Adventures in the Rifle Brigade Book

INTRODUCTION - THE Rifle Brigade, one of the most distinguished regiments in the British army, was formed in the early years of the nineteenth century, when England was in the midst of its long struggle with Napoleon. Known at first as the Ninety-fifth Rifles, it had the great advantage of being trained, from the beginning, by officers who were not merely enthusiastic, but thoughtful and in advance of their time and the fruits of this training were seen on many a battlefield from Corunna to the crowning glory of Waterloo. In these days, when the magazine rifle has reached so high a degree of precision as to be deadly at a range of more than a mile, it is not easy for us to realize how clumsy were the weapons with which our soldiers won their most famous victories. Until the general adoption of the rifle about sixty years ago, the fire-arm in common use was the Brown Bess, a heavy smooth-bore musket, whose effective range was scarcely two hundred yards, and which could not be depended on to hit a mark at one hundred. The rifle, frem which the gallant Ninety-fifth took its name, was not very much better. It was a, flint-lock weighing nine and a half pounds, throwing a spherical bullet four-fifths of an ounce in weight, which was placed in the centre of a greased leather patch, and ram d home with its charge of eighty-four grains of powder. It might be depended on to hit a sixfoot target at a range of three hundred yards but a marksman, to make sure of his aim, could fire no more than one shot a minute. This will explain to the young reader why cavalry played so much more important a part a hundred years ago than now. The Peninsular War furnished the stage on which the Rifles were first to display their valour, and the miliury quasities fostered in them by their first colonel, Coote Metnningham, and by Sir John Mmre, who trained them for two years at Shorncliffe. Napoleon was in the heat of his feverish ambition. He had given Portugal a choice between going to war with her old ally England, and being attacked by France. But he did not wait for an answer. He had made a secret agreement with Spain for the partition of Portugal, and despatched 30,000 men under Marshal Junot to seize Lisbon and establish garrisons through the length and brmdth of the country. This action only masked a deeper scheme for the subjugation of the entire Iberian peninsula. Charles IV, the old King of Spain, who was almost an imbecile, abdicwted his crown in favour of his heir, Prince Ferdinand. Napoleon, declaring that this act had been forced upon Charles, drew both Ferdinand and the King to Bayonne, where he induced the Prince to restore the crown to his father, who immediately surrendered it to Napoleon. Thereupon the Emperor had his brother Joseph elected King of Spain by a body of Spanish nobles. By this high-handed action Napoleon prepwed his downfall. It awoke the stubborn pride of the Spaniards for the first time Napoleon found him self confronted by a national spirit and when England made common cause with Portugal and Spain, he encountered an organized resistance which ultimately shattered his power. Sir Arthur Wellesley, dterwards Duke of Wellington, held Portugal against the most determined efforts of - Napoleons marshals, while the Spaniards harassed them by incessant guerrilla warfare. The French were driven steadily back and forced aaross the Pyrenees France was at the mercy of the conqueror when the Emperors abdication put an end to hostilities. Fourteen months later, on the field of Waterloo, Wellil gton finally crushed the man who for nearly twenty years had tyrannized over Europe. The Ninety-fifth Rifles was engaged in almost all the great battles of this long and strenuous conflict...Read More