Scotland Forever! by Iain Gale

Author:Iain Gale
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Birlinn

Corporal John Dickson of Captain Vernor’s F Troop had been awakened about five o’clock by his comrade John McGee, who had sprung up, shouting, ‘Damn your eyes, boys, there’s the bugle!’

Dickson had told him to shut up. ‘You’re hearing things, man. It’s the horses’ chains clanking, Jock.’ But McGee was having none of it, ‘Clankin’ chains? What’s that, then?’

Dickson had sat up, listened again to the noise, and in it caught the clear shrill note of a reveille call.

‘Damn you, Jock, you’re right.’

The troop were on their feet in a few minutes and set about finding breakfast. ‘Stirabout’ again, a gloopy mix of oatmeal and anything else you could find boiled up in water. Filthy stuff, thought Dickson, but better than nothing.

He was just finishing his portion when Sergeant Ewart found him and drew him out on picket duty. Ewart, twenty years his senior, pointed to the slope and the enemy beyond. ‘Over there, lad, and report what you see when you’ve done.’

Dickson nodded and, finding his horse, mounted and walked her up the slope, some 200 yards to their front. On cresting the hill, he found himself on a road and reined in. It was daylight now, and the sun was every now and again sending bright flashes of light through the broken clouds. But across the valley a low mist lingered, obscuring the enemy.

Directly below him, a regiment of green-coated King’s German Legion riflemen was marching through the ripening green corn to the support of their comrades, who had occupied a walled farmhouse to the right of the high road and just in advance of the lines.

There was a beat of drum and then, past Dickson, marching with a swinging, confident step, came a regiment of Dutch infantry, followed by another, and then one of Belgians and two more. They turned off at the crossroads between high banks on to the plateau and to his left began to deploy on the slope. There must have been at least 3,000 of them, he thought, colours waving high and looking fine, in their blue coats with orange-and-red facings.

Gazing at the Netherlanders, Dickson noticed close behind them a party of the 92nd, Gordon Highlanders under the command of a man he recognised, a Captain Ferrier, from Belsyde, in Linlithgow. Urging his horse forward he rode to join them. He wished them all a good morning and enquired as to their state.

One of their corporals answered. They were Picton’s men, brigaded with the 42nd, the Royals and the Cameron Highlanders in the old Fighting Division from the Peninsula.

All Scots together, thought Dickson. That was good. He wondered if they had suffered as badly as the Black Watch on the 16th.

The Corporal shook his head. Bad wasn’t the word for it, he told him. There hadn’t been a regiment that was there in Picton’s command that hadn’t lost a third of its men.

Dickson thought he must be exaggerating, but shook his head in sympathy.

The man went on. They had done worse than the Black Watch.

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