A VETERAN OF '45

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 117, 11 February 1919, Page 7

A VETERAN OF '45

THE STORMING PARTY AT OHAEAWAI LAST SURVIVOR OF DESPARD'S "FORLORN HOPE." / A telegram from New Plymouth a few days ago recorded the death, at the ago of 93 -years, of Lioutennnt "William H. Free, a veteran soldier of H.M. 58tli Regiment, who Bcrvcd in the war against Hone Heko at tho Bay of. Islands in 1845, and afterwards in tho Taranaki wars, Mr. l'roo was, so far as is known, the very last survivor' of the British soldiers who took part in the battles of Okaihau, Oliaeawni, and Runpekapcka, the only one of the musket-armed redcoats who fought in our earliest campaign that lived to seo' tho conclusion 01 the greatest war in all history. Even at his great ago Mr. Tree's intellect was lively, ftnd his momory good, and when' ho- was visited'towards, tub-ciul of last year by Mr. James Coiftvn, the -historian, who is gathering materials for the national history of New Zealand's pioneering and Maori Wars era, now being prepared wnder the direction of the Hon. G.-W. Russell (Minister of Internal Affairs),' he 'was able to give many vivid details of the; Heke War. His account of his experiences in the famous storming party launched by Colonel ]>espard against the strong Maori ; stockado at Olmeawai'of] July 1, 1845, is described by Mr. Cowan as a particularly interesting contribution to our records of that .nuch-criti-cised operation'.'an episode .v'iToh.is said to have provokod somo stroi.g l|,ngiit,ge from the Duke of Wellington when ho Toad the .dispatches. Mr. Free's recollections of army life- went back to a period that"nt this day seems immensely primitive and. remote. , Ho was born in'a village in County ■ V/icklow, Ireland, in 1825, and in his ■ seventeenth year, at'Carlowv ho iniistrt in .the-'-58th-Regiment. 'After putting in his recruit .:■ drill; ' he . ..was. , se,nt with; iiis. •" regiment y (then . armed with tho old flintlock.misskeJ) to the scene of tho Manchester riots. In 18-13 he was detailed as one of {ho lnilitnvy guard to sail for. Hobart Town in- the convict; ship Anson, 'an old-converted:74-■gu'n ship of .war.:-'.'. • ■■=::-:.:. .■■.:• Tho "Anson broucjit-out -500 .-convicts sentenced to transportation to what was thon called' Van'Dionien's Land; three hundred of these prisoners were Lon- ' doners.'- . The Anson's guard consisted of 50. soldiers of.the 58th,-under a captain-end .subaltern. Thorowere 25 sentries always on- duty,' four haiirs watch; twelve.men of these were stationed on the plop, seated on forms lashed facing the. miiiri deck, with loaded muskets between.ther knees. Tho convicts were divided into, three watohes; each watch was allowed on deck-for three- hours each day,' and as thero.wero thus over 100.prisoners always on deck during-the daylight hours strict vigilance was necessary. "We had no life sentence men," the. old soldier recollected./' "None was in chains-. There were two doctors, sentenced for forgery, who had iron bands on their ankles." ■: The Old -Flogging Days. Mr. Free had witnessed somo atrocious yumshments inflicted, under tho cruel old regime in. tho Army. At .Chatham, just before he came out .to Hobart Town, he saw a soldier literally flogged to death. This man, u good- dutysoldier, was given three hundred lashes •in "alow time"—a minute interval between the strokes. . "We paraded just after breakfast, and it was twelve o'clock before the flogging was finished. Then they took him to the hospital. I went to his funeral three days later—it was all for damning the Queen." Even- in New Zealand heavy floggings were inflicted. At Kuapckapeka, in the Heke campaign, Mr. Free saw a- soldier receive one' hundred and fifty lashes for drunkenness while on guard duty. The inan had'been on"inlying piquet with Free, and somehow contrived to get li•quoi','and was only tied .up-for it. .. ' "Tjjere was a man in our . regiment," the ancient'soldier w-ent on, who, in fourteen years of. service had received a thousand lashes, and had'' .moreover spent seven years in punishment at various periods of his soldiering- in India, England, and elsewhere. Ho was a .'good-duty' soldier,.but reckless, brutalisedby his treatment.' But good old' Colonel Wynyard, who "was a humane offi-.-cer, tried different tactics; it was in the old Albert Barracks in Auckland after the Hoke war. The soldier, a private, was up for thirteen 'chalks' in the twelve months. . The rule was that if a man. had four chalks against him for drunkenness in the year ho was tried by court-martial. The man was brought before tho colonel, and fully expected a .flogging. When he was marched in, however, the colonel just said 'Good morning,' addressing him 'by name, and told him to go back to his barrack's. A few weeks later ho was reported upon as a first-rate 6oldier, good-duty man, and a good templar. The colonel sent for him, and took him on as his orderly, and when the regiment finally left New Zealand the reformed 'hard-case' had five Rood-conduct badges on his sleeve." •Mr; Free had seen-sailors flogged round the Fleet. "They used to flog them round seven or eight ships," he said; "theyM take them in a boat from ship to ship and give them so many strokes, lashed up against the ship's side, until the sentence was complete." In the Northern War. The old 6oldier was one of twenty-five men of the 58th who came across to

New Zealand in H.M.S. Hazard, in adyanco of the regiment, This was just bofore the outbreak of Hono Heke's war. Soon ho was trudging inland in Colonel Hume's expedition to Okaihau—"a rough shop and very short commons., Tho best thing thcro was a bayonet charge against Kawiti's men. I didn't got right up to the Maoris with the bayonet myself, but many of our fellows did." Then Olmeawai, and Despard's foolish "forlorn hope," in which between thirty and forty British soldiers and sailois were killed and over seventy wounded. Mr. Free, now a corporal in the Light Company of the sSth, was ono of thoso told off fur the storming party. The. soldiers wore their rod uniforms, with tho old-fashioned high lenther stock, but many of them wore barefooted. Tnoy carried their full knapsacks even in the charge.

'/Wo formed up in a little hollow," said Mr. Free, "in close order, elbows touching when wo crooked them; four ranks, only 23. inches between each rank. Wo got the orders, 'Fix bayonets! Prepare to charge!'and then 'Charge!' Wo nent along at a steady double, the first two ranks at the. charge with the bay mot— the second rank hod room to put their bayonets in between the front-rank n Miami tho third and fourth rani-.s with muskets and fixed linyonets at the siopo. When within fifty paces of the pa. we cheered, and went at it nt top speed, and. it was diyil take the hindmost. I didn't sco a> single Maori all this - : 'ne— only 'flashes and smoke, and my comrades falling all around. The Maoris, in their sheltered pits, just poked the ■inuy'es of their guns under the outer stockade, and we could do nothing.

The pa was built of great thick posts and solit timber, and the front was curtained with green flax. Tho stockade was ten feet -high and 'more, and wc were helpless..' ''One man, one of tho ladder party, carried up ; a ladder and set ;t against the (jtocMde..' 'Now,' he said, 'then- it is for anyone-'who will go-up-it.' But •who'd'-.•go-,';up the ladder? It would be going to certain death. If anyone tried it he didn't live'long before the Maoris got him. ■••"In our. light company alone we had 21 men killed in the charge. Wo wre, T suppose, not .innro than two and a half minutes' before the stockade, and from. the. time we got ths first order to charge until we got back to the hollow again was only five to seven minutes. ■ "As.wo charged up a'nmii was shot in front of me and another behind 'me.' In the retreat I was carrying off a wounded man on'my back, when he was sfiot dead. .Then I picked up a second wounded man,, a soldier named Smith, and carried him out snfely. Our captain (Grant) was one of those killed. - "Nothing' was explained to ns'before we charge!!. We just went at the strong stonkade-front under orders from a ; colonel, who had a contempt for the ■Maoris." •