Chapter 1: Gone for a soldier

The citizens of Lincoln call the thoroughfare which winds its way up from the south gate to the castle, Steep Street. It is well named, for we were all puffing and panting like old men when we eventually reached the castle entrance, and I doubt if any in the party of new recruits, bound for the 69th Regiment of Foot, waere over twenty years of age. The sentinels at the castle entrance viewed us with bored indifference as we made our way under the portcullis; many such parties as ours had arrived at the castle over the past few weeks. The Second Battalion of His Majesty’s Sixty Ninth Regiment of Foot, had not long returned from the West Indies, greatly reduced in strength due to the depredations the Caribbean climate inflicts on Europeans, and was now in the process of building up its numbers. The year was 1806, and Britain was still locked in the war with France, and needed all the soldiers it could muster.

Becoming a soldier was not what I had envisaged as a career a mere ten days ago, but circumstance had rather thrust it upon me. Had I not been caught poaching, along with several other apprentices, I would have remained in the office of Mortimer Teazle, and Grubbe, scratching away at dull dusty law documents. The magistrate gave me the choice of transportation to Van Diemen’s Land or enlistment into the army. I chose the latter, but some of my companions in poaching opted for transportation. I often wonder what befell my felow apprentices, Barney Humphries, Tommy Foster, and Ralf Harris, in the Antipodes.

After a cursory medical inspection we recruits swore the Oath of Allegiance, were issued with uniforms and equipment, and then distributed among the ten companies that made up the battalion. As fortune would have it I was the first of those assigned to Number 4 Company to be called before the Captain, who was sitting behind a a desk with a quill pen in his hand, and sheath of paper and an ink pot before him.
“I am Captain Ebenezer Merryweather, commander of Number Four Company. What is your name?” His question was asked in a quiet tone of voice, and he gave me a small smile.
“Elijah John Greenaway,” I answered with some pride, as my family were of yeoman stock, and well respected in South Lincolnshire.
“Sir!” The man stood by the side of the desk, a sergeant or something — I was not fully conversant with military ranks as yet — did not have a quiet tone of voice. In fact his thunderous bellow had me jumping out of my skin.
He favoured me with a ferocious scowl. “You will always address an officer as ‘Sir’ Do not make that mistake of omission again, or you will cause me much displeasure.”
He did not say it, as I had wit enough to discern for myself, that it would also cause me great discomfort.
While I was having this discourse with the sergeant Captain Merryweather was writing down the information I had given him. He then asked how old I was.
“I will be sixteen in two months’ time, on the twenty fourth of November — Sir.”
Once again he wrote down the information, then let out a cry of frustration.
“Hell and damnation! The quill nib has broken again.”
I fished in my pocket and pulled out my pen knife. “May I sharpen the quill for you, Sir?”
He handed me the quill, and I soon fashioned a good nib on the end of it, before handing it back to him.
“Tell me Greenaway, how is it you happen to have a pen knife in your pocket, and the skill to sharpen a quill?”
“I am, or rather I was, an articled scrivener, to a firm of lawyers in Grantham, Sir.”
“And how long had you been apprenticed as a clerk at law?”
I made a quick calculation; I had left The King’s School four months before my fifteenth birthday. “Just over a twelve month, Sir.”
Captain Merryweather positively beamed at me. “Capital. Capital. I have need of a company clerk, the previous incumbent died on the homeward passage. You shall take down the information given by the rest of the recruits, and if you have fair enough a hand you shall be appointed company clerk. Sergeant Major Stone will instruct you as to your duties.”

That is how I became the company clerk, and also the protégée of Captain Merryweather, who from then on addressed me as ‘Jack’, as he thought Elijah far too solemn and exalted a name for a lad of my years. In fact most of my friends and family also call me Jack.
Oliver Stone, the Company Sergeant Major — and his surname matched his character, as never had I met a man so hard and unyielding — introduced me to the Company’s duty rosters, nominal rolls and the other administrative records, and I soon had the mastery of the paper work.
This was just as well, for although I was the company clerk the prime occupation of a soldier lies in the killing trade, and for the next three years I learnt all the necessary skills of that trade. Marching, foot drill on the large parade square of Lincoln Castle, loading and firing the Brown Bess musket, bayonet drill, marching, foot drill on the large parade square of Lincoln Castle, loading and firing the Brown Bess musket, bayonet drill, marching, drillin g— I think I make my point?