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==== Raising and the War in Flanders, 1793-1795 ====

The war with the French Revolutionaries led to an increase in the [[British Army]] and among the regiments raised was the 80th Foot. There were two others of that number before the Staffordshire one. In America in 1758, Thomas Gage, then a Colonel and later to become a General, raised a Light Infantry Regiment of five strong companies designed for scouting and skirmishing. The long muskets of the period were cut down to make carbines and the short barrels were browned. It spent its short life of six years in America and was disbanded soon after the end of the Seven Years War in 1763. 

The second 80th, Royal Edinburgh Volunteers, was raised by public subscription in that city as one of the "Loyalty Regiments" in 1778. The declaration of war by France in that year caused a surge of patriotism in Britain for, while the war in America was unpopular, any conflict with France, long regarded as a national enemy, was a very different matter. Little is known of this unit except that it also served in America and fought with distinction under Cornwallis and was in the surrender at Yorktown. Like the first it had a life of six years before disbandonment; many years later a button belonging to this Regiment was found at Williamsburg and is now in the Museum. 

The third, the 80th Staffordshire Volunteers. later to become the 2nd Battalion, The South Staffordshire Regiment, was raised by Lord Henry William Paget in 1793, the "Letter of Service" authorising its formation being dated 12th September. Paget's appointment as Lieutenant-Colonel was the result of a personal application to Mr Pitt. From the present Marquis of Anglesey's "Two Brothers in the Netherlands, 1794-1795", published in the 1954 Summer and Autumn Journals of the Society for Army Historical Research and from information kindly supplied by the Marquis, interesting details are given of the raising of this new Regiment and its service in Flanders. 

Henry Paget was twenty-six when he got command; his younger brother, Edward, held the same rank in the 28th Gloucesters at the age of eighteen! Both had very distinguished military careers, each lost a limb in his country's service and both were Colonels of the 80th , although Henry was officially termed Commandant. He and his Regiment were indeed fortunate in having the wholehearted support of his father, the Earl of Uxbridge, a wealthy and influential landowner in Staffordshire and also Colonel of the Stafford Militia. To his eldest son, Uxbridge gave much financial help and warmly encouraged men from the Militia to transfer to the new unit, many of them were his tenants. He awarded the two Majorities in the unit to his brothers-in-law, Forbes and Josiah Champagnee both of whom were to command later; thus Paget's Majors were also his uncles. These brothers had seen service in America and writing many years afterwards the first Marquis of Anglesey stated: "They were greatly useful in forming the Regiment and in instructing me for I had everything to learn." 

The Earl generously gave commissions, which he could have sold. to the young sons of officers he knew and the adjutant was one Faucet (?) from the "Glouster" Militia and he also had a company. Again quoting the first Marquis: "Twas a beautiful Battalion of the very finest young men, many valuable non-Commissioned Officers that my father gave me, together with 20 or 30 Volunteers from his Regiment and a set of Officers of the best character and conduct." It seems probable that the twenty or thirty were also NCOs, for the greater part of the unit's original establishment of seven hundred came in fact from the Stafford Militia and thus the Regiment was given the name of Staffordshire Volunteers. As the 80th was sent from its Depot at Chatham to Guernsey after only ten weeks training, the men would be up to the rather low Militia standard when they transferred; in March 1794 the strength was increased to one thousand rank and file. 

By a coincidence two other sources of information on the early days of the 80th have come to light in recent years. A book 'Trusty and Well Beloved' edited by Caroline Duncan-Jones deals with the life and letters of William Harness, who, having served in the 69th and 29th Regiments, raised the necessary quota of men to become a company commander in the newly-formed 80th. His previous service was rewarded by his promotion to Major before leaving Guernsey and as the establishment then allowed two Lieutenant-Colonels, both Champagnees held this rank. Harness is writing to his wife and gives an interesting account of his twelve years in the Regiment; most of his letters are written as a field officer and he does not hesitate to criticise his seniors. 

A small leather-covered book, now in the Museum, contains the journal of Thomas St. George, who was commissioned as Ensign in Guernsey at the age of seventeen in 1794 and served in the 80th until his transfer to the 12th Foot in 1804. He accompanied his regiment to Flanders and the Isle Dieu and in 1796 as a Captain was sent to the Midlands on recruiting duties, but unfortunately he gives no particulars of his military duties during this period. Instead he records two leaves in Ireland and pleasure tours in the South Midlands with a wealth of detail, which suggest the guide books from which they may well have been copied. However, his almost day to day description of the Flanders campaign is of real interest and shows him as a well educated and intelligent young man: it is probable that John St. George who also served in the 80th and whose medal is in the Museum, was his brother. 

In Guernsey Paget got down to as much training as the place would permit and laments that the "uncommonly fine recruits" which the Earl continued to find had to sleep on the transports and only come on shore for exercise presumably drill and maybe musketry. Obviously accommodation on the Island was limited and full. The fact that the Band were all gentlemen in appearance and behaviour would be some consolation to Paget's father for having to provide them with "Scarlet Cloath (superfine)." It was not all work at Guernsey, the Islanders being very friendly and hospitable and Harness mentions one party to celebrate a British naval victory, during which the senior officers of the 80th consumed an incredible amount of wine, which was cheap and good. 

Paget accused the Governor, who feared invasion, of trying to keep the Regiment on the Island and there may have been some reason for the complaint. When Lord Moira sailed for Flanders the 80th did not accompany him and its Commanding Officer's indignation was inflamed by the fact his younger brother was in the thick of the fighting. At last orders came, but there was a further delay before they could be implemented and meanwhile Paget was on a cruise in a ship lent by the navy and was very lucky to be landed in Holland about the same time as his men. As a regiment the 80th was almost consistently unfortunate in its sea voyages and this was certainly no exception. Leaving Guernsey on 3rd September 1794, the convoy was delayed for two weeks by contrary winds in the Downs and did not reach Flushing until the end of the month. The transports, which had recently visited the West Indies, had not been fumigated and the result of this neglect was that soon after disembarkation the 80th was stricken with a form of yellow fever and lost, from sickness or death, over a third of its strength. 

In Flanders at this time the British Army had withdrawn behind the Dutch frontier. The lack of co-operation between the Allies has been mentioned and much of the reason for the failure of the campaign was the unreliability of the Austrians and Dutch, both of whom were subsidised by Britain with money which ought to have been spent on her own miserable troops. Apart from being unwilling to fight, the Dutch would not even go to the trouble and expense of fortifying their own towns and the Austrians were badly led and lacking in enterprise. With such Allies the Duke of York was in a most difficult situation; he himself had no experience as a commander and it is likely that much of his future fame as a first-class administrator was the result of the lessons learnt in Flanders. 

On arrival at Flushing the 80th joined Lord Cathcart's 6th Brigade, which soon moved to Dordrecht and here the delayed effects of the yellow fever took a heavy toll on the unit. Leaving its many sick behind it came up with the main British forces on the River Maas, but enemy pressure forced the Duke to evacuate his positions and, moving north, he crossed the Waal by a pontoon bridge. For some time the 80th helped to hold the right bank of the river, suffering intensely from the bitterly cold weather, which allowed the French to cross the rivers where they wished; soon even their guns could move over the thick ice. 

At an attack on Bommel on the last day of 1794 the Regiment had its first real action of the war and Ensign John Hervey was the first to place his Colour on the dyke which protected the town. The 19th, Green Howards, and 80th advanced across the slippery ice and then took Bommel with little difficulty. beating off a counter-attack with such heavy loss that the French asked under a flag of truce for permission to remove their dead and were given an hour to do so. St. George states that the 80th only had one man killed and four wounded though fired on from all quarters. After a night in the open fields in a snowstorm the Regiment with others moved back to Tuil across the river and took its turn on picquet duty before marching the twelve miles to Buren on the night of 3rd/4th January. Buren is about half-way between the Waal and the Lech and it is here that the 38th and 80th were in reserve on 5th January. 

During that month the 80th did a good deal of marching and counter-marching and for a week was based on Eulenburg, crossing the Lech several times until it suddenly and unexpectedly thawed. Lacking support from its Allies, with frozen rivers in front and a torrent behind, the British Army was in a perilous situation, which was rendered even more desperate by the French who crossed the frozen Maas and Waal in strength and had reached Meteren, north of the latter river, before there was any attempt at a counter-attack. This was led by the Hanoverian General Walmoden and was made by five regiments, the 80th being one, and in the sharp fight which followed the enemy was driven back across the Waal with heavy loss, British casualties being about fifty. Writing just after the action, Paget told his father: "The 80th were fortunate to be engaged and did very handsomely" and adds an ominous postscript: "A bad season for fighting." 

This was endorsed by St. George, who curiously does not mention the action at Meteren. By the middle of January the Allies were no longer able to hold the line of the Lech and the retreat to the north was probably the most ghastly in the history of the British Army. St. George relates that during the dreadful night march from Eulenburg to Amersfoort on 14th / 15th January, a distance of twenty-five miles, the cold was intense and the bitter wind so strong that the troops could scarcely wrestle against the driven snow. To lie down was fatal and when the carts went back to pick up stragglers they found two pathetic groups, one consisting of seven men, a woman & a child and the other a man, a woman with two children & yet another woman overtaken in labour. All were dead. The few found alive lost hands and feet from frostbite and would not survive the long retreat. 

Cathcart's Brigade, consisting of Light Cavalry and four Foot regiments, of which the 80th was one, made a circuitous detour well away from the rest of the force along the shores of the Zuider Zee; more than 170 miles through desolate country in the depths of a particularly severe winter. Even before the retreat the army was in a most deplorable state as a cutting from an old undated newspaper in the Museum records. "The new levies which successively joined the Army were, with a few honourable exceptions. of the most wretched description. The 78th and 80th were well composed. well equipped and efficient. The 85th, 87th and 89th were in appearance a disgrace to any service and the laughing stock of all who beheld them." The callous writer might have reserved his scorn for the authorities and not the unfortunate regiments; it was not their fault. 

But for the Earl of Uxbridge the 80th might well have been one of them and as it was the inefficiency of both the State and the service had done much to ruin what had been a fine regiment. The sole redeeming future of this appalling campaign was the undoubted heroism of the ill-fed and worse-clad British troops who were defeated not by the French, but by a combination of unreliable Allies, incompetence at home and in the field and a very harsh winter. One serious defect of the British Army at this period was the lack of experienced or even capable officers. As has been seen by Paget's appointment it was easy for a man with influence to obtain command and most had neither his ability nor enthusiasm; some lacked courage and four were tried by [[Courts-martial|Court Martial]] for cowardice after a single skirmish. Drunkenness was rife and the Colonels, some young and many owing their ranks to patronage and jobbery, were not the men to enforce discipline or even to realise its necessity. 

In addition there was an acute lack of drivers for the artillery, then civilians; a corrupt commissariat, which cheated the troops of food and pay and sold the animals' forage; and finally an almost useless medical corps manned by the dregs of the profession. All these contributed to the makings of the tragedy which befell this most unhappy expeditionary force. 

During four days of the retreat northwards the extreme cold, together with insufficient food and a serious lack of suitable clothing, killed over 6,000 men, women and children. Of this dreadful total the 80th lost 228 dead and 210 were later discharged as unfit for any type of service. Sick and wounded died where they fell or were frozen to death in the ambulance carts. And this while being pursued by a strong, but fortunately rather unenterprising enemy who had, of course, his own difficulties. Moreover this ghastly withdrawal was through a country in some places bitterly hostile to the British, for while the Dutch were friendly enough and at times even hospitable to parties strong enough to be feared, they ruthlessly murdered the many stragglers. 

Throughout February the retreat continued and while St. George gives the route and the daily marches, which varied from eight to fifteen miles space forbids fuller details. On the 11th the 80th crossed the Ems at Leer, but was ordered to re-cross on the 14th to keep the enemy away from the river; the frost continued and it marched over the ice. For the next week the 6th Brigade held a bridgehead which at places was as far as fifteen miles from the Ems and on the 20th the Light Companies of the Brigade and an Emigrant Regiment were formed into a unit under Lieutenant-Colonel Forbes Champagnee as a rearguard. During one withdrawal Champagnee had a narrow escape when he was chased by French Hussars across a river until the ice gave way and he spent a most uncomfortable half-hour in the semifrozen water before he managed to scramble up the bank. When the Light Companies tried to make a stand it was found, somewhat belatedly, they had no ammunition and Cathcart ordered them to make the best retreat they could: by forming line when the French got too close, they reached the protection of the main body of the rearguard. 

That same night, 20th February, a detachment of the 80th formed a covering party to allow the Brigade to retire, but before the withdrawal commenced there was a brush between a strong French party and British cavalry led by Paget. There was grave concern as to the fate of the main portion of the Brigade and particularly the 80th and 84th, presumably the rear units, and great relief when they marched in. Unfortunately their servants and baggage were too far ahead and were captured, together with the sick, by a raid of French cavalry. The lack of ammunition for the Light Companies and of an escort for the baggage indicate bad staff work. Reading St. George's journal, it appears the French Hussars were more enterprising than the British cavalry. 

During the remainder of the month the 80th was on outpost duty every second day. On 1st March the covering force was withdrawn and the Regiment moved, as usual in two wings, but when they reached the Ems the ice had melted and they had to march to Meppen, where there was a bridge. The river crossed, the 6th Brigade marched up the right bank to Leer and there on the 20th helped to repel a strong enemy attack on the town, but the chief credit for the victory goes to the British artillery which inflicted severe loss on the French. The last stage of this tragic retreat commenced on 30th March, when the 6th Brigade, with Paget now in command, marched via Oldenburg to Bremen and as at the latter town they had "colours flying etc." to quote St. George, it would appear that with better weather both morale and conditions had greatly improved. 

Lieutenant-General Harcourt, the British Commander, took the salute at Bremen on 5th April, but the 6th Brigade was not allowed to stay in the Free Town which was neutral. The Guards however were not so scrupulous and insisted on staying in Bremen and St. George states the soldiers had better quarters than their captains. Although what was left of the 6th Brigade embarked on the 12th it did not sail until the 24th and Portsmouth was not reached until 9th May; St. George estimates the strength of the British Army as seventeen thousand, but he may not have included the cavalry which left later. 

Fortescue considers that if the retreat had lasted another four days scarcely a man would have survived. He quotes a letter from General Walmoden to the Duke of York who had gone home before the retreat. "Your army is destroyed. The officers, their carriages and a large train are safe, but the men are destroyed." This terrible indictment was only too true; so great was the disgrace and misery of the campaign that no British account of it was published for many years. The future Duke of Wellington, who had served in it as a regimental commander, refused to discuss it and would only say: "I learnt what one ought not to do, and that is always something." He certainly took the bitter lesson to heart. It is of interest that the 80th received its baptism of fire quite close to Arnhem, where it was to earn such great fame 150 years later.