Company Of Spears

Another gun fired, and a horse from F Troop bolted the ends of the line – towards the guns rather than away. Hervey groaned as he saw the wretched dragoon lying back almost flat in the saddle, reins at full length, while the trooper charged through the Chestnuts’ limbers. Thank God they had been dismounted at the Duke of York’s funeral! He could never have been confident of their steadiness otherwise. It was no surprise that Strickland had been so determined to return to Hounslow that night of the smash, to be ready for first parade. Foot drill was a not altogether alien practice for cavalry but it required very strict attention, especially when mustered with the Foot Guards under the eye of so many senior officers – the Duke of Wellington included. To dismount a regiment of cavalry had been an extraordinary rebuke to the nation, however. Everyone said so. The duke had been at the Horse Guards a month, now, insistent on withdrawing the troops from Portugal as soon as may be, for the dispatch of a mere five thousand men to Lisbon was these days a heavy drain on the disposable force of the country. Indeed it had been the cause of delay in the Duke of York’s funeral arrangements: there had simply not been enough soldiers to bury a field marshal. Hervey could still barely credit it, for Waterloo had been but a dozen years before!

Strickland had not been the only casualty of the Duke of York’s funeral. Hervey had been taken aback by the severity of the cold that night; the ceremonies were greatly delayed on the day itself, and the service had not finally got underway in St George’s chapel until evening, by which time several dragoons had succumbed. They at least had been revived by the guardhouse braziers; several of the mourners, it was held, did not survive the week. The Duke of Wellington (so Lord John Howard, Hervey’s ‘friend at court’, said) had been indisposed by the freezing air, and had not been able to attend the Horse Guards until two days following, so that there had been much industry in those first weeks, for the duke insisted always on the work of the day being done in the day. The accumulated work of several months could not be so quickly disposed of, however; not least the promotion lists which mounted by the day on the Military Secretary’s desk. Hervey shook his head. It was the very devil of a business, for his stock stood never so low. The affair in Portugal had seen to that. And he needed his stock to be high, for he had lately applied for his majority. It was ironic that for so many years, when he had not had the means to purchase, the business of promotion had been merely actuarial, to be transacted between the regimental agents without reference to any other, and that now he had the money, the Horse Guards was scrutinizing every transaction. All because of the scandal over the Duke of York’s mistress selling commissions. In truth, he assured himself, the scrutiny was but a formality, and he need not worry. What he ought to be addressing his thoughts to was the business of the lieutenant-colonelcy. There were always more buyers than sellers, in the cavalry especially, and the price would no doubt be hiked up improbably, beyond reach of but a few of the very richest peers. Except that if there truly were an Augean stream now flowing through the Horse Guards, it might be possible once more to have the lieutenant-colonelcy at regulation price. And since he was senior officer on full-pay duty … Though where he might find even the regulation price – £6,175 – was quite beyond him.

‘Hervey?’

He woke from his troubled contemplation to see the Chestnut Troop’s captain saluting. ‘Dalbiac, you are finished?’

‘There is one round left per gun. I would have them limber up and come into action again on that ridge yonder. Shall you charge?’

It was the usual way, and it would go hard with the dragoons if he said ‘no’, especially with the Chestnuts galloping half a mile to the ridge, but he was determined to work the regiment by degrees rather than give every trooper his head and then count the fallers. ‘We shall not charge; we shall advance deliberately, with skirmishers out. Thank you for your support. How are your injured gunners?’

Captain Dalbiac frowned. ‘The number seven’s not long for this world, and the ventsman will likely lose his thumb.’

‘Then I am sorry for them both.’

‘The number seven occasioned his own misfortune, and if the ventsman hadn’t burned his thumb to the bone there’d be the devil to pay!’

Hervey nodded. Fireworking was a hazardous affair, and it could only be done with the most faithful of drill. If the ventsman had not burned his thumb to the bone it would have proved he had not held it to the vent diligently. ‘Very well. Perhaps you will let us occupy the ridge first and then join us for a final discharge?’

Captain Dalbiac saluted, reined about and cantered back to his guns.