The Waterloo Roll Call
March, 1839.
------------------
95TH RIFLES.
(_2nd Battalion._)
Robt. Trafford.
Appointed quartermaster to above batt. 2nd June, 1837.
------------------
95TH RIFLES.
(_3rd Battalion._)
Dugald Macfarlane.
Appointed 1st lieut. 18th July, 1815. H. p. Feb., 1816.
RESERVE FORCES.
54TH REGIMENT OF FOOT.
James Willox.
Appointed quartermaster to above regt. 27th Sept., 1827. H. p. 1846. D.
June, 1864.
------------------
91ST REGIMENT OF FOOT.
Sergeant-Major Andrew Maclean.
Appointed quartermaster to above regt, 8th Aug., 1823. D., at Boulogne
in 1869.
PART IV.
A FEW WATERLOO HEROES.
1ST LIFE GUARDS.
Field-Trumpeter J. Edwards.
Sounded the bugle for the decisive charge of the 1st Life Guards at
Waterloo. Was 32 years in the regt., and received a pension in June,
1841 His medal and bugle are still preserved in the regiment.
------------------
2ND LIFE GUARDS.
[1] Corp. John Shaw, k.
[2] Private Samuel Godley.
[3] ” Johnson.
” Dakin.
” Hodgson.
Footnote 1:
The well-known pugilist and “fancy man” of this regt. His prowess when
charging with the Life Guards at Waterloo was exemplified by the
number of cuirassiers he slew. The little that is known of his early
life, and the account of his death at Waterloo, are given in his
biography by Lt.-Col. Knollys, who, out of very scanty material, has
compiled a very interesting little book. Shaw was born at Woolaston,
co. Notts, in 1789, and enlisted 15th Oct., 1807.
Footnote 2:
Known in the regt. as “Marquis of Granby,” from the fact of his having
a bald head. Had his horse shot under him in one of the charges at
Waterloo, and was thrown. As he got up, minus his helmet, which had
fallen off, a cuirassier rode at him and attempted to cut him down.
Godley managed to kill his assailant, and mounting the Frenchman’s
horse, rode back to his regt. who welcomed him with shouts of “Well
done, Marquis of Granby!” Discharged in 1824. D. in 1831. M.I. St.
John’s Wood Cemetery.
Footnote 3:
Immediately after the first charge of his regt. at Waterloo, when the
French cavalry were being pursued by ours, Johnson pursued three
cuirassiers who, with a view of escaping, turned down a narrow lane.
“There proved to be no thoroughfare at the end of the road, when
Johnson, though alone, attacked the three, and, after a slight
resistance, they surrendered themselves prisoners.”
------------------
1ST DRAGOON GUARDS.
[1] Troop Sergt.-Maj. Thos.
Nicholson, W.
[2] Sergt. John Hodgkins.
Footnote 1:
Received a sabre wound through his body when charging at Waterloo.
After being discharged he resided at York, and kept the “Light
Horseman” Inn, Fulford Road. D. there, 28th Sept., 1850, aged 66.
Footnote 2:
Served at Salamanca in a dragoon regt. Aftds. exchanged to 1st D.G. as
sergt., and was present at Waterloo. Bought his discharge after 17
years’ service, and recd. a pens. of 6_d._ a day for two years! He was
a native of Tipperary, but spent the latter part of his life at
Penrith, where he was a well-known figure, being “29 stone in weight,
6 feet 2 inches in height, and 2 feet 4 inches across the shoulders.”
D., at Penrith, in 1867, aged 80.
------------------
2ND DRAGOONS.
[1] Troop Sergt.-Maj. Wm.
Robertson.
[2] Sergt. John Weir, K.
[3] Private Thos. Stobo.
Footnote 1:
A native of Renfrewshire. Aftds. sergt.-major of the Rl. Fifeshire
Yeomanry. Was in every charge made by his regt. at Waterloo. D., at
Kirkcaldy, in Dec., 1825.
Footnote 2:
“Sergeant Weir of the Scots Greys was pay-sergt. of his troop, and as
such might have been excused serving in action, and perhaps he should
not have been forward; but, on such a day as Waterloo, he requested to
be allowed to charge with the regt. In one of the charges he fell
mortally wounded, and was left on the field. Corporal Scott of the
same regt. (who lost a leg) asserts that when the field was searched
for the wounded and slain, the body of Sergt. Weir was found with his
name written on his forehead by his own hand, dipped in his own blood.
This, his comrade said, he was supposed to have done that his body
might be found and known, and that it might not be imagined he had
disappeared with the money of the troop. John Weir joined the Greys
about 1798, and was a native of Mauchline, Ayrshire.”—Copied from a
MS. in possession of the regt., and communicated by Capt. G. Tancred.
Footnote 3:
The oldest soldier in the Greys at Waterloo. Served at Dunkirk under
the Duke of York. D. 1852. His brother was aftds. a capt. in the same
regt.
------------------
6TH DRAGOONS.
Troop Sergt.-Maj. Wm.
Seney.
” ” John
Laws.
[1] ” ” Matthew
Marshall, W.
Sergt. Hugh MʻMahon.
” Johnston Marlow.
Private Wm. Penfold.
” Robert Potters.
[2] ” Jeremiah Brown.
Footnote 1:
“The Enniskilleners charged in line when Marshall’s squadron dashed
into the thickest of the enemy’s phalanx, and were cut off from the
other troops of the regt. Marshall, while sabreing a cuirassier on his
right, had his bridle-arm broken by a stroke from his enemy on his
left, and had not proceeded much further when he was beset by another
crowd of French cavalry and hurled from his horse by a lance which
penetrated his side. While he was falling he received a heavy blow
across the body, and another which broke his right thigh. He lay
unconscious except when goaded into sensibility by the hoofs of the
enemy’s horses passing over his mangled body. The ground afterwards
becoming somewhat clear he espied a horse without any rider, towards
which he crawled, and was about to mount, when a French trooper
galloping up cut him down in the midst of his hopes, inflicting
several severe wounds on his body. This part of the field being again
occupied by the French, a French artilleryman made Marshall’s body a
resting-place for his foot while he rammed his gun. For two days and
three nights Marshall remained on the field with 19 lance and sabre
wounds. On the regt. returning home he was discharged with 2s. per
day. Resided at Belfast, where he was much respected. D. there, 28th
Sept., 1825.”—_Scots’ Magazine._
Footnote 2:
Born at Enniskillen 14th March, 1792. Fought at Waterloo and in the
Kaffir, Sepoy, and Maori wars. Living at Melbourne, Australia, in
1891.
------------------
7TH HUSSARS.
Sergt.-Maj. Edward Cotton.
Had his horse killed under him at Waterloo. After being discharged from
the regt. he took up his abode at Waterloo, and became a guide to the
battlefield. Being a clever and well-educated man, he was able to
compile a very interesting little book called _A Voice from Waterloo_,
which held its own among the many accounts of the great battle. Besides
this he formed a Waterloo Museum, which has always been a great
attraction to visitors. In 1875, when the Editor was at Waterloo, the
Museum was kept by a niece of the late sergt.-maj., who d. 1st July,
1849, and was bd. in the orchard of Hougomont, by the side of Capt.
Blackwood, who fell in the battle.
------------------
16TH LIGHT DRAGOONS.
Sergt.-Maj. Baxter, K.
A Pa. hero, mentioned in the records of this regt.
------------------
18TH HUSSARS.
Sergt. John Taylor.
Belonged to Capt. Ellis’s troop. In the charge at Waterloo he made a cut
at the head of one of the French cuirassiers, which had no other effect
on the Frenchman than to induce him to cry out, in derision, “Ha! ha!”
and to return a severe blow at the sergt., which was admirably parried,
and then Taylor thrust his sabre into the mouth of the cuirassier, who
immediately fell, and the conqueror cried, “Ha! ha!”
------------------
COLDSTREAM GUARDS.
Sergt. John Graham, Light Company, 2nd Batt.
Distinguished himself in the defence of Hougomont, and by his great
personal strength was of great assistance in helping to close the
courtyard gate against the French. “At a later period of the day, when
in the ranks along the garden wall facing the wood, and when the
struggle was most severe in that quarter, he asked Lt.-Col. Macdonell’s
permission to fall out. The colonel, knowing the character of the man,
expressed his surprise at the request made at such a moment. Graham
explained that his brother lay wounded in one of the buildings then on
fire; that he wished to remove him to a place of safety, and that he
would then lose no time in rejoining the ranks. The request was granted;
Graham succeeded in snatching his brother from the terrible fate which
menaced him, laid him in a ditch in rear of the enclosure, and true to
his word, was again at his post.”—Col. Mackinnon’s _History of the
Coldstreams_. Was selected in August, 1815, for the pension granted by
the Rev. — Norcross, Rector of Framlingham, “to the most deserving
soldier at Waterloo.” D., at Kilmainham, 23rd April, 1843. He was a
native of Cloona, co. Monaghan.
------------------
3RD FOOT GUARDS.
[1] Sergt.-Maj. Ralph Fraser.
[2] ” Brice MʻGregor.
Footnote 1:
Aided in closing the gate at Hougomont. Served in Egypt in 1801. “In
the landing at Aboukir Bay, on 8th March, the boat in which Corporal
Fraser was, containing sixty persons, were all destroyed by the
enemy’s fire excepting fifteen.” Served in Hanover, at Copenhagen, and
in the Pa., and was twice badly wounded. Discharged in Dec., 1818.
Aftds. a bedesman in Westminster Abbey. Living in 1861.
Footnote 2:
A native of Argyllshire. Enlisted at Glasgow in 1799. Aided in barring
the door at Hougomont, and being very strong, was of much service in
the gallant defence of that farmhouse. Shot a cuirassier dead who
attacked him, and rode into the courtyard on the Frenchman’s horse.
Discharged in 1821 with a handsome pension. Appointed one of the
Yeomen of the Guard. D. 27th Nov., 1816.
------------------