The downside of spending chunks of time away from home is less opportunities for wargaming (that is pretty much none apart from a bit of painting and Zoom chats) but the flip side of that is that there is plenty of time away from distractions allowing me to catch up on my reading, and I have a lot of catching up to do.
This is the remarkable tale of one William Roworth of HM 44th Foot between 1786 and 1797. ‘Not So Easy, Lads.Wearing the Red Coat 1786-1797’ is the account of the service seen by this single English infantry regiment through the eyes of one of its other ranks in his letters home. Roworth rose to the rank of Serjeant Major by the time he left the army, after serving in the disastrous Flanders campaign before embarking for the West Indies, facing the horrors of a transatlantic crossing and the disease-ridden islands so vital for Britain’s economy.
The author has used these personal letters together with a wide range of other original sources including official correspondence, private letters, army records and news archives to weave together a fascinating story of ordinary men on campaign. Roworth was a volunteer, as were many of his contemporaries, and served his regiment proudly despite the constant hardships and danger both on and especially off the battlefield. What lifts this book up above others covering the same campaigns is that we read here the perspective of ordinary soldiers, such as their fears, for themselves and their families, duty, ambition, and the sheer distance they were away from home. The author traces our subject’s service from his enlistment, home service, Flanders and the retreat through Germany, the horrors of the Atlantic crossing and the campaigns in the West Indies, ending with a look forward to the lives of those who survived.
The book contains a great many black and white illustrations together with eight pages of colour plates, most of which are photographs of the islands where the battalion served as they are today, together with uniform plates and contemporary or near contemporary paintings.
One of the most sobering things I took away from the book, despite knowing full well the effects of service in the West Indies, was that a muster return for troops on St. Lucia in November 1796 shows that well over half of the officers and men were sick in barracks or in hospital. Another return shows that between April and October 1796 almost 3,000 officers and men died of disease while as many as 4,000 to 5,000 were sick and unfit for duty at any one time. Sickness was no respecter of rank, and officers suffered the same as the men, as the data shows. Both Sir John Moore and Sir Ralph Abercrombie were struck down by fever but survived to take their places in history at a later date.
This is tremendous, candid and at times troubling account (from a 20th century perspective at least) and is a story of service and resilience that has been thoroughly researched and told well and should be read by anyone with an interest in the period, militarily as well as from a social point of view. A really enjoyable experience; the book, not service in the West Indies in the late 18th century!
From Reason to Revolution 1721-1815.
ISBN: 978-1-915113-86-3 soft covers 285 pages
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