The officer corps of the British Army of the late Georgian and early Victorian periods was drawn from a diversity of backgrounds. Contrary to one perception, the aristocracy represented only a minor, if influential, component: more prolific were those drawn from the lesser gentry, minor landowners and the professional classes, and it was possible for a soldier of even humbler origins to rise to high rank if he possessed the talent and the luck. During the years of the Peninsular War, for example, no less than 803 ‘rankers’ were commissioned as officers,1 although it was difficult for them to prosper after the war if devoid of either influence or financial resources. The opportunities were a degree more auspicious for those who had some military connections, and one of the most remarkable officers from a relatively modest background is the subject of this study: Colin Campbell.
From a family more artisan than gentry, Colin Campbell had a reasonable education and was commissioned while still a boy. He began to learn his trade during a gallant career in the Peninsular War but, in common with many junior officers, Campbell’s promotion was slow in the limited opportunities for distinction following the end of the Napoleonic Wars. However, he served widely and clearly capably until he became famous for his command of the Highland Brigade in the Crimea, and, following that, in higher command in India, where he reached the pinnacle of his reputation.
In the pantheon of military heroes of the Victorian era, Colin Campbell was unusual, and while he may not have been among those of the first rank as a tactician, he surely was in terms of the rapport he established with those under his command. Fairness and understanding seem to have dictated his conduct, as related by a number who encountered him. William Munro graduated as MD from Glasgow in 1844 at the age of 22 and joined the 91st Foot as assistant surgeon in the same year. Ten years later he was appointed surgeon to the 93rd (Sutherland) Highlanders and shortly after joining his new regiment in the Crimea first met Campbell. As an experienced officer his observations on his commander are significant:
… on being introduced to him, he shook me kindly by the hand, and bade me to ‘look well after my regiment as it would soon need all my care and attention’. he was the picture of a soldier; strong and active, though weather-beaten. Ever after my first introduction to him, in the Crimea and in India, Sir Colin was kind and friendly to me.2
When recalling Campbell’s participation in the action at Balaklava, notably that involving the 93rd that became known as the Thin Red Line, Munro observed that after the regiment had fired a couple of volleys at the approaching Russian cavalry:
The men of the 93rd at that moment became a little, just a little, restive, and brought their rifles to the charge, manifesting an inclination to advance, and meet the cavalry half-way with the bayonet. But old Sir Colin brought them sharply back to discipline. He could be angry, could Sir Colin, and when in an angry mood spoke sharp and quick, and when very angry, was given to use emphatic language; and such he made use of on that occasion. The men were quiet and steady at a moment.
Although not born in the Highlands, but from Glasgow, Campbell understood the Highlanders, who clearly adored him, and their esteem was reciprocated. Munro explained:
The men were very proud of Sir Colin as a leader, and were much attracted to him also, and for the following reason. He was of their own warlike race, of their own kith and kin, understood their character and feelings, and could rouse or quiet them at will with a few words … He lived amongst them, and they never knew the moment when, in his watchfulness, he might appear to help and cheer or to chide them. He spoke at times not only kindly, but familiarly to them, and often addressed individuals by their names, for long use and constant intercourse with soldiers had made his memory good in this respect. He was a frequent visitor to the hospital, and took an interest in their ailments, and in all that concerned their comfort when they were ill. Such confidence in and affection for him had the men of the old Highland brigade, that they would have stood by or followed him through any danger. Yet there was never a commanding officer or general more exacting on all points of discipline than he.3
Another 93rd Highlander, William Forbes-Mitchell, quoted an example of Campbell’s memory for faces before the assault on the Sekundrabagh. A Welsh sergeant of the 53rd named Joe Lee, who had served previously under Campbell:
presuming an old acquaintance, called out, ‘Sir Colin, your Excellency, let the infantry storm … and we’ll soon make short work of the murderous villains!’ Sergeant Lee was known by his nickname, Dobbin, and Campbell remembered even this, asking, ‘Do you think the breach is wide enough, Dobbin?’ When the attack was mounted the 4th Punjabis in the first wave faltered, and as soon as Sir Colin saw them waver, he turned to Colonel Ewart, who was in command of the seven companies of the Ninety-Third … and said, ‘Colonel Ewart, bring on the tartan – let my own lads at them!’ Before the command could be repeated or the buglers had time to sound the advance, the whole seven companies, like one man, leaped over the wall, with such a yell of pent-up rage as I had never heard before or since.4
For all the rewards bestowed upon him, Campbell seems to have remained level-headed, even modest. On his first encounter with the 93rd after he had been elevated to the peerage, the regiment’s pipe-major, John MacLeod, said, ‘I beg your pardon, Sir Colin, but we dinna ken hoo tae address you noo that the Queen has made you a Lord’. Campbell replied, ‘Just call me Sir Colin, John, the same as in the old times; I like the old name best’.
The Times correspondent William Russell recalled an incident from the mutiny in which Campbell, with his arm in a sling following an injury sustained in a fall from his horse, sat on a native bed around a camp fire, surrounded by Baluchi troops:
Once he rose to give an order, when a tired Beloochee flung himself on the crazy charpoy, but was jerked off by an indignant comrade with the loud exclamation, ‘Don’t you see, you fool, that you are on the Lord Sahib’s charpoy?’ Lord Clyde broke in, ‘No – let him lie there; don’t interfere with his rest’, and himself took his seat on a billet of wood.
Inevitably a degree of romanticism intruded upon the reality of the Highland regiments and their commanders during the Victorian period, perhaps tending towards an over-simplification of complex factors. Some half a century after Campbell’s death it was stated that ‘Fifty years of arduous service had raised him from a carpenter’s son to the peerage, but he always remained a simple, God-fearing Scot, beloved by the rank and file of his army’.5 It is important that a remarkable individual is now reassessed and commemorated in an important new biography.
Philip Haythornthwaite
1 USJ, 1835, 413.
2 Munro, 2.
3 Munro, 36–7.
4 Forbes-Mitchell (London 1887 edition), 47–8.
5 Gilliat, 331.