"This Column is to commemorate the conquest of Egypt, and the events of the Campaign under the command of General Sir Ralph Abercromby, K.B., in the year 1801, when General Browne Clayton (then Lieut.-Colonel) commanded the 12th Light Dragoons, and afterwards commanded the Cavalry in pursuit of the Enemy to Grand Cairo, taking, besides other Detachments, a Convoy in the Lybian Desert, composed of 600 French Cavalry, Infantry, and Artillery, commanded by Colonel Cavalier, together with Bonaparte's celebrated Dromedary Corps, one four-pounder, and one stand of colors, and capturing 300 horses and dromedaries, and 500 camels. The events of this Campaign are further to be commemorated by the appointment of Trustees, under the will of General B. Clayton, who shall annually at sun-rise on the morning of the 21st of March (when the French, under the command of General Menou, attacked the British Encampment, before Alexandria) raise the Standard on the Column, and hoist the tricolor French flag, which shall remain until the hour of ten o'clock, when the British Flag shall be hoisted and kept up until sunset, as a Memorial of the Defeat of the French, which event forms the prelude of Britannia's Triumphs, through a regular and unbroken series of Glory and Prosperity down to the Battle of Waterloo in 1815; and on the 28th March, annually, the British Flag shall be hoisted half-standard high, as a Memorial of the Death of the brave Commander-in-Chief Sir Ralph Abercromby, who died of the wounds which he received before Alexandria, on the 21st March, 1801." [5] Colonel Ponsonby's groom, an old soldier, who was in the rear with a led horse, rushed forward, with tears in his eyes, and continued to search for his master, regardless of his own danger, until he was driven away by the French skirmishers.