Rifles - Mark Urban [152]
All the same, campaigns were best endured by putting a best foot forward and some compensations were soon discovered. Many did not expect the fighting to last long. The 1st Battalion of Rifles would be brigaded under General Kempt, who was known and respected from the Peninsula, as was Picton, their divisional commander. Picton was remembered by some for his feud with Craufurd and his occasional signs of ill grace towards the Light Division. In this new campaign, however, this evidently did not prevent him appreciating the 95th’s military qualities.
Food was very cheap, the messes being able to fry up a pound or two of bacon every morning. Drink, likewise, did not strain the pocket, with many soldiers indulging rather too freely, reminding their officers of their duty to limit the consumption of alcohol.
‘As the middle of June approached’, wrote Kincaid, who had scurried across to Belgium from a shooting party in Scotland, ‘we all began to get a little more on the qui vive, for we were all aware that Napoleon was about to make a dash at some particular point.’ Orders were duly received in Brussels late at night on 15 June to muster the men in the Place Royale at 11.30 p.m. Such were the pleasures of the Belgian metropolis that ‘in consequence of the difficulty of assembling the division, it did not march until near four o’clock this morning’. Lieutenant Gairdner was left behind to round up the 95th’s stragglers and this party got under way at 8 a.m. on 16 June.
Kempt’s brigade was marched down towards Charleroi, south of the forest of Soignes, where there were alarms that the French were present in great numbers. Wellington, ‘humbugged’ by Napoleon’s marches, had been obliged to throw together a disparate body of men to reinforce his Dutch-Belgian allies near an important road junction called Quatre Bras.
At about 2 p. m., the 95th, having marched a hot summer’s day, paused just north of the crossroads and began cooking up a meal. As they sat there, the riflemen watched the Black Legion, the Germans under the Duke of Brunswick, march by. Wellington soon appeared and directed the Rifles to move to the south-east of Quatre Bras to occupy a position in some trees on the left flank of his army, maintaining the line of communication to the Prussians who were heavily engaged that day at Ligny. As was often the case in the Peninsula, Wellington gave orders to the commanding officer of the Rifles in person, saying, ‘Barnard, these fellows are coming on; you must stop them by throwing yourselves into that wood.’
The 95th marched a little south-east on the Namur road and then turned right, or south, into the fields. Four companies were ordered by Barnard to attack some French light troops to their front. The companies extended among rows of billowing corn, which came up so high they could hardly see over it. Simmons, with the 10th Company, fell under that tough old duellist Jonathan Layton, for the titular commander, Charlie Beckwith, had quickly removed himself to a staff position, just as he had in the Peninsula.
Layton and Simmons directed their men down to a formidable-looking hedgerow not far in front of the French. Some enemy cannon had begun playing on the Allied lines and one of the old riflemen quipped, ‘Ah! My boys, you are opening the ball in good style!’ Simmons worked his way through the thorny hedge, dropping onto lower ground on the other side and instantly coming under French fire. With the crackle of musketry intensifying, he wondered why his men were holding back. Simmons went back through the thorns and found Sergeant Daniel Underwood, a veteran like himself of O’Hare’s old Peninsular 3rd Company. Why was he holding back? Underwood made out it was because of the thorns. ‘Why man! You are like a fine lady!’ Simmons taunted him. Still he did not go forward. ‘I rushed forward and struck him in the centre of the knapsack with my