant travelling reasonably locally, mostly to stately homes and towns in the south and south-west of England. Last month, however, I discovered a major perk of studying a man who was a Governor of Gibraltar: the opportunity to visit the Rock itself.

Rock of Gibraltar from the airport

I am about halfway through my biography of John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham. Chatham was appointed Governor of Gibraltar in 1820, and was actually on the spot from 1821 to 1825, when he returned to England for his health. I needed to find out what he did while he was in Gibraltar, and there are few resources in England to tell me. My visit, therefore, was primarily to use the Gibraltar National Archives, but I was also curious to visit the place where my research interest had spent four years of his life.

In geographical terms, Gibraltar is stunning. It is, essentially, a large chunk of limestone that attached itself to the Iberian peninsula several million years ago. Even now the "Rock", as it is known, seems entirely separate from the Spanish mainland. The place is tiny, about seven miles long and less than two miles wide: during my five day visit, even though I spent nearly every day from 9 to 5 in the archives, I managed to walk the entire length and breadth of the place.

Tiny it may be, but Gibraltar is full of history and proud of it. Gibraltar's history is closely intertwined with that of Britain. It was taken from the Spanish by siege in 1704, and formally ceded by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. Ever since, despite a number of wobbly moments, most notably the "Great Siege" by the Spanish from 1779 to 1783, Gibraltar has been British.

The place is very much a military garrison, and it shows. Recent land reclamation has expanded the size of the territory past the town walls, but the older town is clearly fringed with austere grey-bricked bastions, many of them dating back to the 1700s and beyond. The main part of the town runs along the backbone of Main Street, from the Governor's Residence, the "Convent", at one end to the Grand Casemates Square at the other.

King's Bastion and reclaimed land beyond

Many of the tightly-packed, colourfully-painted houses branching off from this street are painted with numbers to denote barracks. Side streets have a distinctly military flavour: Governor's Parade; Cannon Lane; Glacis Road.

Although the town is clearly old, it largely dates to the post-1783 period. The Gibraltar Museum has several pictures showing the devastation caused to the town by the various bombardments during the Great Siege. By 1783 there was barely a house with a roof on it.

Main Street in 1783 (Wikimedia Commons)

By 1821, the period I was researching, the place was nearly completely rebuilt, but there were ongoing initiatives. The Cathedral of Holy Trinity, the largest Protestant church in Gibraltar, was not begun till 1825. My boy Chatham, indeed, laid the foundation stone shortly before returning home.

Cathedral of the Holy Trinity

The Great Siege is, indeed, everywhere. Monuments to General Elliott, the governor during the siege, are scattered all over the town. Up on the scrub-covered and monkey-infested crest of the Rock itself is a network of tunnels dug by British engineers and artillerists, begun during the siege and completed over the next few decades. A portion of these are open to the public, and they are well worth a visit.

Inside the Great Siege Tunnels

The tunnels stretch for over a mile through the Rock, all man-made. Many advances in military engineering were made during the siege, including the development of a gun carriage designed to fire down a steep slope, invented for the express purpose of defending Gibraltar's siege tunnels against the Spanish.



Standing on one of the viewpoints atop the Rock, it is immediately obvious why Gibraltar has been such a strategic point for British seapower. It commands the enormous Bay on one side and the expanse of the Mediterranean on the other. The coast of Africa is clearly visible, even on a cloudy day.

Africa, from Europa Point

Here was a port where British ships could shelter and reprovision and keep a watchful eye over the activities of Britain's allies and enemies alike. This was the port to which the HMS Victory was taken for repairs after Trafalgar in 1805. The "Trafalgar cemetery" still exists, where many of the sailors who died as a result of the battle are buried.



Gibraltar was a very important military and naval post, and my boy Chatham was lucky to be the Governor of it. Unfortunately he appears to have hated it there, and never struck a rapport with the place. There were circumstances for this, of course, but I cannot help but feel sorry for it. Gibraltar is beautiful and deeply interesting. I was made very welcome there, and everyone I spoke to fell over themselves to assist me in my research. The highlight of my trip, however, was probably taking my laptop up to the top of the Rock and writing, with a view of the Bay spread out before me.

Perhaps the most inspiring place I have ever written

I am so glad my research took me to this marvellous place. I can't wait to go back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jacqueline Reiter has a Phd in 18th century political history. She is currently working on the first ever biography of John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham, due to be released by Pen & Sword Books in September 2016. When she finds time she blogs about her historical discoveries at http://alwayswantedtobeareiter.wordpress.com/, and can be found on Twitter as https://twitter.com/latelordchatham.

“The Mischief Done Me”: all change at the Admiralty, 1794

by Jacqui Reiter

On the evening of 10 June 1794 the Countess of Chatham, wife of the First Lord of the Admiralty, arrived at London's Opera with good news. The singer Anna Morichelli was performing, but her aria was interrupted by Lady Chatham's announcement: Lord Howe's fleet had trounced the French off Ushant in what became known as the battle of the “Glorious First of June”.[1]

Henry Perronet Briggs, “Visit of George III
to Lord Howe's Flagship, 26 June 1794” (1828)

The First Lord of the Admiralty had more reason to celebrate this victory than almost anyone else. John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham was the prime minister's elder brother. He was intelligent and well-mannered, but notoriously lazy, and despite his closeness to the prime minister had little political clout. He had become highly unpopular as a result of the expedition to Dunkirk in 1793. Stores and gunboats were not sent out in time to assist the Duke of York's army, and Chatham was blamed by the press for the campaign's failure.[2] “The opinion of Lord Chatham's insufficiency in his office is quite universal,” Sir Gilbert Elliot recorded in his diary.[3]

John Pitt, 2nd Earl of Chatham, by
Martin Arthur Shee (ca 1794)
Wikimedia Commons

As far as Chatham was concerned, therefore, the Glorious First of June saved his career. In the summer of 1794, Pitt strengthened his government by coalescing with the Duke of Portland. Pitt engaged in a complex cabinet reshuffle to accommodate his new allies. To his relief Chatham kept his place, but the past year of stress had taken its toll on his health. Despite his reputation he was usually a regular attender of Admiralty Board meetings, but after the official celebrations of Howe's victory he took a holiday. From the 26 August to 29 September 1794 Chatham rested at Cheveley Park, his country estate, nursing a “Complaint in his Stomach”.[4]

Had he realised what was going on in London, he might have been less complacent.

An Admiralty Undermined

“Have you yet fixed the day of your Return?” Pitt wrote to Chatham on 22 September. “The longer you can contrive to stay [at Cheveley] the better.”[5] Pitt was only partly concerned for his brother's health. In persuading Chatham to stay away Pitt was also trying to end a cabinet rift which, within three months, would lead to Chatham's disgrace.

Chatham was one of the few members of Pitt's wartime cabinet with direct military experience, but since Dunkirk, as he later recalled, his “opinion was treated with no great respect”.[6] Strategy was decided by Pitt and his two main allies, Foreign Secretary Lord Grenville and Home Secretary Henry Dundas. Chatham resented Dundas's influence most. As Treasurer of the Navy he often interfered in Admiralty affairs. In July 1794, he became Secretary of State for War with the power to override naval requirements for military purposes.

Henry Dundas, by Henry Raeburn
(ca 1805). From Wikimedia Commons

While Chatham was away at Cheveley, eight French ships of the line were spotted making for an unknown destination.[7] Dundas decided they were bound for the West Indies, where the British were trying to open a new war front to cripple French expansion and increase British commerce. Dundas pressured Chatham to send naval reinforcements at once, but Chatham had other plans. The British had briefly possessed Toulon in the autumn of 1793 but had lost the port back to the French in December. Lord Hood's fleet remained in the Mediterranean for much of 1794, and Chatham held it a priority to reinforce him. He wrote doubting the urgency of sending ships to the West Indies, and received a testy response: the military garrisons in the West Indies desperately needed relief which the navy could swiftly provide. “If your Lordship was to see from the returns how little is left in each of [the regiments curently in the West Indies] you would not conceive that I was unduly alarmed … Our Security in the West Indies for many months to come depends entirely on a commanding and extensive Naval Force”.[8]

Dundas's tone infuriated Chatham, as did the attempt to use navy personnel to cover the War Office's shortcomings in providing insufficient troops. He wrote to inform Dundas that both he and the Admiralty Board found the “style of Complaint in your letter” insulting. As for the naval force in the West Indies, it “was very ample, and I shall think sufficient for Naval Objects”.[9]

Chatham's draft response to Dundas,
September 1794, in the National Archives
PRO 30/8/364 f 169.
His anger can clearly be seen
in the legibility of the handwriting.

When Chatham returned to London at the end of September he was horrified to find Dundas had overridden him in cabinet in his absence.[10] The six ships meant for Hood sailed for the West Indies, and the wind was unfavourable for sending any more to Toulon. Chatham was furious but there was nothing he could do; and by locking horns with Dundas he had made himself a dangerous enemy.

“Unjustly hurt”

Dundas evidently decided he could no longer work with Chatham, but he waited until a cabinet meeting at the end of November to make his move. Like most of Pitt's cabinet meetings it was unminuted. Perhaps the cabinet discussed Lord Hood's fleet, or the end of the campaign in Holland, or the West Indies. The result was a public quarrel between Chatham and Dundas, after which Dundas seems to have hinted at resignation to Pitt.[11]

Presented with a choice between Dundas and his brother, Pitt had no hesitation in choosing Dundas. In many ways Chatham's dismissal had been overdue for a year. In the words of Pitt's biographer John Ehrman, Chatham “was expendable”.[12] For the sake of ministerial unity, Chatham had to go.

Pitt dealt with the upcoming confrontation with Chatham by trying to avoid it. He retreated to the safe distance of his country villa and sacked his brother by letter. All references to Dundas were necessarily cryptic: “I must ascribe it to some fatality of temper (in whom it is not material to enquire) that the attempt to prevent the unfortunate quarrel should have been in vain”. The government had to appear strong and united, so the real reason for Chatham's dismissal had to be suppressed: “I should most wish … that nothing which has led to this point should transpire.” In a post scriptum Pitt dropped his final bombshell: “ I have preferred telling [my opinion to] you by letter to a conversation, which must be unnecessarily distressing to us both, and to which I really do not feel myself equal”.[13]

Letter from Pitt to Chatham, 1 December 1794,
Cambridge University Library Pitt MSS 1557.
Photo by Stephenie Woolterton

Fifteen miles away in Admiralty House, Pitt's news dropped on Chatham like the proverbial ton of bricks. He “hardly [knew] what to think or what to say”, but when Pitt continued to refuse his brother an interview Chatham's desperation emerged uppermost. “Without something further passing between us I must stand in a very perplexing situation”, he begged.[14] To his friend Lord Camden, Chatham was more explicit: “I am to leave the Admiralty immediately … The situation in which this arrangement puts me, is perhaps the most distressing in which any man was ever placed”.[15]

Chatham knew the public would ascribe his dismissal to incompetence. There had been no naval defeats: on the contrary the Glorious First of June was only six months past. Parliament was in recess, so there was no obvious politically-driven need for the change. Chatham understood all too well that his reputation was the sacrificial lamb on the altar of governmental stability. The fact that Pitt had been pressured into the decision by Dundas made matters worse.

“If it had been required of me, for the service of the Country, to sign my own death I should have taken as few minutes to consider as I have now done days,” Chatham told Pitt, “but when I reflect, that without attention, I may be signing my own disgrace, I know that all the feelings you possess, will not make you think the worse of me, if I pause again, & again in a situation, which I never thought I would have to look at, & for which I am so little prepared”[16].

Eventually, of course, Chatham gave in: he had no choice. He was given the office of Lord Privy Seal, a sort of “ministry without portfolio” with no real duties attached. The opposition newspapers had a field day. The Morning Chronicle printed the following caution:

“With your Gout—is it possible you should intend
To turn naval at once—and that mast to ascend;
The footing is slippery—the falling is sore,
Should you pop in the sea, you'll be heard of no more.
But if you must mount to this height to the clouds,
Be your hammock suspended aloft in the shrouds;
Then with claret well dos'd, and wrapp'd up in your rug
If the weather is calm, you may sleep like a bug:
But if storms rend the air, and the thunder roll round,
Quit the ship—Should you not, the whole crew are aground;
Get a birth [sic] more secure for yourself and the crew,
Where the wages are high, and there's nothing to do...”[17]

Admiral Alan Gardner,
by Sir William Beechey.
From Wikimedia Commons

When Parliament reconvened in January the opposition attacked Chatham. Neither Pitt nor Dundas were particularly impressive in defending the former First Lord. Pitt was too close to him, and Dundas would hardly stick his neck out for the man whose heels he had just tripped up. Chatham found a more reliable champion in Admiral Gardner, one of the Lords of the Admiralty. Briefed by Chatham, Gardner's speech was the closest Chatham got to a public defence. On Chatham's behalf Gardner demanded a public enquiry into Chatham's tenure of the Admiralty: “Nothing, he was assured, would give the Noble Lord greater pleasure, than an enquiry into his public conduct”.[18]

Of course it didn't happen, but Chatham cannot have expected his request to be granted. The young George Canning, Pittite MP for Newtown, summarised Chatham's plight: it was good “that he [Chatham] is gone—for the voice of the publick was against him, and that is reason enough.”[19]

Aftermath

Two years after his dismissal Chatham had neither forgiven nor forgotten. In 1796 Chatham poured out his grievances in an anguished letter to Lord Camden:

“I have never had a full and decided conversation, with my Brother on ye subject, because he has very cautiously and constantly avoided it … I am sorry I can not agree with you, in looking forward to it … It may be a little better or a little worse, but that is all, for the mischief done me, is irreparable, and tho' my Brother, whenever he gives himself time to reflect, must … regret the step into which he was surprised, he can never set it right”.[20]

The rift was papered over later that year when Pitt moved Chatham to the more prestigious post of Lord President of the Council. The promotion was tacitly meant, and accepted, as an olive branch, and by early 1797 the brothers were described by a mutual friend as “less uncomfortable together than they were”.[21] Tragically, however, they never recovered their closeness, and neither fully trusted the other for the rest of Pitt's life.

Removing Chatham from the Admiralty was sensible, and not just because Chatham was not up to the job. To an extent whether Chatham was successful or not was irrelevant: he attracted criticism simply because of who he was at a time when the war effort lurched from disaster to disaster, and the Pitt government was vulnerable.

His successor did not suffer from the same disadvantages of identity. As Lord Castlereagh observed when the French fleet broke blockade in 1797, “As there are not the same ends to be answered by attacking this First Lord of the Admiralty, as the last, I dare say we shall hear much less about it than we should if Lord Chatham had been there.”[22] Chatham's removal did help Pitt's government, but at a price. As he himself foresaw, the rest of his public career was blighted by the events of 1794.


References

[1] Lady Newdegate (ed), The Cheverels of Cheverel Manor (London, 1898), pp. 147-8
[2] For the reforms see John Ehrman, The Younger Pitt: The Years of Acclaim (London, 1969), 316-7; for Chatham and the Dunkirk campaign see Times, 28 August 1793; Morning Post, 30 August 1793; Morning Chronicle, 11 September 1793; Times, 14 September 1793; Morning Post, 14 September 1793
[3] Life and Letters of Sir Gilbert Elliot, 1st Earl of Minto (London, 1874) II, 160, 11 September 1793
[4] Pitt to the Dowager Countess of Chatham, 17 September 1794, PRO 30/8/12 f 462; Admiralty Board minutes for 1794, ADM 3/112-114
[5] Pitt to Chatham, 22 September 1794, PRO 30/8/101 f 123
[6] Memorandum by Chatham, undated but January 1795, PRO 30/8/364 f 171
[7] Dundas to the King, 14 September 1794, in A. Aspinall (ed), The Later Correspondence of George III (Cambridge, 1962) I, 243
[8] Dundas to Chatham, 14 September 1794, PRO 30/8/368 f 28
[9] Chatham to [Dundas], draft, undated but September 1794, PRO 30/8/364 f 169
[10] Memorandum by Chatham, undated but January 1795, PRO 30/8/364 f 171
[11] This seems clear from Pitt's letter to Chatham, undated but 1 December 1794, Cambridge University Library Pitt MSS 1557
[12] John Ehrman, The Younger Pitt: The Reluctant Transition (London, 1983), 379, 499
[13] Pitt to Chatham, undated but 1 December 1794, Cambridge University Library Pitt MSS 1557
[14] Chatham to Pitt, 1 and 2 December 1794, Cambridge University Library Pitt MSS 1558, 1560
[15] Chatham to Lord Camden, 13 December 1794, Kent RO U840/C254/1
[16] Chatham to Pitt, 5 December 1794, Cambridge University Library Pitt MSS 1565
[17] Morning Chronicle, 16 December 1794
[18] Speech by Admiral Gardner, 7 January 1795, reported in the Morning Chronicle, 8 January 1795
[19] The Letter Journal of George Canning, ed. Peter Jupp (London, 1991), p. 182, 7 January 1795
[20] Chatham to Lord Camden, 7 August 1796, Kent RO U840/C254/4
[21] Lord Bathurst to Lord Camden, undated but early 1797, Kent RO U840/C224/3
[22] Lord Castlereagh to Lord Camden, 25 January 1797, Kent RO U840/C98/1

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Jacqui Reiter has a Phd in 18th century political history. She believes she is currently the world expert on the life of the 2nd Earl of Chatham, and is writing a novel about his relationship with his brother Pitt the Younger. When she finds time she blogs about her historical discoveries at http://alwayswantedtobeareiter.wordpress.com/.