WHEN TOMMY REARS UP.

Taihape Daily Times, 16 May 1919, Page 6

WHEN TOMMY REARS UP.

To “rear up” is a well-known slang term in the Army, and like most simi-lar-slang, it is wonderfully expressive.

It meaus something rather less than mutiny; insubordination, if you please, hut insubordination due in the first instance to official blundering. A horse rears up when ridden badly by an incompetent mount, especially if whip and spur be used too freely. So, too, does Tommy. There you have the whole thing in a nutshell. One of the earliest, and, one of tiro most serious of these always regrettable occurrences happened so long ago as 1743. in connection with no less famous a corps than the Black Watch. Raised originally for service against the. lawless Highland freebooters, this fine regiment was ordered to London in the year above mentioned, the pretence being that the King wished to review them there. When, however, they arrived in camp at Finchley, orders came for them to be embarked at once for Flanders.

The Scotsmen protested vigorously, pointing out that under the terms of their enlistment' they could not legally be compelled to serve outside Scotland, much less be sent abroad. But General Wade, a stern disciplinarian, refused even to listen to their protest, so the men simply packed up their kits and started off secretly at dead of night to march back to their own country. SEAFORTHS MUTINY. It speaks volumes for the lack of communication in those days, and the state of the roads, when we read that the regiment had actually got as far north as Oundle, in Northamptonshire, before being overtaken and brought .back. Afterwards a general court-mar tial assembled in the Tower of London, and a number of the men were condemned to death, but the extreme penalty was eventually remitted to all, except three of the ringleaders. These men, two corporals and a private, were duly executed. Nor is the above the only regrettable occurrence of the kind due to breaches of faith on the part of the British military authorities in dealing with Scotsmen. In 1778 similar trouble, arising from a similar cause, goaded the Seaforth Highlanders to mutiny. Four companaies entrenched themselves on the hills overlooking the city of Edinburgh, an : d defied their .officers to touch them. However, tact and forbearance were used in this case: in a few days the malcontents, their main grievance having been remedied, returned to duty, cheering for King and Country.

Undeterred by these experiences, however, in 1795, orders were issued in London to break up another famous Scottish regiment, the Cameron Highlanders, the men to be drafted amongst four English regiments. The dour Scotsmen said little when the order was read out to them on parade, but there was an ominous loading of muskets and buckling on of side-arms, and their sturdy old commander, Colonel Cameron, rode off in hot haste to Whitehall to interview the Duke of Cumberland, the then Commander-in-Chief.

“To draft the 79th,” exclaimed the gallant old Scotsman/ “is more than you or your Royal father cither dar* 3 do.”

“Then,” said the Duke, “the King, my father, will certainly send the regiment to the West Indies.

A GRENADIER’S INCIDENT,

This, in those days, wa s equivalent to a sentence of death; but Colonel Cameron was in nowise daunted by it. “You may toll the King, your father, from me,” he retorted, angrily, “that h e may send my Highlanders to hell if he likes, and I’ll ride at the head of ’em, but ho darna draft ns.”

So to 1 hel West Indies the regiment went, and th e deadly climate took terrible toll of it, seme eight hundred men dying, mostly of yellow fever, in about eighteen months. Coming down to mere recent times many people will remember the outbreak amongst the Grenadier Guards at Wellington Barracks in 1890. This unfortunate affair, 'duo largely to a regrctablo misunderstanding, resulted in a unmber of privates being sentenced to imprisonment; the supersession of Colonel Maitland, the commanding officer; and the “banishment” of the offending regiment to Bermuda.

Two years later a similar outbreak occurred amongst another Guards regiment stationed at Windsor. Th,e men were under orders to proceed to Shorncliffe, and, resenting the change, they cut up a number of saddles and did other damage. Similar disciplinary measures to those mentioned abov e ■were taken in connection with this occurrence.