HLI Chronicle 1914 - The Royal Highland Fusiliers

164 HIGHLAND LIGHT INFANTRY CHRONICLE.He, I am afraid, little thought that beforetwo short hours had winged, their flight hewas to appear before his Maker.The Regimenthad just commenced firing, and theColonel bawling out "Well done, my braveHighlanders! " when he was mortally woundedby a musket ball, and soon after expired,lamented by very few in the Regiment.K. On the 4th of July, 1813, we tookpossession of the higher Pyrenees, and eneampedupon Puerto Maya (or Pass). Tostate the partic ular services of the soldierfrom the 4th of July till the 13th of Decemberwould fill a volume, and I am unable for thetask. I shall, however, state a few anecdotes,which will serve to fill up the blank and amusethe reader. Suffice it to say that our wholetime was occupied in eonstructing works ofdefence and in fighting. On the !i5th of July,after morning parade, we were ordered tocook our scanty morsel of coarse beef. Thecooks went to work with alacrity, and in ashort time dinner was in a forward state;but, alas! our dinners were destined to feedthe eagle and the vulture. At this time someof the men were cleaning their arms, somewashing, and all knew that we were to have a"brIDlh." A. Captain Archibald Armstrong,an Irishman, and a brave, hardy, home-spunsoldier, was on out-picket, and on observingthe enemy in motion immediately gave thealarm. A young officer, who had latelyjoined, and who had never seen an action,said to Oaptain Armstrong-" These arebullocks, and not men." The Captain immedidiatelyretorted-" By Jesus! my youngfellow, you will shortly find these bullocksto have bayonets on their horns!" So,true it was that in less than an hour he wasseverely wounded by one of Capt,ain A.'s"bullockil," as the French were commonlyafterwards called. We were soon in motion.Our presence in front was so necessary thatin order to save our camp kettles we wereobliged to empty them upon the ground,and, of course, to lose our allowance for twentyfourhours. We soon met the enemy, and thework of death commenced. The carnage wasdreadful. After two hours' mutual destrucfion,and being overpowered by numbers,we were compelled to retire, and fell back toa commanding eminence, where we were reinforced.We were scarcely formed when againattacked, and another severe struggle tookplace. We kept our ground till night put anend to the action, when latterly t,he firing wasconfined to skirmishing. I happened to beone of that party, and the place where aconsiderable number of us were stationedafforded no shelter. The enemy, on the contrary,had some wood and tall fern, whichafforded them tolerable shelter. In thissituation we remained for an hour. I had myregimental cap pierced, and th~ small tincanteen I carried on my pack was rendereduseless. Two Sergeants of the Companywere killed be9ide me. On examining mypack I found a ball, which had been arrestedin its course by a pair of shoes. Such is aspecimen of the first action on the Pyrenees.I escaped unhur,t. My enemy fired the ball,but Providence directed its course. Whennight closed the action, and a little before weleft our situation, my comrade said to me­" What would you think of my taking a turnamong these dead and wounded Frenchmen?I might, perhaps, get something useful."I remonstrated. and pointed out the improprietyof his leaving his ranks to go in questof plunder. At the foot of the eminence,and distant about two hundred yards fromwhere we were posted, lay a number of deadand wounded French. My comrade stoledown the declivity, and had not been awaymany minutes when we heard the report ofa musket, and just as we were forming toretire he joined us. A wounded Frenchmanhad wound~d him in the heeL He said tome-" Greed creates grief. If I had takenyour advice I would not have catched this."None of the officers knew of it. If they didhe would have been deprived of his pension'besides receiving corporal punishment. Heis still living. No two British Generals were