The Cavaliers of Fortune; Or, British Heroes in Foreign WarsGrant, James
History
The Cavaliers of Fortune; Or, British Heroes in Foreign Wars
Grant, James
British -- Foreign countries; Great Britain -- History, Military
Riddled with wounds, Colonel Donald M'Donald of Inch, Knight of St.
Vladimir, died in 1830, and is interred at Edinburgh; Lieutenant
Winchester died there in 1846. Captain Campbell died, by leaping
over a window, with a pistol in each hand, to chastise a person who
had insulted him; some have died as emigrants among the wilds of the
far West; many more are lying near Uppark, in Jamaica, where the
close-ranked headstones show where 1300 of the Gordon Highlanders are
sleeping far from their native hills; and now Paymaster Gordon, and
Lieutenants Ewen Ross, John Grant, and Alexander Gordon alone survive
to wear the _war decoration_.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 3: As an example of the number of _officers_ belonging to
the clans, who served during the war and escaped its slaughter, we
may state that there were on full and half-pay commissions, in 1816,
22 Buchanans; 67 Camerons; 22 Drummonds; 26 Fergusons; 41 Forbeses;
49 Grahames; 90 Frazers; 96 Grants; 144 M'Leans and M'Kenzies; 248
Campbells; and other names in the same proportion.]
[Footnote 4: MS. Records, 92nd Highlanders.]
[Footnote 5: Lieutenant Hope, 92nd.]
[Footnote 6: "Record:" Lyon Court, Edinburgh.]
[Footnote 7: Note of his services furnished to author from Horse
Guards.]
SIR SAMUEL GREIG.
Sir Samuel Greig, Governor of Cronstadt, Admiral of all the Russias,
and commonly called _the Father of the Russian Navy_, was a Scotsman of
humble but respectable parentage, and was born at the ancient seaport
town of Inverkeithing, in Fifeshire, on the 30th of November, 1735.[8]
He was educated by the parochial schoolmaster, who lived long to boast
of his pupil, for the Domini would seem to have been still alive when
the old statistical account of Scotland was published in 1794.
When very young, Samuel Greig entered the British navy, and at an
early age obtained the rank of lieutenant. In 1759 he served with
the fleet of Admiral Sir Edward Hawke, C.B. (afterwards Lord Hawke),
when blockading the harbour of Brest, where a fine French fleet lay,
under the pennant of the Marquis de Conflans. At that time a double
invasion of Britain (one by the way of Scotland, the other on the coast
of England) was threatened; but Commodore Boys blocked up Dunkirk,
and Rodney bombarded Havre-de-Grace, while the French transports and
flat-bottomed boats lay inactive in Brest, with the fleet of M. de
Conflans; till a violent storm in autumn, having driven the ships of
Sir Edward Hawke into Torbay, the marquis put to sea with twenty-one
sail of the line and four frigates, and threw all England into
consternation.
With twenty sail of the line, Hawke left Torbay, and came up with the
French fleet between Belleisle and Cape Quiberon, close in on the
coast of France, and in the desperate conflict which ensued, "young
Greig," though a subaltern, is said to "have eminently distinguished
himself." The battle began at two o'clock, P.M., on the 20th of
November.
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