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East Kent Regiment
Military History Army English Regiments East Kent |
The East Kent Regiment We founded many and mighty state,? After many other battles in which the Regiment of Holland took part, but which, as has been observed, it would be impossible in our present limits even to enumerate, the regiment came to England, after the Peace of Munster (1648), and were placed on the English establishment seven years later. After their adventurous career for the past three-quarters of a century, the first years of service in England must have seemed singularly dull to the bold spirits of the Holland Regiment. Gradually that name sank into desuetude, as the veterans of the Holland service died out, and in 1689, when the incorporation of the 3rd Foot into the guards advanced the Buffs to their present numerical rank, they received the title of ?Prince George of Denmark?s Regiment of Foot.? The custom of the historians of the day was, however, to designate a regiment by the name of its colonel, and the Buffs were accordingly known by the honourable title of Churchill?s Regiment, the brother of the great captain himself being their commander. They soon went abroad to the neighbourhood of their early achievements, and at Walcourt showed that the years of peace had in no way lessened their material aptitude. The fought at Steenkirke and at Laden, where they suffered so severely that active measures had to be taken to recruit them. While in the neighbourhood of Ghent, the official record relates that General Churchill, Colonel of the Buffs, had an alarming adventure. During an inspection, he, with two or three other officers and about a dozen men, halted for a short time at a roadside house. Almost directly afterwards the French surrounded it: half the guard were killed, and the other half kept up a gallant fire from the windows. Churchill trying to escape was taken prisoner, ?and plundered of his money, watch and other valuables. While the marauders were engaged in sharing the booty, he stole away undercover of a hedge and succeeded in safely reaching the allied army. The small band left in the house defended themselves for some time, but reinforcements for the enemy constantly coming up, abandoned the unequal struggle and surrendered.? The Buffs took part in the expedition under the Duke of Ormond against Vigo, where the allies captured two men-of-war and eleven galleons, with about 7,000,000 pieces of eight. Soon after occurred the famous battle of Blenheim, the first distinction the Buffs bear on their colours, followed, eighteen months later, by Ramillies. At the latter battle the Buffs, led by the son of their Colonel, made a most brilliant charge. They were posted upon a rising ground; ?beneath them raged the battle with varying fortune, until the genius of the British leader and the valour of his troops extorted a reluctant victory. The enemy were driven back and fell into terrible confusion. At this important crisis Lieutenant-Colonel Churchill proved himself worthy of his descent. Placing himself at the head of head Buffs, followed by Lord Mordaunt?s regiment, and five squadrons of dashing sabres, he swept down the slope, crossed the morass which lay in his way, past the Little Ghent, clambered up the steep hill beyond, and crashing with musket and bayonet into the enemy?s left flank, drove three regiments into a miry hollow, where most of them were captured or slain.? At this period of there career, when the Royal order the colours of English regiments received the addition of St. Andrew?s Cross, ?Prince George of Denmark?s Regiment,? says the official record, ?was permitted to display a dragon on its colours, as a regimental badge, as a reward for its gallant conduct on all occasions. The dragon, being one of the supporters to the Royal Arms in the time of Queen Elizabeth, also indicated the origin of the corps in Her Majesty?s reign.? They fought at Oudenarde; at Malplaquet, ?Marlborough?s last great victory, and his most decisive as well as his most sanguinary,? the Buffs were in the thick of the fighting, suffering so much that again they were forced into retirement to await the arrival of recruits. It is recorded that dure in the battle, when the retreating French were being pursued through the wood and fiercely disputing every step, the Duke of Argyll, then colonel of the Buff?s, ?threw open his waistcoat to show his men that he was no better provided with armour than themselves.? It was about this time that the regiment acquired the title of ?Buffs,? the facings being changed to that colour. They fought at Dettingen, at Fontenoy, and Falkirk-at the last named battle almost turning defeat into victory, and when obliged to retire showing a marked difference from the confused stampede of many of the other troops. Lord Stanhope, quoted by Mr. Adams, thus speaks of the demeanour of the Buffs: ?Theirs was a retreat, and not like their comrades, a flight; they marched in steady order, their drums beating and colours displayed, and protected the mingled mass of other fugitives.? They fought at Laffeldt, at Guadaloupe, and Belle Isle. Then followed the American War of Independence in which they were actively engaged, and in which, especially at Ewtaw Springs, they were conspicuous for their valour. ?The British Force,? writes the historian before quoted, ?was far inferior in numbers to the American army. About nine o?clock on the morning of September 8th, the attack commenced. It was delivered with valour; it was withstood with patience. A fierce swift fire of musketry ensued, and then the Buffs took to the bayonet, driving back the troops opposed to them for a considerable distance, until, advancing too far, they exposed their flanks to the enemy, suffered a sharp loss, and retired to their original position.? Seven years afterwards they joined the British Army in the Peninsula. Some of the regiment were with Sir John Moore at Corunna; the first Peninsula name on their colours commemorates the passage of the Douro, of which it has been said that ?no exploit in Spain was more brilliant, grand, and successful.? When the able arrangements had been made, and Wellesley?s laconic, ?Well, let the men cross,? had given the command, the officer and twenty-five soldiers, who, as Napier says, ?were silently placed on the other side of the Douro in the midst of the French Army,? were soldiers of the Buffs. The gallantry of the Buffs, who, at first unsupported, had borne the brunt of the enemy?s attack, was rewarded by the Royal licence to bear on their colours the word ?Douro.? At Talavera they lost a hundred and forty-two killed, wounded, and missing. At Albuera they were well nigh annihilated. With three other regiments they charged up the hill in the face of a scathing fire. They were rushing onward, ?confident in their prowess and cold steel,? when they were charged by four regiments of cavalry, and fell in scores. Then occurred some of those instances of heroic valour, which are good to chronicle. ?Ensign Thomas was called upon to surrender the colour he held, but he declared he would give it up only with his life, and fell, pierced with many wounds, a victim to his gallantry. The staff of the colour borne by Ensign Walsh was broken by a cannon ball, and the Ensign fell severely wounded, but he tore the colour from the broken staff and concealed it in his bosom, where it was found when the battle was over.? They were engaged, having received some reinforcements-badly needed-from England, in all the operations of Hill?s division, and joined the main army in time to join in the battle of Vittoria. They fought at Nivelle, a battle at which seemed present all the material required for the epic of the poet of the masterpiece of the battle painter.
?A splendid spectacle was presented,? writes one whose
brilliant pen seems inspired with the genius of both.
?On one hand the ships of war, sailing slowly to and fro, were
exchanging shots with the fort of Socoa; while Hope, menacing all the
French lines in the low ground, sent the sound of a hundred pieces of
artillery bellowing up the rocks. He
was answered by nearly as many from the tops of the mountains, amid the
smoke of which the summit of the green Atchulia glittered to the rising
sun, while fifty thousand men, rushing down its enormous slopes with
ringing shouts, seemed to chase the receding shadows into the deep
valley. The plains of
France, so long overlooked from the towering crags of the Pyrenees were
to be the prize of battle; and the half finished soldiers in their fury
were breaking through the iron barrier erected by Soult as if it were
but a screen of reeds.? With
indomitable valour the Buffs acquitted themselves that day; they bear on
their colours the record of their service at Nive; at St. Pierre they
formed part of the right of the army, under Byng, where at an opportune
moment they checked the French under d?Aurargnac.
The word ?Peninsula? commemorates, as the official
announcement puts in, with a not ungraceful formalism, ?the
meritorious exertions of the regiment on the field of honour during the
preceding seven years.? Service
in America-where they fought at Plattsburg-and in Canada prevented the
Buffs from sharing in the victory of Waterloo, but they arrived in
France in time to form a portion of the army of occupation.
Passing over the next few years, during which they were quartered
in New South Wales, we next find the regiment actively engaged in India.
At Punniar, the twin battle of Maharajpore, the Buffs were with
the force under General Grey, which, ?despite the fatigue of a long
and toilsome march,? inflicted a crushing defeat upon a large body of
the Mahrattes. They joined the
forces in the Crimea in the spring of 1855, and were not consequently
present at any three great battles-Alma, Balaklava, Inkerman-whose names
we recall involuntarily when the Crimea is mentioned.
But there was another engagement, almost as familiar, in which
the principal dramatis personae were officers and men of the Buffs.
We refer to the assault on the Redan.
The French were to attack the Malakhoff, and as, unless that were
first secured, the possession of the Redan would be useless, because
untenable, we were to wait until an agreed rocket signal should inform
us that our allies had performed their part of the allotted task.
Not till seven in the evening did a universal exclamation
announce that the signal was made-?four rockets almost borne back by
the violence of the wind, and the silvery jets of sparks they threw out
on exploding being scarcely visible against the raw grey sky.?
A hundred of the Buffs under captain Lewes formed half the
covering party; with the scaling ladders were a hundred and sixty men of
the same regiment under Captain Maude, while others were in support.
Soon the stormers advanced at a run, ?while the round shot tore
up the earth beneath their feet, or swept men away by entire sections,
strewing limbs and fragments of humanity everywhere.?
The officers of the Buffs were amongst the very few that survived
the terrible approach unwounded. Even
when our men streamed in it was impossible to retain possession.
The Russians were being constantly reinforced; by some oversight
our stormers were left unsupported.
In vain did the Buffs and their companions fight desperately,
stubbornly; they were driven out, and on the slopes and in the
embrasures lay heaps of those who had given their lives in vain.
But though the assault was a failure, it was a failure devoid of
shame, and to many the opportunity for deeds of signal courage.
Amongst these were Captain Maude, who has been mentioned as
commanding the covering party, and Private john Connors.
Twelve years previously Maude had fought with his regiment at
Punniar, and while in the Crimea had shown himself a most able officer.
On this occasion, with only nine or ten men, ha had gained an
important position within the works, ?and though dangerously wounded,
did not retire until all hope of support was at an end.?
For this he won the Victoria Cross.
Connors won his by displaying no less intrepidity.
?Fighting furiously hand to hand with the Russians, he sought
to save the life of an officer of the 30th by shooting one
and bayoneting another of the latter?s assailants.
As the body of this officer was found the farthest in the Redan
of any, it was a proof that Connors was one of the foremost of the
stormers.? After
the Crimea the Buffs repaired to India, though not in time to
participate in the suppression of the Mutiny, and their next active
service was in the China war of 1860.
Here they were in the 3rd Brigade, which formed part
of the Second Division under Sir Robert Napier, and in the engagement at
Sinho were the first to come into actual contact with the enemy.
It was decided that the second division should take the chief
part in the capture of the Taku Forts, and when Tangkoo had been taken,
the Buffs were posted at the gates leading to the forts.
About this time the Chinese began to consider the advisability of
coming to terms, and, as earnest, returned a couple of prisoners who had
fallen into their hands. On
of these was a sergeant of the Buffs ?who had suffered such barbarous
treatment as their hands as to be incapable of standing,? and whose
sufferings had driven him quite mad.
After the fall of the forts and the capture of Pekin, the Buffs
enjoyed another spell of leisure till the war in Zululand of 1879.
Here they were in the first column commanded by Colonel C.
Pearson, of the regiment, their immediate chief being Lieutenant-Colonel
H. Parnell. They speedily
tried the metal of the enemy at Inyezane, where both the officers above
named had their horses shot under them.
Before long colonel Pearson was practically blockaded at Etschowe,
and during the weary time of waiting the Buffs had to deplore the death
from fever of Captain J. Williams. Throughout the campaign the regiment behaved in a way worthy
of its traditions; and when it is remembered what the traditions of the
Buffs are it would be difficult to utter greater praise.
Since 1879 the services of the Buffs have being in China, Egypt,
and in England, Zululand being the last important campaign in which they
have been engaged.
Extracted from 'Her
Majesty?s Army
How Corporal Alfred Marsh Of The 1st Battalion East Kent Regiment (The Buffs), Won The D.C.M. Near Armentieres On the morning of October 23rd 1915, the 16th Brigade, composed of the 1st East Kent?s (The Buffs), the 1st Leicester?s, the 1st Shropshire Light Infantry, and the 1st York and Lancaster, were holding the centre of the line of our 3rd Corps between the Rue du Bois and Bois Grenier. About 6 a.m. a message reached the Buffs that a scout was required at Brigade Headquarters, and Corporal Alfred Marsh, the senior scout of the battalion, was sent. On arriving there, Corporal Marsh was told by the General commanding the brigade that the Leicester?s on the left flank of the brigade were being attacked, and that the attack had been preceded by a heavy bombardment, which had cut all the telephone wires connecting them with Headquarters, so that all communication was entirely suspended. The General, fearing that matters might be going badly with them, directed Marsh to make his way to them and bring back a report as to how they were faring. Marsh set off and passed along the rear of our line, until he came in sight of the position which the Leicester?s had held, when he saw that the trenches had been blown almost to pieces, and that what was left of them was in possession of the Germans, parties of whom were scattered about in the rear of our original line. In order to avoid these parties, he made a wide detour, making use wherever possible of the numerous ditches with which the country hereabouts is intersected. However, the enemy were using the ditches too, and, after entering three of them and finding Germans in each, he decided to make a dash across the open. As soon as he showed himself, the Huns turned a machine gun on him, but though one bullet smashed the butt of his rifle, he was not hit, and after running for some considerable distance with a rather vague idea of the direction he was taking, he got into another ditch. Peering cautiously out of this, he discovered, to his consternation, that he had got between the Germans who had captured the Leicester?s trenches and the enemy?s lines. He therefore started off in the other direction, sometimes making use of the ditches and sometimes running across the open. In the course of his journey, he fell in with two parties of Germans, who hunted him like a rabbit and obliged him to double back on his tracks; but he succeeded in eluding their pursuit, and eventually came upon a party of between two or three hundred of the Leicester?s under a second lieutenant, who had dug themselves in some little distance to the rear of the line they had been obliged to abandon. The enemy were all round them, and Marsh, to escape the shots which they fired at him, ran as hard as he could to the trench and jumped into it, greatly to the astonishment of the young officer in charge of the Leicester?s, who seemed to be under the impression that he was a German disguised in our uniform, and holding a revolver to his head, threatened to shoot him. Not without some little difficulty, he succeeded in convincing the officer that he was a British soldier, who had been sent to ascertain what had happened to his battalion, and having taken a sketch of the position and estimated as accurately as he could the number of the enemy surrounding them, he set out on his return to Brigade Headquarters. His adventures continued, as in crossing a ploughed field, he encountered a German patrol, who fired upon him, whilst he was also spotted by the crew of a machine gun, which paid him some unwelcome attentions. But at length he succeeded in reaching Brigade Headquarters, with the loss of his cap, which had been knocked off by a rifle bullet, and the heel of his left boot, and thus succeeded in maintaining his reputation as the best scout in the 16th Brigade. The same night Marsh had command of a party, which covered the retreat of the Leicester?s with the loss of one killed and only two wounded. Corporal Alfred Marsh, whose gallantry and skill were recognized by the Distinguished Conduct Medal being conferred upon him, is twenty-one years of age, and his home is at Faversham, Kent. Extracted from 'Deeds That Thrill The Empire' FREDERICK FRANCIS MAUDE (Major, afterwards General, G.C.B.) 3rd Buffs (East Kent Regiment) Knight of the Legion of Honour Frederick Francis Maude, born December 20th 1821, died at Torquay on June 20th 1897; was the son of the Rev. Honourable J. C. Maude. In 1861 was A.A.G. at Gibraltar; commanded a division in India 1875-80, and the 2nd of the Khyber Force during the Afghan War, 1878-9. Retired 1885 JOHN CONNORS (Private) 3rd of Foot The Buffs, (East Kent Regiment) On September 8th 1855, during the assault on the Redan, Connors displayed great courage in personal conflict with the Russians. He also rescued an officer of the 30th Regiment who was surrounded by the enemy, one of whom he shot, and bayoneted another, and inside the Redan was noticed in personal combat for some time with the enemy. Selected by his comrades to receive the French War Medal. |
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