William Henry Pennington, also known as W. H. Pennington (26 January 1833 – 1 May 1923) was a soldier in the British Army who during the Crimean War took part in the famous Charge of the Light Brigade in 1854. On leaving the Army he became a Shakespearean actor and in 1870 was the lessee and manager of Sadlers Wells Theatre. After a performance in Hamlet he became known as 'Gladstone's Favourite Tragedian'.
Early life
Pennington was born in Greenwich in London in 1833, the son of Margaret née Sullivan (1807-1890) and Albert Pennington (1810-1874), a civil servant who later set up a school on Shacklewell Lane in Hackney. Albert Pennington trained his son to be a schoolmaster with the intention of passing the school on to him in the future. However, William Henry had a taste for adventure and as a youth joined the Mercantile Marine, serving for about three years on various ships and sailing as far as Australia, the East Indies, Java and Singapore. On leaving the Mercantile Marine he enlisted in the 11th Hussars on 24 January 1854 at Portobello Barracks in Dublin with the regimental number 1631. Before joining the Light Cavalry Brigade his previous experience on horseback had been 'a pony ride on Blackheath' as a boy.
Military service
Pennington was among the first of his regiment to leave for the Crimean War in 1854, travelling with the baggage party and some 60 men and their mounts. On 25 October 1854 he took part in the Charge of the Light Brigade during which he was injured with a musket ball in his right calf. Pennington wrote an account of his experience in the Charge during which his horse Black Bess was killed beneath him with a bullet through the head. Although wounded with a shot to the leg he managed to limp away from danger, determined 'to sell my life as dearly as I might'. While still a mile away from the starting point of the Charge and in a great deal of pain with his leg he was given a loose horse by some men of the 8th Hussars with whom he fought his way back up the 'Valley of Death' until he lost contact with them.
His letter to his father describing the Charge was published in The Times, among other newspapers: 'I was surprised to hear that no letter had reached you, as I wrote a month ago since, describing the Light Cavalry charge on the 25th October as far as it concerned myself. My wound was from a musket ball through the calf of my right leg, but so far has healed that I began to walk upon it an hour or so in the day. It was a mad but gallant charge made by our Light Cavalry at Balaclava.
The newspapers will let you see our position at the time. The word was given to "Charge guns to the front." We advanced at a gallop to these guns, and a fearful fire of grape, shell and canister, with ditto on the right and left flanks and infantry pouring in a dreadful fire; horses and men fell thick and fast, but even this did not check our onward rush. All the Russian infantry artillery men were sabred and for an instant we were masters of the guns, but having no support, could not hold them.
In this condition we were charged to flank and rear by numerous regiments of Russian cavalry and but for the desperation with which our men met their way there would not have been a single man retire from that fatal charge.
As for myself, I never reached the guns in front as a grape shot went through my busby, about two inches above my head, knocking it to one side, another ball through the calf of my leg and the next through my horse's head (a fine black mare).
I was now at the mercy of their Lancers, whom I saw lancing wounded and dismounted men. The demons give you no quarter when you are down. At this moment the 8th Hussars came by with a horse without a rider. This I mounted, and formed in the rear of the 8th as if it were my own regiment, dashed on. But worse again - we were obliged to wheel "Right about" and to pass through a strong body of their cavalry which had gathered in our rear, and cutting off our retreat.
Of course, with our handful, it was life or death, so we rushed at them to break through, but as soon as we got through one body there was another to engage. At any rate, with five or six fellows at my rear I galloped on, passing with the determination of one who would not lose his life, breaking the lances of the cowards who attacked us in the proportion of three or four to one, occasionally catching one a slap with a sword across his teeth, and giving another the point on his arm or breast.
They still pressed on me till I got sight of our own "Heavies" when, thanks be to God, they stopped pursuing us, and I got clear, without a scratch from their lances ... (Oh, the sabre before the lance!)