Staff appointments—Party to Melbourne—Mint detachment to Sydney—Survey of Aldershot heath—Department of Practical Science and Art—Staff ranks to the survey companies—Dress—Party detached to Heligoland—Also to Paris for the Exhibition—Corporal Mack’s services in testing woods—A foreigner’s surprise at the varied employments of the sappers—Sergeant Jenkins’ interview with the Emperor—Fire at the Manutention du Commerce—Radical change in the dress—Arms and accoutrements—Costume of the quartermasters—Supernumerary sergeants—Additional staff appointments—Exhibition at the Mauritius—Arrival of company from Bermuda, and removal to Aldershot—Chatham becomes the head-quarters—Rejection of the services of Van Diemen’s Land detachment by the Legislative Council, which are accepted by the Governor of New South Wales—Organization and pay of driver troop—Additions to the corps and various incidental alterations—Detail of establishment of corps—The band—Its costume—Dress of the bandmaster—Party recalled from Purfleet—Detachment to Hythe for rifle practice, &c.; the system pursued there becomes a leading feature in the instruction at Chatham.

Major Walpole, on his promotion to be lieutenant-colonel, was removed from the appointment of brigade-major to the corps, and succeeded by Captain Frederick A. Yorke, R.E., on the 17th February. Lieutenant-Colonel Walpole had been commissioned to the office from the Cape of Good Hope, where he had served for many years in command of the tenth company, and been twice dangerously wounded in action with the Kaffirs at Fort Peddie. During the six years he had held the appointment he carried out in all respects its requirements with a diligence, consideration, and success, that were of great advantage to the corps, and enhanced in public estimation its services and merits.

In Major Yorke, now Lieutenant-Colonel, the corps has the good fortune to have for its chief executive an officer who, for the greater part of his military career, has been much employed with it both at home and abroad. Under Major-General Matson, when brigade-major, he was the acting-adjutant at head-quarters, and thus early became acquainted with the organization, character, services, and resources of the royal sappers and miners.

On the 3rd March one sergeant and five rank and file sailed from Southampton for Melbourne to reinforce the civil staff employed in the survey of the waste districts of the Crown, and landed on the 24th July. This addition was made to the colonial establishment, as applications for land by the emigrants were increasing and urgent, and could not be met by any resources to be engaged in the colony.

In April a party, hutted on the bleak heath of Aldershot, commenced a series of surveys, having reference to the use of the moor as a military camp for periodical evolution and exercise. The detachment mustered at one time as many as twenty-four non-commissioned officers and men, and dwindled down to an initial party of a few choice hands to finish the operation. Captain Cameron, R.E., had the direction of the service; and corporal James Macdonald, now sergeant, a non-commissioned officer of tried ability and indefatigable activity, was its local superintendent. In ten months the detachment, after being instructed by the corporal, completed a survey of a selected district of about 800 acres for the Commander-in-Chief; another of some 1,500 acres for the professional use of Major-General Sir Frederic Smith; and a general one for the Ordnance, including the ground specially surveyed, extending over an area of 13,000 acres. Each survey provided its contours to suit particular requirements; and the whole range of duties for providing data for the plans, usually performed by different parties, with qualifications adapted to each particular service, were wholly carried out by corporal Macdonald^[128] and his party. The work has since been engraved on the 6-inch scale.

Six rank and file to complete the mint detachment at Sydney, embarked in two parties on the 8th April and 19th June, taking with them the portable houses, shops, machinery, and stores necessary for the formation of the establishment. The men had all been instructed prior to leaving the royal mint in London in the art of coining, and were taught by Messrs. Walker, of Millwall, the method of fitting together the iron roofing, cisterns, girders, &c., to form the mint buildings. One man had also been instructed by Messrs. Whitworth and Co. at Manchester, in the manipulation and action of the several lathes to be used in the coining processes. They respectively reached Sydney on the 10th July and 24th October.

Three men were withdrawn from the department of science and art in the summer for service in the East, viz., two for employment as photographers, and one—corporal Dickson—as conductor of the pontoon equipment and stores. One of the photographers—corporal Pendered—had, while in that department the care of the students’ drawings sent from the various local schools of art, in competition for prizes offered by the commissioners. Corporal Dickson, who until his removal had acted as a clerk at Marlborough House, received from the Board of Trade a gratuity of 5l. in recognition of his usefulness. The non-commissioned officers who remained under Captain Owen, R.E., were corporals Frederic Key and James Mack; the former, stated to be full of invention and intelligence, continued throughout the year to act as overseer of the civil carpenters employed at Gore and Marlborough Houses; and the latter, remarkable for his good information and acquirements, was found a most useful clerk and draughtsman. It should also be noted that one or other of these non-commissioned officers travelled during the autumn to several provincial towns in England and Scotland, such as Nottingham, Coventry, Sheffield, Warrington, York, &c., and exhibited to local institutions in connection with the central school of design at Somerset House, a collection of students’ drawings for which prizes had been awarded at the spring examination at Gore House. The exhibition was so arranged as to be packed and conveyed from town to town with readiness and facility, and wherever they itinerated with their charge, were treated with attention and courtesy.

As a reward for undoubted merit two staff ranks—sergeant-major and quartermaster-sergeant—were given to the survey companies on the 28th July by Sir Hew Ross, Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance. Similar appointments had been held by the companies for many years with only modified advantages, but now they were constituted permanent ranks and carried with them all the benefits prescribed by the rules of the service.

This year the moustache, under certain restrictions, was permitted to be worn; and the Kilmarnock bonnet, discarded in 1837, was revived. Its dimensions, however, were of a more reasonable measurement than in olden times, and suitable for campaigning. A yellow band was added, also a plain yellow ornament on the crown, and the scanty peak worn for nearly forty years, was replaced by one familiarly termed the war peak, sufficiently large to offer an efficient shade to the face from the sun.

Leaving the great events which occurred about this period, to be treated without interruption in subsequent chapters, the more ordinary incidents of the corps will first be disposed of.

Unable to obtain British troops to furnish contingents of sufficient magnitude for the East, parliament voted the formation of regiments of foreigners to meet the pressure. Depôts for their enrolment were fixed at different places, but the principal station was at Heligoland, a small rocky island in the North Sea. As however the embodiment could not take place without the means of sheltering the force, the island itself having only accommodation for the native population, Lieutenant A. R. Lempriere of the engineers, with three sapper carpenters, were sent there in March, in the steamer ‘Hamburg.’ Towards the end of the month the party landed, and with the assistance of some broad-backed women—the men being too indolent to work—the huts brought out were carried up the stairs—a stupendous flight exceeding 200 steps formed in the face of the steep cliff—to the position where the cantonment was to be established. Hopeless to complete them within the time required, twelve other sappers, mostly carpenters, under sergeant Goodear, sailed from Woolwich on the 28th July. In a few days they were deep in the work. Rows of huts covered with Croggan’s asphalted felt, built in streets, were always ready by the time the troops arrived to occupy them. It took one hundred and four of these portable houses to accommodate the legion. Tanks were also built to supply water in case of fire, and an apparatus was erected for distilling sea-water so that it might be used for domestic purposes by the troops. When all these services were completed, the sappers no longer needed in Heligoland were shipped for England, landing at Folkestone on the 29th December. Lieutenant Lempriere remained, as did also sergeant Goodear, to oversee the native workmen in the formation of roads and in executing repairs to the huts. At the conclusion of the war they returned home. The efficiency and usefulness of the party were warmly acknowledged by Colonel Steinbach, commanding the legion.

At the instance of the Royal Society, a sergeant and three rank and file were sent to Paris in April to exhibit, at the Palais de l’Industrie, several specimen maps and some of the chief instruments used in the trigonometrical surveys of the United Kingdom. The two non-commissioned officers employed under the Board of Trade at the department of Practical Science and Art also accompanied Captain Fowke and Mr. Henry Cole, to assist in the British section of the Exhibition. The sappers were—

• Sergeant—William Jenkins.
• Corporals—Frederick Key and James Mack.
• Second-corporal—Nicholas Clabby.
• Privates—Ludovico Hart and James Kelly.

Besides arranging spaces for the exhibitors, opening the cases as they arrived, and arranging the articles for exhibition, the sappers turned their hands to a hundred different duties, making themselves generally useful and sustaining the character which the corps had received for its services at the Great Exhibition of 1851. The British department was surveyed by them and corporals Mack^[129] and Clabby drew the plans. Key was the overseer of skilled labour and likewise superintended the hanging of the paintings at the Palace des Beaux Arts. The remainder had the care of the professional instruments. Of these Hart was instructed at Paris in the process of photography by Mr. Thurston Thompson, and the proficiency he attained there in the art, has introduced him to a similar duty at Southampton, in which the progress he has made promises to be a great saving to the public by reducing plans photographically, and thus superseding the hand-labour of draughtsmen.^[130]

The Emperor in one of his visits to the Palace examined the maps and instruments, and sergeant Jenkins had the singular distinction of explaining their nature to His Imperial Majesty.^[131] This was the first party of English soldiers that had been in Paris since the army of occupation quitted the suburbs of the French metropolis in 1815. Appearing invariably in the uniform of the corps they were regarded with peculiar interest, and from all quarters were received with a friendliness more than ordinarily debonair and cordial. For their assistance in extinguishing a fire at the Manutention du Commerce, the press of Paris handsomely acknowledged their services.^[132] Individuals left for England at different times, and on the return of the last two in January, 1856, the Board of Trade honoured the whole party with presents. Sergeant Jenkins received a silver watch with the most approved compensation arrangements for use in connexion with astronomical observation; Key a gold one; Mack an expensive photographic apparatus; and the other three each a case of beautifully finished mathematical instruments. The gifts bore an inscription to the effect that they were given “for services at the Paris Exhibition, 1855.” The French Commissioners also gave them bronze medals.

An agitation which for more than a quarter of a century had exposed the inappropriateness of the old costume, at last succeeded in effecting its abandonment. Involved in the change the royal sappers and miners adopted an uniform under royal sanction, which has the credit of being the neatest in the service.

Late in the summer the coatee with its double breast, short body, garish trimmings, and narrow skirts gave place to a scarlet single-breasted tunic with facings and edgings of dark blue plush. Falling back with a curve, the collar is bound all round with yellow cord while the pointed cuffs are embellished with an Austrian knot of yellow cord which, stretching over the plush rises with a flowing involution more than seven inches up the sleeve. Plain skirts measuring about twelve inches long, lined with white shalloon, are broken in their plainness by two upright pocket slashes with plush edgings having three points and as many buttons. Double cords take the place of the huge epaulettes of former days, and the buttons unaltered in shape and device, are sewn two inches asunder down the breast as low as the waist, and two smaller ones add to the ornamentation of the cuff. All ranks wear the same description of tunic. That for the drivers is shorter in the skirts for riding.

Corresponding with their grades the sergeants and staff-sergeants have finer cloth and wear royal gold cord on those parts where the rank and file display yellow worsted cord only. Rank is shown by chevrons of gold lace worn above the elbow, but the badges to denote the staff-sergeants occur just above the sleeve knot with the points upward. Lance-corporals have one stripe on the right arm; other ranks have the marks on both arms. Second corporals one on each arm; corporals two; sergeants three and an embroidered crown; colour-sergeants an equal number of chevrons surmounted by an open banner and based by a couple of crossed swords; and the staff-sergeants four badges of broader lace and an embroidered crown. The last, in addition, have facings of garter blue silk velvet, shoulder knots of treble twisted gold cord with blue eyes bearing silver embroidered grenades; sleeve knots traced in and out with Russia gold braid and the skirts lined with white kerseymere. The bugle-major’s rank, in addition to the chevrons and crown, is indicated by a musical device with banners, which must have puzzled the professors of embroidery to make it sufficiently characteristic, elaborated with cross trumpets, rams’ horns, tambourines, and other insignia, around a lyre and grenade.

The artificers of the driver troop—farriers, shoeing smiths, wheelers, and collar-makers—are distinguished by the usual devices, worn above the elbow.

The buglers wear worsted embroidered cross trumpets on both arms, and the good conduct men are distinguished by badges of narrow gold lace on the right arm just above the knot.

No better colour for trowsers than dark Oxford mixture cloth could be introduced. They have therefore been retained, as also the red stripes down the outer seams. The working trowsers are of the same colour, and similarly striped, but a few shades coarser in texture. The driver troop wear strapped trowsers of the regimental quality, of which each man receives two pairs annually.

In the midst of a variety of conflicting ideas as to what constitutes the best head-dress, the uncomfortable chaco still holds its unsightly place as a component of sapper uniform. Top-heavy for the drivers in riding, the chaco forms no part of their uniform, and so the forage-cap is made to do double duty.

The fatigue jacket is of red cloth. Loose and suitable for working it descends as low as the hips, but is militarized by blue cloth pointed cuffs, single twisted shoulder-cords of yellow worsted, and a blue cloth rounded collar. As before, the buttons are small and convex, bearing the garter device, and worn about an inch apart, evincing less coxcombry than in the defunct days of close buttons. All the non-commissioned officers wear gold chevrons and gold single twisted shoulder-cords.

Scarlet jackets, after the fashion of the fatigue ones, are worn by all ranks on drill parades and in walking. In addition to their chevrons the sergeants and colour-sergeants wear embroidered crowns, the latter rank being distinguished from the former by a fourth chevron. Besides the plain single-breasted blue surtout, modernized with a rounded collar, the staff-sergeants appear, on parade occasions, in scarlet jackets with the badge of their rank, gold studs down the front, and dark blue silk velvet cuffs and collar, both trimmed with Russia gold braid, and finished with what the tailors, in the poetry of their trade, term crowsfeet. There are no buttons on the jacket, except two on each cuff and two to sustain the double shoulder-cord. The fronts are closed by hooks and eyes.

The cloth forage-cap—a delicate institution of peaceable times—was set aside by the adoption of a small Kilmarnock bonnet and chin-strap, well suited for the rough usages of war. Worn with a dragoonish air in the day, it offers itself as a substitute for a pillow at night without the fear of spoiling its shape. It is of dark blue wool banded with a yellow stripe manufactured in the web and decorated with a brass boss in the centre of the crown. The buglers wear the distinction of a pair of crossed trumpets on the front of the cap, while the sergeants and staff-sergeants have small dark-blue cloth caps with large projecting peaks, trimmed with scarlet piping and gold lace bands. The crown of the cap, à la cavalry, is formed of eight pieces—a curious fancy—radiating from the centre and covered at the point of union with a gold netted convex boss. The band of the staff-sergeants is wider and richer than that of the sergeants.

That important article of dress, “the ammunition boot,” has been much improved in these late days. Before railways were invented the laced-up boot was a favourite among soldiers, particularly those who could boast of having performed long marches in the Peninsula and France; but when travelling by rail began to be the fashion of the service, it was discovered that the laced-up boot was not only odious in regimentals and uncomfortable, but not water-tight. So by degrees the Blucher boot was introduced in the army, and the sappers, the last troops, perhaps, to adopt it, received Bluchers this year for the first time. The troop of drivers wear half Wellingtons.

The carbine introduced in 1843 being discarded, the Lancaster percussion-musket was given to the corps late in the year. Bored elliptically without groove, and carrying an elongated bullet, its range exceeds 1,000 yards: that of the carbine, even in extravagant instances of flight, scarcely ever struck a mark at 300 yards and was uncertain at 200. After a few rounds had been fired it was inefficient, and impromptu expedients had to be resorted to, when the bore fouled with the powder, to ram the cartridge home. Many a man broke the ranks to find a brickbat or other rude assistance to hammer the ramrod into the barrel. These primitive severities are now at an end. The bayonet can be used in the double capacity of a sword or bayonet. With a hilt partly of black skin cross-pressed, and partly brass, with a transverse brass bar guard, it is fixed to the musket by a suture and spring. The blade, about two feet long, has a rounded back and runs on with a spine to the point, from whence a return stretches with a slight swell up its back, and then loses itself in the spine about ten inches from the tip. Thus the sword for a certain distance is two-edged, and when fixed, the length of the musket, prepared for a charge, is shorter by one inch than the abandoned carbine and sword bayonet.

The accoutrements remain as formerly; but the appointments of the staff-sergeants, now of white patent buff, consist of a waist-belt with slings and gilt waist-plate bearing the royal arms, and a pouch-belt, both plain and two inches broad. To the latter is attached a black leather pouch carried by gilt rings and mountings, having on the flap the device of the royal arms and supporters with the corps motto. Swords hilted like those of the quartermasters, but of a peculiar metal, sheathed in steel scabbards and tasselled with gold acorns, complete the improvements of this period.

The drivers have no rifles or muskets, but are armed with light Prussian swords having half basket-hilts and buff leather tassels. The gripe is partly of black japanned wood, ridged; all else, with the scabbard, are steel. The narrow buff waist-belt, with slings which suspend the sword, have a plain brass waist-plate. In addition, the non-commissioned officers have a buff pouch-belt carrying a small plain black leather pouch. The former bears a brass slide at the breast as a substitute for a buckle. All ranks wear swan-necked spurs with spiked rowels.

Of the dress of the quartermasters nothing has yet been recorded in these pages. Their costume is similar to that of the subalterns of engineers, with the exception of the appointments. The tunic harmonizes with that of the staff-sergeants, except that the sleeves bear no device beyond the Austrian knot, and the gold cord is larger.

The jacket is also similar to the staff-sergeants, deviating only by the addition of gold Russian braid down the fronts and round the girth, finished at the centre of the waist and collar seam with crowsfeet.

A waistcoat is also worn of scarlet cloth, single-breasted, with gilt studs crowded down the front. Hooks and eyes serve the place of buttons. Collar, pockets, and edges are trimmed with gold braid and graced with crowsfeet at the centre of the collar, and at each end and centre of the pockets.

A surtout is permitted as a lounging appendage to the costume, but it would require the professional assistance of a Buckmaster to describe without fault the man-millinery of this military frock. It is of dark-blue cloth, single-breasted, opening five inches down the breast to show the waistcoat, up to which from the waist the fronts are closed by hooks and eyes. Eight loops of braid nearly two inches broad, with two rows of netted barrels or olives on each side—two on each loop—descend from the shoulders in lessening lines to the waist. The ends of the loops inwards have flys three inches long which fall down like tags, covering the inner row of barrels. The front edges, rolling collar, and pointed cuffs, hind arm and back seams are trimmed with braid seven-eighths of an inch broad traced in and out and finished on the cuffs and centre of collar with crowsfeet. From the back seams flow two streamers eight inches long on each skirt of the same width of braid as that which covers the seams; and the tracing on both edges terminates in two crowsfeet. All the trimming and traceries are of mohair braid.

The trowsers are the same as the uniform of the corps, but with gold lace stripes one inch and three-quarters wide for dress occasions. The cloak is of blue cloth, riding length, with sleeves. Lined with scarlet shalloon, and amassed with a cape, make it waterproof in a storm. An upright collar of scarlet cloth with gilt fuming grenades, chains, hooks, and buttons, make up the sum of its ornaments.

Every non-commissioned officer, as he ascends the weary ladder of preferment, keeps his eye steadily on the cocked-hat. It would therefore be unpardonable to omit the description of a badge which has given rise to more ambition in the ordnance corps than can possibly be satisfied. It is the only commission open to them, and the struggle to gain it is far more difficult than for born gentlemen to attain the rank of General. If life be spared this comes as a matter of course, but only one in thousands can hope to be invested with the latter. The cocked-hat then is a small one compared with the Kelvenhuller, and though as confined in its dimensions as the Ramilies, is very unlike it. It seems to be a sort of compromise between the two. The right leaf stands six inches and three-quarters high, while the fan, its fellow leaf, tops it by nearly an inch. The former bears a cockade of black watered ribbon and a gold-laced loop two inches broad, which is stayed by a regimental button. The corners or shoots are nearly five inches long and two and a half broad, bearing tassels of small gold and crimson bullion affixed to gold netted pads which lie snugly in the recesses formed by the overlapping of the fan. The ribbon worn on the sides of the left leaf is of plain black silk. Surmounting all is the plume, five inches and a half long, made of cock-tail feathers, which fall over the crown of the hat in the shape of a mushroom.

The forage-cap is assimilated to that worn by the staff-sergeants; the gold-laced band being broader and richer.

Coming to the appointments, they consist of waist and pouch belts of white patent leather, respectively one inch and a half and two inches wide, the former having narrow slings, gilt buckles, rings, and waist-plate with the corps’ device in silver, and the latter a gilt engraved buckle and mountings to correspond with the hilt of the sword. These ornaments are worn on a fly of the belt just above the pouch, which is small, of black patent leather, bearing the regimental badge of the royal arms and supporters with the corps’ motto, and attached to the belt by rings issuing from gilt leaves. The sword is thirty-two inches and a half long by one inch and a half wide. Its gripe, of black fish-skin, is ribbed with treble gold wire, sustained by a plain gilt back, the lower half grated to assist the grasp. The hilt is of the half-basket kind, formed of rolled gilt metal, scrolled, pierced, and engine-turned, embellished with a gold acorn attached to a length of royal gold cord, which after ramifying the perforations, evolves in a tassel. To complete the details, let it be added, that the scabbard which sheathes the blade—proof against any amount of hard work and figured with military insignia—is of burnished steel.

Some important augmentations had been made to the corps, which will be found among the services out of which they in great part arose. Other desirable additions followed, which, belonging more to the incidents of home, will follow in this chapter. A number of sergeants usually employed as clerks, drill-masters, and instructors in the schools, always kept the companies to which they belonged more or less impoverished; so to end a system that could not be avoided, but which operated injuriously, Lord Panmure gave authority, on the 9th October, for the removal of fourteen specially employed sergeants from the companies, bearing them on the rolls of the corps as supernumeraries. Two of the number were appointed staff-sergeants.

Widening daily into unwieldy dimensions, with a meagre controlling staff, gave rise to other essential appointments in the corps. On the 17th December, an Adjutant (Captain F. E. Cox, R.E.) and a Quartermaster (Michael Bradford, from the rank of sergeant-major) were commissioned.^[133] The appointment of Brigade-Major, long felt to be an inadequate staff rank, was changed to that of Assistant Adjutant-General. Heretofore the chief executive of the royal sappers and miners held no higher regimental rank than that of Captain, with the staff commission of Brigade-Major. Under the same authority a sergeant-major and a quartermaster-sergeant were added to the corps.

There was an Exhibition at Fort George, Mauritius, in December, 1855, of a collection of productions indigenous to the island, and subjects of a constructive nature, to represent the industrial habits of the community in that distant region. Indebted for the idea to its great prototype in London, the Exhibition originated with the 22nd company of the corps stationed there, and most of the articles—such as models of inventions and objects of mechanical interest in the island—were contributed by non-commissioned officers and privates of the company, of whom sergeant Frederick Hibling was the chief exhibitor. The exposition was open for a week. Each day had its appointed charge varying from 3d. to 2s., and the surplus receipts were applied to charitable purposes.

From Bermuda the 21st company arrived on the 22nd December, leaving a small detachment of invalids to carry on the works. Its removal was accompanied by a representation which told of the loss the colony would sustain by the step; but the urgency of affairs in the East admitted of no consideration interfering with the resolve of sending the company to the Crimea, constituted as it was of climatized men and competent artificers. At the time of their landing, however, there were strong indications of diplomatic negociations putting an end to existing differences; but to prepare the company for the worst, it was forwarded to Aldershot on the 8th January, 1856, under the command of Lieutenant J. H. Wilson, to be trained in camp to the discipline and usages of war.

Another of the changes which resulted from the incorporation of the ordnance service with the army was the removal of the head-quarters from Woolwich to Chatham. Successive Directors of the establishment at Chatham had shown the benefits probably to accrue to the corps by the measure, but forty years’ representation were insufficient to dispose of the counter-advantages which were considered to be the effect of instruction carried out at two stations—one for forming the soldier, the other for working up the soldier into a sapper. At a time when the country was expecting changes, and those changes promised a return to the State more beneficial than an adherence to old systems was likely to yield, nothing was permitted to stand in the way of making the trial. Accordingly the fiat was issued by Lord Panmure; and Chatham from the 10th January became the head-quarters of the corps. On that day, Lieutenant-Colonel Yorke, Assistant Adjutant-General, marched into Brompton Barracks at the head of the sappers, leaving for the works at Woolwich a strong company quartered in temporary huts erected in Mill Hill road.

A detachment had been sent to Van Diemen’s Land in 1852 at the request of the Colonial Legislature to carry on the surveys of the settlement, but it had barely entered on its duties when a feeling of hostility was shown to its employment. Whenever a chance offered of presenting it in an unfavourable aspect, the Legislative Council greedily accepted it, and gave the imperial party the full weight of its opposition. In August, 1855, the Governor-General sent a message to the Council recommending Captain Hawkins who commanded the surveyors, for the appointment of Surveyor-General, but between a select committee nominated to inquire into its necessity and the Legislative Council, the office was never conferred. Matters went on coldly enough; the Council had grown stubborn in its sentiments; and to show that the colony had a will of its own, notwithstanding a royal warrant had been issued to form the detachment in accordance with the warm wishes of those who had authority to represent the wants of the province, the colonial secretary coolly intimated to Captain Hawkins, on the 16th October following, that himself and detachment were at the disposal of the Governor of New South Wales! The men composing the party were volunteers, had made sacrifices to emigrate, had purchased land in the vicinity of their labours, and were collecting about them members of their families, who, by ones and twos, had struggled to leave their English homes and were on their way to distant Tasmania. In revoking the service, the conduct of the rulers was as heartless and supercilious as absolute; and in beguiling men, by fair promises, to volunteer to serve them; then discountenancing their efficient exertions, and finally, without consulting their wishes, arranging for their transfer to any colony which might be in need of such a detachment, was a feature in colonial management strongly savouring of exceptional faith. The end of all was, that a few of the party, sooner than break up their new homes, took their discharges, and the remainder leaving Hobart Town on the 9th February, arrived in five days after at Sydney, to renew in that colony, under the auspices of Sir William Denison, those services so little appreciated by the censors of Van Diemen’s Land. Captain Hawkins, still in command of the detachment, fixed his head-quarters at Paramatta.

Under the authority of Lord Hardinge, the Commander-in-Chief, dated 2nd April, several increases and alterations took place in the corps. The 23rd company being composed of drivers was thrown out of the numeral roll of the companies and designated the A troop of the royal engineer field equipment. Its constitution and pay was fixed as under:—

To fill up the gap occasioned by its withdrawal, another company, numbered the 23rd, was formed in April. The Corfu company which held a distinct organization, had its establishment risen from 82 to 120, so that it might take its place among the general service companies. A Band was also formed, consisting of one sergeant, one corporal, one second corporal, and thirty private musicians. The detachments raised by special royal warrants for service in Van Diemen’s Land and Sydney were absorbed in the 20th company. The result of all was that the corps gained a clear augmentation of 169 non-commissioned officers and men, and its organization was established according to the following detail:—

This establishment was far greater than had been allowed even during the oppressive years of the Peninsular war, and the number of companies, long in its teens, had swept on by successive augmentations to 27—one being a driver troop.

Without any increase of pay from state sources, the band is supported by an annual subscription from the officers of engineers managed by a committee, of which the assistant adjutant-general is president. Though never recognised, a brass band had been in existence for many years, but when the new order of things was sanctioned, a reed band was established as more in keeping with the refinements of a distinguished corps. The accomplished features of an operatic orchestra were also introduced combined with the sacred musical accessories of the church; and the bald services of a garrison chapel which, until the arrival of the head-quarters at Chatham, was conducted without singing, has recently been varied and made additionally grateful by the use of chants, glorias, psalms, &c.^[134]

The costume of the band, approved by Prince Albert, is perhaps the handsomest in the service though the contrasts are extreme. A black bear-skin head-dress, scarlet cloth trousers, and white cloth tunic constitute the uniform. The first is free of embellishment and without feather or plume, but has a gilt curb chain for the chin. The trousers have a stripe of gold lace five-eighths of an inch broad down the outer seams, a distinction never before, it is believed, conferred on any band in the service. After the Hungarian fashion, but less picturesque, the tunic is tastefully trimmed with gold lace, gold traceries, and gold square untwisted cords for the shoulders. All the lacing is half an inch wide and the tracing is worked with Russian braid. Cut on the model of the corps’ tunic, except that the skirts have no slashes and the fronts are curved, its facings and edgings, of silk plush, are of a bright blue, and agreeably harmonize with the white cloth, giving it an appearance of ultra delicacy. Let but a storm soak it, and its elegance departs. The collar is laced all round and traced on the inner edges, enlivened by eyes in the angles, and a crowsfoot at the centre. The cuffs are similarly laced, and traced on both edges with a series of eyes and finished with crowsfeet. Down the front edges and back seams to the bottoms of the skirts both in front and rear, the lace again occurs traced in and out and figured at the terminations with a play of artistic fancy developed into highly florid crowsfeet. Simpler configurations crown the lacing of the back seams, which is relieved at the waist by ornithological devices resembling, with greater truth, a sprig of shamrock than the object to which the tailors have so strangely likened them. Down each breast are five bars compressed in length as they reach the waist, traced on both edges, having eyes at the corners and terminating at the points, with the ever-present crowsfeet. Except the two shoulder buttons, the tunic possesses no adornment of this kind, the fronts being closed by hooks and eyes.

The waist-belt is of white patent leather; the plate the same as that worn by the staff sergeants, the sword has for its hilt an ornamental Maltese cross bearing the device of a buglehorn, and sheathed in a black leather scabbard with brasses ornamentally shaped. It is shorter than the one worn by the buglers. The forage cap is similar to the sergeants; but the jacket and trousers are like the drill dress of the privates with an addition to the jacket of twisted gold shoulder cords, blue cloth edgings, and blue cloth piping down the hind arms and back seams terminating with blue cloth cushions as substitutes for buttons.

A very pleasing uniform has been adopted for the bandmaster, of scarlet cloth without breast bars. In all other essential particulars it is laced, traced, and figured like the tunics of the musicians. The facings and edgings are of garter blue silk velvet. The collar is traced with a series of eyes on the inner edges of the lace; and the shoulder-cords trebly twisted are ornamented with embroidered grenades. The trousers, for bandmaster and bugle-major, are of dark Oxford mixture with a stripe of rich gold lace, one inch and three quarters wide, down each outer seam. In undress is worn a dark-blue cloth surtout, single-breasted, hooked up to the neck, with upright rounded collar, and five loops two inches wide of mohair braid down the front, which are further ornamented by the addition of a row of netted barrels, and flys. All the rest of the trimming is similar to that on the surtout of the quartermasters. The forage cap and trousers are also similar, but the accoutrements of the bandmaster with one exception correspond with those of the staff sergeants.

Instead of a sword he wears an elegant scimitar, short and light, in a brass scabbard, the hilt being composed of masks and foliage of the “cinque-cento” period. The curve of the gripe issues in a lion’s head, with ring attached, bearing a flowing treble twisted fretwork chain united to a ring at the guard.

Considered advisable to add to the system of instruction at Chatham the art of photography, four non-commissioned officers were sent to Kensington Palace on the 6th March to learn the process; and after being taught at Gore House by Mr. Thurston Thompson, returned to Chatham on the 5th May; since which date photography has formed an interesting item in the instructional proceedings of the establishment.

Akin with this is the system introduced by Captain Du Cane on his return from the Crimea for teaching non-commissioned officers and men the method of using the electric telegraph for military purposes. So successfully had the schooling of the men in this department of field usefulness been conducted, that in June a small force of sapper telegraphists was sent to Aldershot to establish the field telegraph. Three stations were soon in action, one at each of the camps, and one at Farnborough close to the electric telegraph company’s office. Double needle instruments were used at each of the stations and double wires connected with them stretched over the roofs of the huts and borne over the open spaces by poles rising between twenty and thirty feet high. A non-commissioned officer or more acted at each station and two always at Farnborough. Line orderlies attended the sappers to carry the messages.

Purfleet, attached from time immemorial to the Woolwich district, was, under the new order of things, combined with the created district of Waltham, and the small party of six sappers, which for many years had been employed in the Ordnance repairs at the station, was removed to Woolwich in May.

To add to the military efficiency of the corps, one sergeant and eight rank and file, commanded by Lieutenant G. R. Lempriere, were sent to Hythe in May to learn under Colonel Hay the approved method of rifle practice and judging distances. Their success was looked upon as very satisfactory. Though less time at drill than other detachments they stood well in the comparison, and one of their number, lance-corporal John Yelland, bore away the prize pen and certificate awarded by Colonel Hay. He was the best shot out of 164 men of different regiments who had for some months been contending for the honour. The sappers returned to Chatham on the 5th August, and the information obtained at Hythe has become one of the leading features of instruction at the royal engineer establishment. Lieutenant Lempriere is the instructor; and some of the men who have passed through his hands have proved themselves better shots and better in judging distances than the Hythe prizeman.