A great story, and it's a true one!

Whilst going through the digest of the 91st I came across a really good story.

One of the officers of the regiment, Captain James Walsh, was serving with the regiment in Spain and was present at the Battle of Talavera ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Talavera ) . The diary said that during one attack against a French position he was lost and reported missing. But he reappeared a few weeks later with a tremendous story.

"Captain Walsh, taken by the enemy in a charge and with many other officers, was marched under a strong escort of cavalry and infantry towards France, but affected his escape at Vittoria, on the night of the 20th of August following - swam the river and, after suffering the utmost privation and hardships, he with the greatest difficulty rejoined the army in Portugal and reported himself personally to the Duke of Wellington."

What I find amazing about this though, is that when I thought about it, that was a hell of an escape! Vittoria is on the northern edge of Spain near the bay of Biscay, and Wellington's army was a good couple of hundred miles away near the Portuguese border! He had to contend with not only the rough terrain and the incredible heat of a Spanish summer, with no adequate supplies and no detailed knowledge of the geography of Iberia, but with the danger of running into other people; the French would have re-captured him or killed him; the Spanish could have helped him or turned him in to the authorities, and even the British might not have treated him well, he could have been seen as a deserter ( a capital offence, but he would have been flogged for it before he was hanged! ) so he was in a rough situation.

Yet he made it! And then probably looking not-very-official stood before the Duke of Wellington and explained himself. Clearly he was impressed a he suffered no punishment for his absence, rejoined the regiment immediately and continued to serve. I found, further on in the book, a note that Walsh was wounded at the Battle of Toulouse in 1813 "slightly" but I had to leave before I could find out anything else yesterday. Needless to say, I wanted to know more, so I searched online and found a biography of him ( http://www.napoleon-series.org/research/biographies/GreatBritain/Detachments/c_Walsh.html ) which explained to me what happened afterwards and before where I came in. Its a good read!

"War makes rattling good history, but peace is poor reading"

Thomas Hardy