A FEMALE SCOTS GREY.

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 8, Issue 31, 7 February 1916, Page 2

A FEMALE SCOTS GREY.

The annals of the Scots Grey Regiment show that a woman for some time fought in their ranks. Mrs. Christian Davies wag a native of Ireland. Her husband having entered the Army, she assumed male attire and followed him.

They did not, however, meet till after the Battle of Blenheim,- when they agreed to pass as two brothers. But at Ramiilies Mrs. Davies was wounded and her sex discovered. “I escaped,” she says, in her narrative, “unhurt, though in the hottest part of the battle, till the French were entirely defeated, when an unlucky shell from a steeple, on which they had planted some mortars, struck the back of my head, and fractured the skull.

“I was carried to Meldre, but I did not recover in less than ten weeks. No sooner had they discovered my sex but they acquainted Brigadier Preston that his pretty dragoon (for so I wag called) was a woman. The news ' spread far and'near, and reaching my Lord John Hayes’s ear, he came to see me, as did my former comrades; and my lord called for my husband. “He gave a satisfactory account of our first acquaintance, marriage, and situation, with the manner of his having entered the service, and nay resolution to go in search of him. My lord seemed very wqjll entertained, and ordered that my pay should be continued while under cure. “When his lordship heard that I was well enough to go aboard, he generously sent me a parcel of linen. Brigadier Preston made me a present of a handsome silk gown; every one of our officers contributed what was requisite for the dress of my sex, and dismiised me from the service with a handsome compliment.” Mrs. Davies remained with the Army, and became the regimental sutler. She wr« useful-in obtaining information, and on one occasion both herself and pack-horse were made prisoners. After the peace cf Utrecht, she returned to England, and Queen Anne allowed her a pension of a shilling a day.