38
THE YPRES TIMES
Early in the reign of Charles II they were placed under the command of the
Earl of Linlithgow and they fought against the Covenanters at Bothwell Bridge.
In 1680 they marched to London where they remained in the English service though
they did not come under the English establishment until 1707 the year of the union
by Act of Parliament of the two countries, England and Scotland.
In 1689 one battalion embarked for the Netherlands under Marlborough and
was engaged in action the same year, and in the next at the battle of Fleurus. In
1691, at the seige of Mons, the rank of lieutenant-colonel was first granted to its
captains by William of Orange. In the following years the Scots Guards took part
in the battles of Steenkirk and Landen. In 1694 it was quartered at Bruges. In
the next year, 1695, it distinguished itself highly at the seige of Namur it advanced
without firing a shot exposed to a murderous fire of the enemy behind the town's
ramparts. Displaying great steadiness under fire they drew close to the palisades
where they poured volley after volley into the ranks of panic-stricken defenders."
There appear to have been two battalions of the Scots Guards from the earliest
period of their history. One had been sent to the wars in 1689 and the other
followed subsequently. In 1696 one was sent home on the news of a threatened
French invasion. But it re-embarked the following year and rejoined the main
army in Brabant.
They returned for a while to Scotland during the reign of Queen Anne, but
with the failure of the Stuart dynasty they remained in the English service, loyal
soldiers of the Hanoverian George I. They took no part in the Bonny Prince
Charlie movements. On the other hand they distinguished themselves in the
foreign wars, especially at the battle of Dettingen, and they took part also in the
battle of Fontenoy. They became known as the Third Guards, the territorial
designation being perhaps obnoxious to the Georges.
Some detachments of Scots Guards served against the rebellious American
colonists, but I have not been able to trace where exactly they were engaged.
The regiment served in France and Spain during the war against Napoleon.
It obtainied new fame by a very gallant charge at the battle of Lincelles. That
was in 1793. In 1799 one battalion was quartered in Holland. In 1800 one
battalion was sent to Egypt and took part in the battle of Alexandria. Returning
it was sent to Hanover. In 1807 it was sent to Denmark and occupied Copenhagen.
The other battalion had been sent to Spain and was soon engaged under Wellington
in the Peninsular War. It served in the Peninsular until July 1814 when it had to
shift to meet the new menace of Napoleon. It had taken part in the capture of
Madrid and of Oporto and fought ruggedly at the passage of the Douro, at
Talavera, Barossa, Busaco, Fuentes d'Onor, Salamanca, the seige of Ciudad
Rodrigo, the battle of Vittoria, the attack on the heights of St. Jean de Luz, the
battle of the Nive, the passage of the Adour and the investment of Bayonne. The
other, the 2nd battalion took part in the battle of Barossa.
In 1813 the six companies of the 2nd battalion were sent to the Netherlands, the
blockade of Antwerp and the storming of Bergen-op-Zoom. The second battalion
also played a distinguished part at Quatre Bras and Waterloo where it was in the
second brigade of Guards under Byng. It returned home from Paris in 1816.
King William IV again changed the title of the regiment and it became the
Scots Fusilier Guards (1832), and it adopted the bearskin cap. There ensued a
quieter period in its history for the Napoleonic struggle had exhausted Europe and
it was a generation before the powers could fight again. But when France,
England and Italy combined against Russia the Scots Guards were in the army of
the invasion of the Crimea and fought gallantly at Inkerman, and took great part
in the sustained seige of Sevastopol.
