George III. held many reviews in Hyde Park, especially during the early days of the American War of Independence, and the Park was a veritable _Champ de Mars_ for military exercises. In 1778, an earthen rampart, twenty feet high and three feet wide at its base, was erected as butts for musket practice. It began at Cumberland Gate, and ran westwards towards Bayswater. Being near the high road, it was very dangerous, although at that time the other side of the road was all fields.
On June 2nd, 1780, broke out the fanatical riots generally known as the “Lord George Gordon Riots,” with which we have nothing to do, other than to chronicle the fact that the troops in and near London being considered insufficient to cope with the rioters, others were summoned from different parts of the country. Lodging must be found for these on their arrival, and we read in _The London Chronicle_, June 6-8, 1780, that “Orders are given from the War Office for a Camp to be formed in Hyde Park, and the several regiments that are to compose the same are now on their march; and, yesterday, the Hampshire Militia pitched their tents there for that purpose.” Also, later on in the same paper (p. 552), “Seven battalions of militia marched into Hyde-Park yesterday afternoon, where they immediately encamped. A large detachment of the Hampshire militia are doing duty at the President Lord Bathurst’s house in Piccadilly. The Park Gates are all shut, and no person suffered to pass through on any account whatever.”
_The Morning Chronicle_ of June 10 says: “Thursday (June 8), six regiments of Militia were encamped in Hyde Park; they are to be joined by several other regiments, which will make their number 10,000 men”: and the same journal, June 13, tells us that, “The Grand Camp in Hyde Park consists of the nine following regiments: the Queen’s, the Royal Irish, the Twenty-second, Cambridge, South Hants, North Hants, Oxford, Northumberland, One of York.” On the 14th June, the King, Prince of Wales, and “the Bishop of Osnaburgh” (Duke of York) visited the Camp--and so he did on several other occasions. But the riots came to an end, and
[Illustration: THE SOLDIERS’ TOILET, 1780.
the news of the taking of Charlestown drove everything else out of people’s heads, so that we do not hear much more of this Camp; but Paul Sandby painted a series of views of the Camp, and exhibited them at the next Royal Academy. He also engraved them. “_The Great Encampment in Hyde Park._” “_The Encampment in Hyde Park_--_The Filbert Merchant_.” “Ditto--_Marshall Sax’s Tent_.” “Ditto--_The Soldier’s Toilet_” (which is here reproduced), and several others. In “_The Soldier’s Toilet_” we get rather more than a peep into the domestic life of the Camp, and in the background we see St. George’s Row, and the chapel attached to the burial ground in the Bayswater Road, now rebuilt. After the scare was over, and martial law in London was abolished, the Camp was much visited; but when it had fulfilled its needs it had to come to an end, and on the 10th of August the Camp broke up, after having earned golden opinions from the Londoners.