With these considerations, I send this volume forth, trusting that the reader will bear in mind that he who wrote it was both actor and spectator in the scenes he has narrated, and feels assured that by their perusal, he will be enabled to guess at what is generally felt and experienced by the individual soldier.
In the British Legion I held a medium rank. I saw not only what its soldiers were, but caught a glance at their officers: with them my military career flickered out its last moments of existence. Its brighter fortunes, short as they were, however, gave me sufficient opportunity to value those unfortunate men—my humbler comrades, and to be convinced by their deeds, that the British soldier, with sickness, oppression, the lash, and other distresses, still possessed his old spirit, and was as fitted to reap laurels as he had been in more glorious times.
Introduction of myself to the reader—To the service—Who would not be a Soldier?—A recruit—Wilkie—Cupid’s Row-dow—The service endangered by another—Arrival at Liverpool—I am made prisoner, but not by the French—Recaptured by our sergeant—Lichfield round-house—St. Paul’s—I join my regiment, and the regiment joins us—Great numbers of rank and file burnt alive 1
I join Captain O’Hare’s company—He falls in a passion—The “fair” and “unfair” appointment—Disappointment—Things of a private nature—Tom Crawley—An example—The Hero—How to catch “flats” in “squads”—New way to tap a barrel—A Rifleman’s plan for sweeping chimneys and tap-rooms—Pipe-clay and parade—The regiment embark for Portugal 6
Arrival in Portugal—Crauford’s forced marches—Teetotalism with a vengeance—The effect of the opposite extreme—Spanish mode of keeping a man from stealing wine—False reports—Talavera—We arrive the day after the fight—A battle scene—Sir Arthur Wellesley—General Cuesta—Dough Boy Hill—The fever—I am taken ill—Elvas hospital—How to cure a fever—Convalescence—Burial scenes—Our Sextons—March to my regiment—The Germans—Pig-skins in danger, our own also—Captain Pakenham—Hanging matters—Two dozen of each—Not sham pain—German discipline 19
Old Trowsers—Sleeping and waking—O’Hare again—Colonel Beckwith—Two upon one—Meagher—Barba del Puerco—General Crauford taken by surprise—The Portuguese incorporation with the light division—Rodrigo—Gallegos—The Beacon night scenes on picquet—Lord Wellington—Napoleon’s Marriage—Crauford’s stratagem—The French spy—We retreat to Fort Conception 28