PREFACE. IN the year 1896 I was asked by the Gordon Highlanders' Association in Aberdeen to give a lecture on the origin and history of their regiment. It was afterwards suggested by the late General J. C. Hay, Lieut.-Colonel the Hon. J. Scott Napier, commanding the 2nd Battalion, and others, that I should write such a history of the regiment as would tend to keep up the memory of individual officers and soldiers, and of the traditions which, in the days of long service, were told by veterans to recruits on the line of march or round the barrackroom fire, but which are apt to be forgotten when generations of soldiers succeed each other more quickly, and when their time and thoughts are taken up by the more varied intellectual and physical occupations of modern military life. It happened that in my youth I heard many stories of the French War; I took delight in the tales of old officers and soldiers (my first salmon was caught under the auspices of a Waterloo sergeant), and when I joined the 92nd fifty years ago, my instructors had been themselves drilled by Peninsular and Waterloo men, so that the traditions of those times were still well known in the ranks; and though I afterwards served much longer in another regiment, the impression left by these tales never altogether faded from my memory. The late Mrs Cameron Campbell of Inverawe; Sir Charles Seton, Bart.; Lieut.-Colonel Stewart of Achnacone; and Mr Innes have kindly lent me letters written during the various campaigns. I have received great assistance from Mrs MacDonell of Keppoch, who knew many of the old officers personally, the Earl of March, Sir F. C. MacKenzie, the late Colonel Ewen MacPherson, C.B., of Cluny; Rev. Canon H. MacColl, the Rev. T. Sinton, Dores; Mr F. J. Grant of the Lyon Office; Mr MacPherson, banker, Kingussie; and others. The original Order Books, which had been lost, were found by General Alastair MacIan MacDonald and entrusted to me. I had some years ago read a journal kept by Quartermastersergeant MacCombie, and I have in my possession that kept by Sergeant Duncan Robertson, a most intelligent Athole man. Also the "Military Memoir" of a 92nd officer, printed at Edinburgh in 1823. The name is not given, but I have reason to believe he was Lieutenant James Hope, nephew to Lord Hopetoun, Colonel of the 92nd, who was promoted ensign from volunteer private in 1809. From these and similar sources I have taken the life and ideas of the regimental family at various times. I have been at pains to have the illustrations of uniform and costume correct, and they are taken as far as possible from contemporary sketches in the British Museum, by British and French artists, the drawings being done by Messrs R. Hope, H. Payne, and R. Simkin. I am indebted to the courtesy of Messrs Blackwood & Sons for the permission to use the plans of Vittoria, Orthes, Quatre-Bras, and Waterloo from Alison's "History of Europe," plans being also taken from Napier's "History of the Peninsular War," and others. In matters of general history, it has been my object merely to give the reason for the various expeditions in which the regiment took part, and in describing the operations, to confine myself as far as possible to the part taken by it. Many of the details as to nationality, dress, messing, and recruiting are of little interest to the general public, but they often show how the interior economy and discipline of a Highland regiment were carried on, and the tone of good feeling which prevailed among officers and men. The book is intended principally for the present and succeeding generations of the Gordon Highlanders, though as a by-way of Highland and military history, it may have some attraction for those interested in such subjects. It is my intention to carry on the story of the 92nd to 1881; then to give an account of the 75th Regiment from its formation till it became the First Battalion of the Gordon Highlanders, and afterwards to continue the history of both battalions to the present time. Those who read will not require to be told that I have no claim to be a practised writer, but I believe I have been accurate as to facts and details. If these tend to increase the respect for the Highland soldiers of former days, and to stimulate their successors to imitate their gentleness in peace and their manliness in war, I shall not altogether have lost my time. C. G. GARDYNE. GLENFORSA, ISLE OF MULL, November 1900. |