Plate Four of Hogarth's Harlot's Progress
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I am delighted and very flattered to be able to say Georgian London was voted 'History Website of 2009' by the online readers of History Today Magazine, and also won the 2009 Cliopatria Award for 'Best Individual Blog' and 'Best New Blog'.
'Fun and engaging posts covering day to day trivia and the more bizarre aspects of eighteenth-century London life. One of the best history blogs out there.' The Digital Scholar
'From London's 18th century rookeries, to being a dwarf in 18th century England, to Jeremy Bentham and the birth of a surveillance society, to what it was like to have gout, to bizarre birth stories from Gentleman's Magazine, Georgian London informs, instructs, and entertains us on ordinary life in 18th century London, emphasizing especially the artisan and immigrant populations of the city. This is fascinating social history presented in blog form, and is a terrific younger entrant into the burgeoning history blog scene.' History News Network
'The focus is, as the title suggests, all eighteenth-century London all the time...and the more you know, the more wonderful it gets, at once more real and more fantastic.' Erin O'Connor, Critical Mass
Welcome to Georgian London. My particular interests are the immigrant population and the artisan communities of London during the 18th century, as well as day to day trivia and the more bizarre aspects of London life three centuries ago.
I maintain large databases: of images from 1600 to 1900 that relate to the fabric of London during the 18thC, of notable immigrants, and a database of artisans and their works which can be searched by name, location, date, work, or trade associations.
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Celebrity London
Plate Three of Hogarth's Harlot's Progress
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Alimony and Acting: The Life of Nosegay Fan
Frances Barton was born around 1737 (although some say as early as 1731) near Vinegar Yard off the Strand, where her father had a shoe stall. Her mother died when she was young and her father did not remarry. Fanny had the good luck to be a very beautiful little girl, and her father and brother (who ran a pub in Stanway Yard later in life) sent her out to sell nosegays. Her cheeky spirit and quick ear soon meant she was singing to the customers and reciting bits and pieces she had heard on the streets of Covent Garden. The actors and actresses thought she was hilarious and used to put her up on a table and get her to sing or act for them and give her a few pence in return. A shrewd girl, she began to learn passages from the famous poets and bring them forth to great amusement, and no doubt a few more pennies.
Fanny then took work with a French milliner in Cockspur Street. She must have had an ability with languages, as she apparently emerged from this employment speaking fluent French. Her stay in Cockspur Street also introduced her to fashion, something that would serve her well for the rest of her life. For a while, she had a friend whose boyfriend was an actor, and spent a lot of time in the theatres.
This period of Fanny's life is hazy. Some scholars have her down as a child prostitute at this stage. I can see why they would draw this conclusion (especially with the later associations with Reynolds), but in the early 1750s Fanny was aged somewhere between 13 and 20. The age of consent at the time was 12. She seems to have continued in employment from the milliner to service as a kitchen maid in the North household, earning money on the side as a 'ballad-singer'. Perhaps she also took money for sex. Who knows? I am in no way condoning teenage prostitution but as far as I can see Frances Barton was acting under no authority but her own and the tendency to brand attractive, assertive women as whores isn't exactly a concept limited to the Georgian period. I would argue for the opposite being true. I would argue that Fanny seems to have abandoned street and theatre working as she entered sexual maturity, for respectable work in a shop and household, in order to avoid becoming a prostitute. There may have been an incident that told her it was time to find more secure work, or maybe she was smart enough to work it out for herself.
By 1755 though, Fanny is on the stage. She is a comic actress, a new kind of entertainer. She dons outlandish outfits, breeches and sometimes fantasy costume. Fanny is a hit. Suddenly earning the heady sum of 30 shillings a week, she invested in education; learning languages, literature and music. Then she married James Abington, trumpeter and music master. Big mistake. They went to Ireland. Dublin only had two theatres at the time, and it appears Mrs Abington was queen of both of them. Mr Abington got jealous, and finally they had to part, but not before Fanny had agreed to give him a pension for the rest of his life, and based upon her success. Oh yes.
Fanny went on to become the mistress of Mr Francis Needham, an MP who furthered her hard-won education and happily showed her off in society. In 1765, they came to England, and Needham died at Bath, with his mistress in attendance. She quickly returned to the stage, where she was even more popular than before.
Once again, there are assertions that Fanny was living as a courtesan. There are no clear attachments extant, but she was soon acting as a trendsetter and arbiter of taste, as a single woman. By 1764, she was posing for Joshua Reynolds. He depicted her as an actress, not a whore, unlike Kitty Fisher and Nelly O'Brien. In 1781, she had a costume allowance from the Covent Garden Theatre for five hundred pounds a year. If Mrs Abington was also selling sex, it was because she wanted to, not because she needed the money.
Fanny took a house in Pall Mall and set about surrounding herself with the thinkers and wits of the day. Horace Walpole, notorious bitch, thought she was great as did Samuel Johnson. She had an ongoing feud/mutual admiration society with David Garrick, who quite rightly regarded her as both a prima donna and businesswoman (he signed his letters to her 'Yours very truly, when you are not unruly'). A mark of her popularity was the sell-out of her benefits. Benefits were the night when one of the actors got most of the takings at the door, and her nights were always 'full to the rails'. James Boswell once upbraided Johnson for braving the crush to attend Fanny's benefit, and Johnson turned on him with, 'When the public cares one thousandth part for you that it does for her, I shall go to your benefit too.'
Frances Abington continued to live in a fashionable and very popular way long after she had given up the stage. She died in her home in Pall Mall in 1815, an old and very successful lady. Brava!
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'A tear in each note and a sigh in each breath': The Castrati
Castration has been used as a punishment, for religious purposes, and also for musical purposes. By the 18thC, men were castrated only as a punishment for sodomy (and not in England), or to keep their voices high and sweet (and only in Italy). Italian castrati were popular throughout Europe for the extraordinary quality of their voices, usually ranging from soprano to contralto but able to sing very high notes without the forced quality of falsetto.
Music was very highly valued and anticipated in the 18thC, and almost every person receiving a rounded education was taught to appreciate music on a level not as common today. Musical artists were superstars and their arrival in London was keenly anticipated. The most famous of all the artists were the castrati, who were usually Italian born. If their voices proved exceptionally sweet as young boys, they were given the option (I hope they were given the option) of retaining their voice at the expense of their testicles. The operation was deemed most successful after the age of eight, but before puberty, and was carefully timed so as to allow the boy to develop some male characteristics, but to beat the voice change. The centre for castration was apparently Naples, but this may little more than an old wives tale, and certainly Charles Burney, who roamed Naples in an attempt to find a surgeon who carried out the operation, was disappointed. It is estimated that during the 18thC, three to four thousand boys were castrated every year in Italy, for the purpose of pursuing a musical career.
If you are still attached to your scrotum, in every sense, feel free to skip this paragraph. Imagine a pair of lobster crackers, with blades instead of grips; that's pretty much was a castratori looked like. A quick incision would be made around the scrotum with a lancet to allow for some loose skin to close the wound, then the castratori would be applied to a no doubt drugged little boy and clamped down for a period of up to five minutes. When it was decided that the bleeding had stopped and there was no risk of haemorrhage, the castratori and the testicles were removed together, and the remaining skin stitched back together. There are no statistics on how many of the boys survived this operation, but I think the vast majority must have done, no matter how awful it sounds.
Growing up as a castrato couldn't have been much fun. They grew tall, with long ribs, arms and legs, making them an unusual, gangly barrel-shape. Even if their voice didn't break, there was no guarantee that it could be trained into a world-class opera 'voice' and most ended up singing in cathedral choirs. They were prone to weight gain, and had chubby, androgynous faces. Their hair was thick and fine, as early castration prevents male-pattern baldness (the thing that works, but no one wants the cure) and they rarely wore wigs. No facial hair, and little body hair spoiled the picture of smooth childhood grown to adult size. Much is made of the ladies of the 18thC going wild for castrati, but whilst they may have been charming and talented company, their penis remained child-sized and their sex drive was low.
The greatest castrati appeared in London in the 1720s and 30s, when Handel was at the peak of his influence. The comparatively few numbers of properly trained female singers meant that castrati were in demand for the female roles. I find the idea of a portly castrato playing a lead female part ridiculous. This does not make me right, and the cognoscenti of the opera world went wild for the likes of Senesino and Farinelli.
Senesino in particular was very popular in England as an artist, Farinelli more so as a heart-throb. Senesino originated from Siena but loved the life of an English gentleman and made friends with the top artisans and designers of the day, such as William Kent and Paul de Lamerie. He had waited until thirteen for castration, and was more facially and physically developed than many castrati, so often played the older parts. Farinelli once played the young lead to Senesino's despot and there is a famous incident recounted by Charles Burney where Senesino became overwhelmed by Farinelli's singing, forgot his part entirely and embraced his young prisoner. Velluti is thought to be the last of the great castrati to perform in London, in 1829, although Pergetti came after in 1844. Both struggled with poor critical reception in England, largely due to changes in attitude amongst the audience.
The later life of a successful castrato was a solitary in 18thC terms, where family and extended family all relied heavily upon each other: they had no children but a great deal of money, so were often surrounded by hangers-on and toadys. Prone to diva tendencies, they hadn't made life easy for their friends and many came to lonely ends. Very few people suffer for their art in the 21stC. They might equate brief poverty, or a squalid drug addiction as part of their artistic learning curve, but very few would be prepared to live with the consequences of such a life-changing surgery. Thankfully, by 1800, the craze for castrati had all but died out, although the last castrato Alessandro Moreschi, was not to die until 1922. His voice was recorded in 1902 and can be heard here. Castration for musical purposes was made illegal in 1870.
In recent years, an astonishing phenomenon in the form of Michael Maniaci has appeared on the opera scene. His larynx developed only very slightly during puberty, and he retains an extraordinary soprano voice as an adult male. He has been called 'the modern castrato'. You can witness part of one of his performances here. I find it astonishing and rather unsettling.
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Making philosophy less mischievous: Isaac Newton on his official birthday-
If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.
Isaac Newton was born in Lincolnshire, more than ten weeks prematurely in the winter of 1642/3. His father died before he was born, but the family were not without money, and Isaac and his mother pottered on alone until she remarried a rector when he was three. Isaac, understandably, loathed his step-father. Less understandably, he later recorded that he had threatened to burn both his mother and step-father alive in an outburst of temper. His mother went on to have more children, but remained devoted to her eldest son. After attending local schools, Isaac went off to board with an apothecary in Grantham and attend King's School, under the tuition of Mr Henry Stokes. Isaac was in the 'lowermost form' until an incident he would later recount to John Conduitt: one day on the way to school, a boy gave him 'a kick in the belly which put him to great pain'. Isaac challenged the boy to meet him in the churchyard after school, where they fought and Isaac apparently won. After that, the spark of competition was lit and he was determined to beat the boy in studies, which he soon achieved. He learned to draw, and filled the walls of his room above the apothecary's shop with sketches of ships he had designed, as well as animals and fantastic beasts. Mr Clarke the apothecary must have been fond of Isaac, or recognized his potential, as none of this, including Isaac's wild outbursts of temper stopped him teaching the boy about the 'Chymical' properties of the things on the shelves. The Clarkes let Isaac create a workshop on their property and in return, he built them an accurate sundial in their backyard, based upon pegs he drove into a brick wall, so they could see it from the house. He also constructed a water-clock for inside the house, which he adjusted in the mornings before he went to school. He made kites, models, toys and 'knick-knacks' and spent much time experimenting with liquids, until his mother took him home to have him trained up as a farmer. To say that Isaac had absolutely no interest in the life of a country gentleman would be an understatement. He liked mill-wheels and weirs, and windmills, but that was about it. Henry Stokes came to hear of his talented pupil's dilemma, and contacted Isaac's mother to suggest the completion of his education.
At Trinity, young Isaac was finally among people who wanted to learn, to think. Although shy and stubborn, he still managed to make friends with John Wickins, who became his firm friend, room-mate and assistant for the next 20 years. Cambridge traditionally relied upon Aristotle but Isaac quickly disregarded him, and the curriculum in general, in favour of Descartes and Copernicus amongst others. He also continued to study theology and was extremely interested in dissecting ancient texts on Christianity and Judaism (he left a larger bulk of work on this than on science). Aged 22, Isaac 'discovered' binomial theory and began work on what would become infinitesimal calculus. Cambridge closed shortly afterwards due to the Plague and Newton went home to Woolsthorpe for the next two years, where an apple fell on his head and he had some incidental thoughts on optics which he tested on his own eyes and nearly blinded himself. Although many have observed Newton was unremarkable as a Cambridge scholar, he returned there as a Fellow in 1667, and in 1669 constructed the first functioning reflecting telescope, and was elected Lucasian Professor of Mathematics, aged 26.
By this time, the other fellows were discussing his work and it was being circulated amongst the great thinkers of England. Newton appears to have held off publishing his more fundamental theorems, which went against him in later life, as others such as Leibniz were working along the same lines and published earlier. It has been said that he feared ridicule for his near-revolutionary thinking. By 1671, Isaac had been persuaded to demonstrate the telescope for the Royal Society. It caused an uproar of approval, and he was elected a Fellow soon afterwards, but Robert Hooke, Curator of Experiments, was critical, and he and Newton became involved in a bitter row that would continue until Hooke's death in 1703. Isaac vowed to publish nothing more, but continued to work in secret on his own alchemical experiments, installing a furnace in his and Wickens's rooms, along with elaborate apparatus. In 1675, Isaac came to London to petition the King for a release from taking Holy Orders (it was necessary to be ordained within 7 years of being made M.A. to remain as a Fellow). Charles IInd consented, and Newton was made exempt. At this time, Isaac also began an intensive study of the textual history of the Bible.
In 1683, Wickens had finally had enough, and wanted to marry. Isaac found another amanuensis, but things wouldn't be the same. In 1687, Newton finally published the first book of his Principia. Although few but the greatest European minds understood it, it propelled Newton into popular thinking as a celebrity genius. His lectures, which has previously been poorly attended, became full (although how good a speaker he was is in doubt) and he became a figure of adoration for bright young things.
Around 1693, Isaac had a breakdown. Always eccentric, he stopped sleeping and turned against his friends, saying they were trying to embroil him 'with woemen'. It is likely it was little more than the suggestion Isaac would benefit from a little feminine company. He began a series of epic fallouts with the great thinkers of the day, mainly due to his erratic sense of morality regarding other scientist's unpublished works. By 1696, he had recovered and was appointed Warden of the Royal Mint, which necessitated a move to London. He took his job very seriously, much to the annoyance of those already there, who had carved out lucrative little niches for themselves. More enemies. Some time before 1700, his half-sister's teenage daughter Catherine came to live with him.
In 1703 Hooke died and Isaac succeeded him as President of the Royal Society and would hold the position until his death. In 1704 he published Opticks, his second masterwork, on the properties of light, and was knighted the following year. By this time, Isaac was getting older, and less prone to the huge tantrums that marked his earlier life. He had severed his ties with alchemical experimentation upon his move to London, but his excessive use of mercury may well have exacerbated his temperament.
He continued to write, think and speak, and in 1710 he and Catherine moved from Jermyn Street to 35 St Martin's Street in Soho. Although still shy and moody, he was seen out and about at the coffeehouses. He revised his earlier works obsessively, and tried to sort out the controversy surrounding his and Leibniz's calculus discoveries. The young Huguenot J.T. Desaguliers became Isaac's assistant and Demonstrator at the Royal Society, but by this stage, Isaac regarded demonstrations as necessary only for 'vulgar' minds. His later years were marked by misfortune (the South Sea Bubble cost him tens of thousands of pounds) and decline (due to kidney stones), although his mind remained as sharp as ever. He presided over his last Royal Society meeting in at the end of February 1727, and went home in agony. He had recorded that around 1724 he had passed two kidney stones that appeared broken, but together would have been the size of a pea. The type of agony this would have caused is almost unknown in the Western world in the 21stC. Passing a kidney stone the size of a grain of rice rates about 8 or 9/10 on the pain scale, with 10 being full body trauma like a massive car accident. Anyone who has passed a gallstone, which rates about a 7, will understand. Kidney and bladder stones cause other infections inside the body, and Newton became prone to debilitating 'voiding' which left him much weakened. Despite the attentions of famous 'stone doctor' Cheselden, the next bout of stones would kill him at the end of March 1727. He died after refusing the last rites, declaring that he did not need them.
Isaac Newton's titanic intellect left little room for the man he was; consumed by the need to discover, he lost much of his humanity. He died without issue and some assert he was a virgin, but I hope this isn't true. After his death his family were marked out only by their intellectual mediocrity, highlighting again Isaac's incredible individuality. Newton's own words at the beginning of this post lead people to mark him as a modest man but his actions speak of an obsessive, selfish and driven. He did not tolerate anyone who stood in his way, yet there is a glamour to his over-riding curiosity and his astonishing mind. In many ways, Isaac Newton never stopped being the small boy who made kites and drew on his bedroom walls, no matter how exalted his later stage became:
I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem only to have been a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay undiscovered all before me.
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A goodly, portly man: Daniel Lambert
Everybody has one too many mince pies over Christmas (or at least, they should), but when you end up weighing 52 stone, it's clear things have got more than a little out of hand.
Daniel Lambert is the famous fat man of the Georgian period. Born in Leicester in 1770, Lambert's father ran the a house of correction in an extremely rough district, and after an apprenticeship elsewhere, Daniel took over his father's job aged nineteen. His teenage years had been interesting and he was a larger than life character in the parish already, having fought a bear, by accident, when it tried to kill his friend's dog, and narrowly escaping being crushed by a collapsing house whilst watching it burn. He was a great breeder of sporting dogs, and his animals were much in demand locally. Almost as soon as he took over his father's job, as a glorified warder, his weight began to increase. By 1793, only four years later, he weighed 32 stone, and paid his first visit to London, walking from Woolwich to the City with no apparent difficulty.
In 1805, Daniel was relieved of his job in Leicester in an apparent re-ordering of the system. He was granted a pension (not bad at 35), but it wasn't enough to live on. He had little choice but to exhibit himself as a freak, even though he disliked the idea. People from London who had heard of his impressive size and bulk had begun to call at the door under false pretences. One man, having heard of Lambert's love of horse-racing, called on the pretext of discussing the breeding line of a particular horse. Daniel realised he was being set up, and responded pertly that the mare 'was got by Impertinence out of Curiosity' and slammed the door.
He admitted that he must either lose weight, become a prisoner in his own home, or go out and look for work and be stared at. When presented with these options, being paid just for being fat seems something of a lesser evil. He arrived in London and took up lodgings in Piccadilly, where he was visited by a huge range of people, and advertised his sporting dogs for auction at Tattersall's. They made an enormous sum, in no small part due to Daniel's fame, and the records show he sold Peg, Punch, Brush, Bob, Bounce, Bell, Charlotte and Lucy who were all small working setters and pointers, for nigh on two hundred guineas (poor Lucy was the runt on just twelve). This amounted to almost five years of Daniel's pension.
Count Borulawski, the famous dwarf, who had retired to Durham, journeyed to visit Daniel and spent no small amount of time with him. Borulawski had made his own fortune through exhibiting himself, and apparently the two talked extensively about how Daniel should conduct his career as showman. The Count was a real character: the first time they met, Daniel enquired after the health of his wife, only to be told solemnly that she was dead. When Daniel apologized, the Count replied, 'I am not very sorry, for when I affront her, she put me on the mantle-shelf for punishment'.
People who came to view Lambert and who were rude or insulting were ignored, and if persisting, told to leave. He was apparently an able conversationist and very polite. His weight was increasing all the time, but it seems he remained fit enough in mind and body to conduct these interviews with little trouble. He was recorded as five feet eleven inches tall, and by the end of his successful six months in London, weighed fifty stone. Fifty.
Daniel lived in Leicester, travelling occasionally to exhibit himself until he visited Stamford in 1809 to view some horses. He died, presumably from heart failure in a public house, where the wall had to be taken out to remove his body. He is buried in Stamford.
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The Variegated Damsel and The Beautiful Spotted Boy
On the 12th of October 1736, on a Jesuit plantation in Cartagena, Columbia a little girl names Mary Sabina was born to the two negro slaves Patrona and Martiniano.
José Gumilla was a priest in charge of the sick on the plantation, and when Mary Sabina was about six months old, he happened to see her when she was with her mother. He discussed the child's extraordinary appearance with Patrona. Mary Sabina had piebaldism, resulting in the astonishing spotted effect visible in the two portraits of her in the gallery. Patrona put it down to the fact that she had a pet dog of black and white colouring of which she had become fond whilst pregnant. Gumilla recommended Patrona guard her baby very carefully lest some ignorant person cast the evil eye upon it.
Mary Sabina's fame rapidly spread. Piebaldism is a form of partial albinism, usually without the attendant eye problems and skin thickening, rendering piebald individuals both extraordinary to look at, and rather beautiful. Particularly fascinating, and striking in black piebald individuals are the contrasting patches of black and white hair. Mary Sabina was undoubtedly a very pretty little girl, as the two images show, but her ultimate fate is unknown. During her life she became something of a local celebrity in Cartagena, and the owners of one of the 'English factories' there sent back her portrait to London, where it now hangs in the Royal College of Surgeons Hall. She was used as an illustration for Victorian lectures on partial albinism where she was dubbed, 'Our Little Variegated Damsel'.
It was only a matter of time before some enterprising individual provided London and its insatiable love of freakery with a piebald individual of its own. In 1808, a little piebald boy was born on St Vincent in the Caribbean. George Alexander Gratton was the child of two black islanders who shared the surname of Gratton (possibly two slaves on the plantation of a man named Gratton, or they may have been married and free). As a baby he was apparently shown to spectators for a dollar per person, but at 15 months old he arrived in Bristol, where he ended up on the care of Marlow-born showman John Richardson, who had apparently paid a thousand guineas for George. The details of this part of his story are hazy enough to be verging on the anecdotal, but there can be no doubt that George ended up in Richardson's care, and that Richardson had George baptized at Newington Church in Surrey on the 22nd of July, 1810.
George was shown throughout London, and England for the next few years as 'The Beautiful Spotted Boy', or the 'Spotted Negro of Renown'. The piebald dog theory (no doubt drawn from Patrona's own 80 years before) makes an appearance in the pictures of George, who looks to be a lovely baby. The similarity in the markings on his body show it is the same boy. He died in 1813, of 'a gathering' about the jaw, which perhaps was a facial tumour his condition predisposed him to. Richardson had done well out of his purchase, and if his treatment of George in death mirrored his treatment of the boy in life, perhaps little George Alexander Gratton's short existence was not so very bad: Richardson had George buried in Richardson's own plot at the All Saints Church on The Causeway in Marlow, and had an attractive and dignified headstone fashioned for him. He was later buried with George, and his own headstone placed behind that of his 'Beautiful Spotted Boy', where they remain today.
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I thought all was over-
I find military history morbid and difficult. I am in no way squeamish, but I don't like the accounts of lonely deaths in muddy fields that seem to enthrall some. However, one such remarkable account from the field at Waterloo has long stuck my head: that of Frederick Ponsonby, the brother of Lady Caroline Lamb. He was a career soldier, like others in his family, and he was 32 the year of Waterloo in 1815. As a cavalry officer, he was part of the charge of the Light Company and they overshot their mark, badly, after having made the charge downhill. The following is his account of what happened after that:
In the melee I was almost instantly disabled in both arms, losing first my sword, and then my reins; and followed by a few men, who were presently cut down, no quarter being allowed, asked, or given, I was carried along by my horse, till, receiving a blow from a sabre, I fell senseless on my face to the ground.
Recovering, I raised myself a little to look around, being at that time, I believe, in a condition to get up and run away; when a lancer, passing by, cried out, 'Tu, n'es pas mort, coquin!' and struck his lance through my back. My head dropped, the blood gushed into my mouth, a difficulty of breathing came on, and I thought all was over.
Not long afterwards (it was impossible to measure time, but I must have fallen in less than ten minutes after the onset) a tirailleur stopped to plunder me, threatening my life. I directed him to a small side pocket, in which he found three dollars, all I had; but he continued to threaten, and I said he might search me: this he did immediately, unloosing my stock and tearing open my waist coat, and leaving me in a very uneasy posture.
But he was no sooner gone than an officer bringing up some troops, to which probably the tirailleur belonged, and happening to halt where I lay, stooped down and addressed me, saying he feared I was badly wounded; I said that I was, and expressed a wish to be removed to the rear. He said it was against their orders to remove even their own men; but that if they gained the day... every attention in his power would be shown me. I complained of thirst, and he held his brandy-bottle to my lips, directing one of the soldiers to lay me straight on my side and place a knapsack under my head. He then passed on into action...Of what rank he was, I cannot say: he wore a great-coat. By and by another tirailleur came up, a fine young man, full of ardor. He knelt down and fired over me, loading and firing many times, and conversing with me all the while. At last he ran off, exclaiming, 'You will probably not be sorry to hear that we are going to retreat. Good day, my friend.' It was dusk when two squadrons of Prussian cavalry, each of them two deep, came across the valley and passed over me in full trot, lifting me from the ground and tumbling me about cruelly.
The battle was now at an end, or removed to a distance. The shouts, the imprecations, the outcries of 'Vive l'Empereur!' the discharge of musketry and cannon, were over; and the groans of the wounded all around me became every moment more and more audible. I thought the night would never end. Much about this time I found a soldier of the Royals lying across my legs—he had probably crawled thither in his agony; and his weight, his convulsive motions, and the air issuing through a wound in his side, distressed me greatly; the last circumstance most of all, as I had a wound of the same nature myself.
It was not a dark night, and the Prussians were wandering about to plunder...though no women appeared. Several stragglers looked at me, as they passed by, one after another, and at last one of them stopped to examine me. I told him as well as I could, for I spoke German very imperfectly, that I was a British officer, and had been plundered already; he did not desist, however, and pulled me about roughly. An hour before midnight I saw a man in an English uniform walking towards me. He was, I suspect, on the same errand, and he came and looked in my face. I spoke instantly, telling him who I was, and assuring him of a reward if he would remain by me. He said he belonged to the 40th, and had missed his regiment; he released me from the dying soldier, and, being unarmed, took up a sword from the ground and stood over me, pacing backward and forward. Day broke; and at six o'clock in the morning some English were seen at a distance, and he ran to them. A messenger being sent off to Hervey, a cart came for me, and I was placed in it, and carried to the village of Waterloo...
Happily, Frederick survived his seven sounds, was nursed back to health by his sister Caroline, married, fathered six children and went on to a successful career in the Army, but the British aristocracy would never recover from the battle of Waterloo: too many of its young men died in the field and the landscape of British society was changed forever. Frederick Ponsonby's experience of battle is timeless, and universal to all those who have fought and continue to do so. That he survived to relate it is a testament to the human spirit.
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