SIR GEORGE RIDOUT BINGHAM entered the army in June, 1793, as ensign in the sixty-ninth regiment, and served at Corsica and in the Mediterranean. He was promoted to captain in the eighty-first in 1796, and major in the eighty-second in 1801, and he served with those corps at the Cape of Good Hope and the island of Minorca. On the 14th of March, 1805, he was nominated lieut.-colonel in the FIFTY-THIRD regiment, and assuming the command of the second battalion in Ireland, on the 1st of April, he was at the head of that portion of the regiment during the whole of its arduous and distinguished service in the Peninsula, commencing with the expulsion of Marshal Soult's army from Oporto in 1809, and continued until the end of 1812, when the battalion was so reduced in numbers, that six companies returned to England to recruit; and during these campaigns his conduct reflected honour on the corps to which he belonged. In 1813 he commanded with reputation the second provisional battalion. He received a cross and one clasp for the battles of Talavera, Salamanca, Vittoria, Pyrenees, and Nivelle; he was also nominated Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath, and received permission to accept of the Order of the Tower and Sword of Portugal. He commanded the troops which proceeded to St. Helena with Napoleon Bonaparte, in 1815, and served as brigadier-general at that island until 1820, when he returned to England in consequence of having been promoted to the rank of major-general in 1819. In 1831 he was appointed colonel commandant of a battalion of the Rifle Brigade. He served on the staff of Ireland from 1825 to 1832. He died in 1833. As a soldier and a gentleman he stood high in the estimation of all who knew him; he was an ornament to his profession and an honour to his country. LONDON: Printed by WILLIAM CLOWES and SONS, Stamford Street, For Her Majesty's Stationery Office. TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE Obvious typographical errors and punctuation errors have been corrected after careful comparison with other occurrences within the text and consultation of external sources. Except for those changes noted below, all misspellings in the text, and inconsistent or archaic usage, have been retained. Pg xxxiii, 'castle of L'Ourde 5' replaced by 'castle of L'Ourde 52'. Pg 3, 'towards Ticonderago' replaced by 'towards Ticonderoga'. Pg 21, '[Sidenote: 1815]' inserted before 'In 1815 the ...'. Pg 55, 'occupy the barracks' replaced by 'occupying the barracks'. Pg 58, The Illustration of the memorial monument placed after this page had no caption. The description of this Plate from Pg xxxv has been inserted as a caption. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Historical Record of The Fifty-Third or Shropshire Regiment of Foot, by Richard Cannon