Easter this year looks set to be rather different from usual. Although people are naturally alarmed about covid-19, we are at least not worrying that there may be rebellion and massacre in the near future. Spare a thought, then, for the British community in India in 1857. The events that the British still generally (and inaccurately) refer to as the Indian Mutiny were not to kick off until May, but by Easter that year there were already indications that things were not as they should be.
In my book, Cawnpore, my narrator, John Williamson, is the Deputy Collector — part of the British administration running India. He has arrived in India from Borneo. There is a reference in this passage to his guilt over killings he had witnessed there. Sadly, Victorian colonial history features quite a lot of massacres. John Williamson has been involved in a massacre in Borneo and (though he does not know it yet) is is about to see one from the other side in Cawnpore (now Kanpur). That Easter, though, the European community was determined to carry on as if there were no signs of trouble to come. This extract from my book reflects the reality of life at the time.
I took myself to my office and settled to work as best I could. There was plenty to do. The end of the week would be Good Friday and work in the office would stop while the Europeans took themselves to church for a day of prayer and fasting.
That evening I did not return directly to my bungalow but, instead, called in on the Club. I was not a regular visitor for I never felt truly comfortable with the gentlemen there. Still I took care to call in often enough that neither my presence nor absence caused comment. This evening I wanted to judge for myself the atmosphere in the European community.
All seemed much as it had been on my last visit a couple of weeks earlier. The waiters moved quietly from table to table pouring more brandies than might have been expected in quieter times and the newspapers were tattered from the number of people reading them but there was no sign of panic. Indeed, the promise of Easter seemed to be calming nerves. The stately rhythm of the ecclesiastical year seems to promise that the present crisis would pass. The story of the Resurrection and Christ’s triumph over death reassured believers (and none would admit to doubting) that the Lord would see them safely through their present travails.
So the days to Easter passed with no further excitement and, on Good Friday, I joined the faithful in St John’s Church to repent my sins. I listened to the murmured prayers of the men and women around me and wished that I could share their faith and their belief but I could not and I left the service still weighed down by the guilt of all that had happened in Borneo. Every Good Friday since I had stood by and watched my friend destroy his enemies, I had repented my sin, that I had not stopped him. Yet I did not believe that God had forgiven me.
My spirits were lifted the next day when I dined again with Hillersdon. It was a quiet evening with Charles treating me almost as one of the family. Lydia suffered with the heat, given her condition, but was as bright and cheerful as could be expected and we parted with best wishes for Easter Day.
The service on Sunday went well. The bright red of the officers’uniforms enlivened the place and their voices covered for any weakness on the part of the choir. All the European families had turned out to celebrate and decorated eggs were handed to the children as they left the church. Listening to their laughter and seeing their mothers in their Easter bonnets, it was easy, for a moment, to imagine ourselves back in England and the air of menace that had filled every waking moment for so long seemed temporarily lifted.
Cawnpore is available as an e-book at £1.99 or in paperback at £5.99. (Remember that Amazon can be slow to deliver books at the moment.) Although it is the second of three books about John Williamson, it can be read as a stand alone novel.
“For anyone who has a love for this period, Cawnpore is probably one for you.”
Apparently I’m not alone in struggling to remember what day it is. This has been a strange few weeks, hasn’t it? Obviously, as I sit at home and write most days, it’s made a lot less difference to me than to most people. Even so, it’s been rather weird. My beloved, who has been frantically busy the past few months, is still working, but from home. It’s strange having somebody else in the house all the time, but quite nice. Outside the wider world seems so dislocated from its normal self that is difficult to connect to things. I had expected to see a massive increase in the amount of activity online, but I find both Facebook and Twitter oddly quiet. I guess most of us feel we have nothing to talk about except the virus, and we really don’t want to talk about that more than we have to. Instead I’m spending more time on e-mails and messaging and much more time on the phone. My son, who is of a generation that will always rather text than make a phone call, says he has been rediscovering telephone calls and talking to friends he hasn’t actually had a conversation with in ages. We all reach out in the ways we can, I guess.
It seems to have affected the way people read as well. Readership of my blog is down. (I hope you’ll forgive this light-weight post because it seems a bad week to write anything heavy that I suspect people won’t read.) I’m hoping to see some increase in the sales of my books, though. Or, at the very least, an increase in the readership of Dark Magic on Kindle Unlimited. (It’s the only one of my books on Kindle Unlimited, so if you are a member you can read this one for free.)
Somebody on Twitter asked if people were changing the sort of books they read. Were they using the opportunity to catch up on really heavy things?
It made me think about my reading recently. One nice thing is that I’ve been doing rather more of it. Unable to go out dancing or skating (which between them would usually account for about four afternoons/evenings a week) I’ve definitely been reading a bit more. The things I’ve read have been either the literary equivalent of comfort food, or heavy books I’ve been putting off.
I finished Riflemen, which was a Christmas present. It’s a history of the 5th Battalion of the 60th (Royal American) Regiment, who were active in the Peninsular War. It’s an absolutely brilliant book (my review is here: http://tomwilliamsauthor.co.uk/riflemen/) but it’s not what you’d call an easy read. It was lovely to have the time to sit down and finish it. I also finished a short book of Lt Thomas Blomfield’s letters to his family from the battlefields of the Peninsula. The letters are fun to read, combining family gossip (“Give my love to Louisa and tell her I hope she is a good housekeeper”) and accounts of the horror of events like the sacking of Badajoz (“The town was given up to plunder for 24 hours and such a scene I never before saw.”) Even the bowdlerised accounts of some of the war, designed for reading by his family, are horrific. It’s a fantastic read for anyone interested though.
I’ve also been reading about police procedures for another contemporary novel I’m working on and I’m starting on Carol McGrath’s latest, The Silken Rose. It’s based on the life of the 13th century Ailenor of Provence which is rather outside my comfort zone, but Carol is a great writer, so I’m expecting to enjoy it.
At the other extreme, I’ve been indulging my not-so-secret vices: chick lit (Sophie Kinsella’s Sleeping Arrangements) and thrillers like Lee Child’s brilliant Reacher series and even the odd graphic novel (which is the posh name for comic books). Writers aren’t supposed to admit to that sort of reading, but it’s great – and it’s particularly great at a time like this.
I’m very lucky in being able to dance tango at home and we’ve started to video our efforts so we can identify the bits that need improvement. It turns out there are a lot of them, so we won’t be bored.
All in all, we’re lucky. The virus passed over without doing any significant damage, though my beloved has lost her sense of smell, which is more upsetting than you’d think. I’m honestly not sure if I’ve had it or not, though being in the same house gives that day of feeling a bit unwell a whole new significance. Every time I coughed we got nervous. We know people who have been really sick, so we appreciate how lucky we are.
Stay at home. Stay safe. Let me know how you’re spending your time.
While I’ve been self-isolating (one very mild case of coronavirus in the house, over now) I’ve had the chance to finish Robert Griffith’s Riflemen, a history of the 5th Battalion, 60th (Royal American) Regiment.
The first thing to say about this book, and the most
important, is that it is very, very good. Technically it’s not
the first history of the battalion, because a couple were produced early in the
19th century, but it’s the first modern history.
I’m not an academic historian, so I’m probably not the right
person to say how these things should be done, but this seems a remarkable
piece of historical research. Rob has spent a spectacular amount of time with
army pay lists and battalion details in the National Archives. This book is the
product of a considerable amount of original study. (I know that reviews don’t
normally refer to the author by given name, but Rob is a well-known figure on
the army historical research scene and calling him anything else just seems
odd.)
Rob Griffith presenting at the National Army Museum
The 5/60th was formed in December 1797. Originally made up mainly of German (or vaguely Germanic) soldiers, it introduced many of the practices that distinguished rifle regiments, from tactics to the green uniform at a time when most British troops still wore scarlet. The 5/60th served the British Army until 1818 when it was lost with a reduction of the number of battalions in the 60th. Its impact on light infantry tactics, though, remained for many years.
The 5/60th was formed at a time when the 60th operated mostly in the West Indies – regarded as part of the Americas, hence the American (later Royal American) regiment. It was because the regiment served mainly in America that it was seen as a safe place to man almost exclusively with foreign soldiers, often with their own foreign officers. Despite this, the 5/60 first saw action in Ireland during the 1798 rebellion. Later it saw active service in Surinam and garrison duty in Nova Scotia as well as the West Indies. It was the Peninsular War, though, that made the reputation of the 5/60th (though the 95th Rifles is the regiment best remembered nowadays, partly because of the efforts of the fictitious Sharpe). The battalion was awarded 16 battle honours for its campaigns in the peninsula and across the Pyrenees into France. It was still fighting at Toulouse when Napoleon abdicated in 1814.
I have to admit I did not find this
an easy read. It has over 400 pages and there are
three distinct but interwoven threads throughout. Firstly, it is the story of
the men who served. Rob provides an astonishing amount of detail about
individual men, from their lives before joining the regiment, through their
service with brilliant insights culled from court-martial records, to the time
and nature of their deaths. Detailed accounts are sometimes given of the
medical treatment they suffered (and I use the word advisedly) before their
deaths and these can make uncomfortable reading. I had the pleasure of
listening to Rob lecture on the men of the battalion at the National Army
Museum. In many ways it was better than reading the book, because anecdotes
about real people bring home the reality of the times so well.
The second strand is information that puts the battalion into the wider military context. We get details of the need to build up the army and how this was done, how men were recruited and trained, with a lot of detail on the tactics that were taught. There’s a discussion of the rifle and the way it was loaded and fired. (Lying down with your feet to the enemy and firing from that position is counter-intuitive but apparently could work.) We learn about garrison life in various colonial outposts and how officers lobbied for, or bought, promotion. There is a lot about life on campaign with details of provisioning, medical treatment and arrangements (or the lack of arrangements) for sheltering the troops. If you are interested in the nitty-gritty of life in Wellington’s army – mainly, but not exclusively, the light infantry – this is a must.
The second strand, in particular, comes and goes with whole chapters on various aspects of military life interspersed with a chronological account of the campaigns of the 5/60th, which are inevitably dominated by the Peninsular campaign. It helps, I think, if you already have some idea of Wellington’s war. I imagine most readers will, and when Rob is talking about a battle I know or I place I’ve visited, I found the accounts enlightening. Without that background, though, the incessant marching, counter marching, flanking, advancing and retreating can just become something of a blur. It’s massively better than my ‘O’ level history (where the Peninsular War, for some unfathomable reason, featured heavily) but still not nearly as clear as some fictional accounts. (Lynn Bryant’s Peninsular War saga, for example, gives staggeringly accurate and understandable accounts of many of the battles.) Riflemen does benefit from some nice maps, though occasionally significant details are missed off. Rob also adopts the standard use of differently shaded blocks to separate cavalry and infantry with colour distinguishing the British and French forces. Sadly, the maps are all in black and white, leaving room for considerable confusion and far too many jokes about shades of grey.
I have always been interested in how Wellington moved from the often defensive warfare, largely in the south and west of Spain, to taking the war to the enemy and crossing the Pyrenees and this book gives a good overview of this. I do understand now why so many writers seem to overlook what should be a dramatic end to the story of the campaign. In fact, the move into France seems to have been very scrappy with few clear victories and defeats and even more marching to and fro than in Spain, but now with the added bonus of extreme cold. I honestly struggled with this bit, but I don’t think it’s Rob’s fault. Almost 400 pages in, accounts of the tides on the Adour robbed me of the will to live. I think the soldiers (with rather more excuse) were beginning to flag too. A disproportionate number of the 5/60th died in these last weeks of the war while the French, fighting on their home ground with decent numbers of men, were unable to turn the tide. I think both sides knew the war was over and were by now going through the bloody motions without conviction. The weariness the reader may well feel at this point is probably a fair reflection of the subject matter.
Obviously I found some parts of this
book better than others and, for me, it could well have been a bit shorter. But
other people will be gripped by exactly the bits I skimmed over while they may
find the accounts of courts-martial (all gripping stuff in my view) irrelevant
and dull. The fact is that this isn’t really a book to read carefully
cover-to-cover (unless you are a very serious military history nerd, in which
case your dreams have all just come true). It’s the definitive history of one
battalion which had a disproportionate role not only in the war against
Napoleon but also in developing the infantry techniques of the British Army.
It’s an astonishing work of scholarship and an invaluable reference for anyone
with a serious interest in this period. If you have a passion for almost any
aspect of the British Army of the time, there will be something in this book
for you.
Robert Griffith is to be congratulated on this excellent work.
A word from our sponsor
My interest in the Napoleonic era stems from the research that I’ve done for my books about James Burke. Burke was real person and although most of his adventures are fictional a lot of research goes into making the backgrounds authentic (though nothing like the level of research that Rob Griffith does). Eventually it gets to the point where I spent more time writing stuff like this than I do writing fiction. (I am working on a non-fiction account of the background to Waterloo, if anyone knows a publisher who might want it.) Nobody pays me for writing these blog posts, although I do now accept donations if anybody wants to buy me a coffee. What I would really appreciate, though, is if you bought one of books. They are all available on Kindle and cost £2.99 or less.
Last week, when the world seemed a very different place and people still went to the theatre, I saw ‘Magic Goes Wrong’ at the Vaudeville on the Strand. I know people who know people who advised the show on its magical content, so I was confident that I would enjoy the evening but I didn’t know what to expect.
What I got was a very traditional evening of magic, but
things did often go a bit wrong. Or very wrong.
If you’ve already read Dark Magic you will have some idea what’s going on. If you haven’t, let me explain …
The show that you get in ‘Magic Goes Wrong’ is supposed to
be a benefit for a charity set up to benefit the victims of magical accidents.
There are some famous real-life magical accidents. The bullet catch trick (and,
yes, that does feature in Dark Magic)
is supposed to have claimed several fatalities, most famously the Chinese
Magician Chung Ling Soo (in fact an American called William Ellsworth Robinson). Chung Ling Soo was shot dead on stage at the
Wood Green Empire in London in 1918.
Roy Horn (of Siegfried & Roy) was almost killed by a tiger in his Las Vegas act in 2003, ending his career. Houdini collapsed on stage after a student visiting his dressing room had hit him several times in the abdomen, something that Houdini could cope with when he was prepared in his act but was unable to survive when taken by surprise. (The student had had no ill-intent but hadn’t realised that Houdini needed to brace himself for the blow.)
Most magic shows,
though, pass without incident. Even in the cursed world of Dark Magic there is never a performance with multiple fatalities.
‘Magic Goes Wrong’, on the other hand, starts with the unfortunate demise of a
pigeon and builds up to a truly impressive body count. I didn’t believe the
trigger warning that starts the evening and which warns of a live bear. I
should have. And the people the bear (inevitably) savages should have taken it
more seriously too.
‘Magic Goes Wrong’
hasn’t a serious or meaningful bone in its twisted body. (Speaking of which,
the contortionist act is a minor highlight.) It is, however, consistently
hilarious. It also features some impressive real magic – much of which goes
unremarked by an audience far too caught up in the comedy to realise that they
really are watching things that should be impossible. Penn & Teller have
contributed an escape from a sealed water tank which I have seen them perform
as a major trick in their stage show. Here the magician apparently drowning on
stage is easily ignored while your attention is fixed on the antics of cast,
crew and unfortunate audience volunteer as they combine to doom the poor man to
a watery death. People vanish and reappear, girls are cut in half, and men in
small boxes are pierced through with spears. All you are concentrating on,
though, is the magician’s assistant opening the door of a vanishing cabinet
before the magician has left it, the stage set that closes just a few seconds
earlier than it needs to, or the sound effect that comes on at all the most
inappropriate moments.
I was going to recommend that you all buy tickets but, of course, you can’t go to see it now. With any luck it will be back on once the present crisis has passed. It’s something to look forward to.
Meanwhile, if you want comedy based on a magic show with an unfeasibly high body count, you could read Dark Magic. It’s escapist fun and we all need that right now. It may be hard to get hold of the paperback as Amazon concentrates on delivering more important things, but you can still buy it on Kindle. It’s just £1.99 and will take your mind off things for a day.
With everybody getting super excited about coronavirus, it’s a bit difficult to focus on the mundane business of producing a weekly blog post. I don’t generally write about things as late as the First World War or I would be writing about the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic which some people think killed more people than war itself.
The 1889 – 1890 flu pandemic is closer to my time period and is mentioned in Jean Stubbs’ “Victorian mystery” Dear Laura, which I reviewed here back in 2018. Known as Russian flu, it killed about one million people world-wide. The spread of Russian flu was extremely rapid. It seems to have started in St Petersburg early in December 1889. It reached Britain only six weeks later. (This does show that the absence of air travel doesn’t stop pandemic coronaviruses.)
Wars are often associated with disease outbreaks but I can’t think of an epidemic that is associated with the war against Napoleon. It’s horribly possible that the terrible death toll over the 20 years of fighting the French meant that deaths from disease did not stand out. The year after fighting finished was the “year without a summer” when, following a huge volcanic eruption in Indonesia, there was a year of low temperatures and heavy rains which resulted in agricultural failure across Europe. This led to the worst famine seen in 19th-century Europe. Doubtless there will have been many deaths from disease as well, but these were lost in the famine deaths.
The evacuation of Walcheren by the English
Regular readers of this blog will already know about Walcheren fever, which struck down so many British soldiers in 1809. It’s likely that Walcheren fever was not one sickness but a combination of malaria, typhus and typhoid fever. Malaria, of course, is not contagious and because the soldiers were effectively isolated abroad many of those with typhus and typhoid fever died before returning to Britain. Walcheren fever doesn’t seem to have spread into the general population (although, of course, typhus and typhoid fever were common at the time).
Moving further back into history we get to the Great Plague of London in 1665/6, as featured in Deborah Swift’s excellent (and profoundly depressing) A Plague on Mr Pepys. The Great Plague killed an estimated 100,000 people—almost a quarter of London’s population—in 18 months. Terrible as it was, it pales into insignificance compared to the 14th century Black Death, which is thought to have killed around half the population of Europe. It took literally hundreds of years for population levels to climb back to their pre-plague levels. The social and economic changes that resulted from the Black Death marked the beginning of the end of feudalism in Britain.
Back before the days of vaccines, deaths from contagious diseases were an everyday reality and epidemics culled the human population terrifyingly often. (I’ve only mentioned the big ones: minor outbreaks were too common to count.) Even as late as 1941 something as mundane as measles killed 1,145 people in England and Wales. To our forefathers, coronavirus deaths would hardly have been worth noticing. This is not to diminish the awfulness of seeing your friends and family die before their time, but it helps, perhaps, to see this latest outbreak of disease in the perspective of a long history of epidemics and pandemics.
References and credits
Valleron, Meurisse & Boelle (2008) Historical Analysis of the 1889–1890 Pandemic in Europe International Journal of Infectious Diseases
Public Health England: Measles notifications and deaths in England and Wales: 1940 to 2017
Images
Main image: Four Horsemen of Apocalypse, by Viktor Vasnetsov. 1887.
Newspaper cover: Supplement to Le Petit Parisien 1890
The evacuation of Walcheren by the English – By Henri Félix Emmanuel Philippoteaux
Two women lying dead in a London street during the great plague, 1665, one with a child who is still alive. Etching after R. Pollard II.. Credit: Wellcome Collection. Creative Commons licence
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