People don't talk this way anymore

First thing through the door, my boss hands me what feels like a phone book. It's wrapped in a cardboard suit and when I got that off my jaw dropped! It was, in simpler terms than the vernacular of the time, the regiment's diary of events for the better part of half a century!

I was asked to go through it and find references to certain events and facts. It was all written in that beautiful, flowing script that some guy 200 years ago wrote with a quill and ink!

But the really cool thing was when I came to the diary entries for 1809 which documented the regiment's actions during the Peninsular Campaign of the Napoleonic Wars. The scribe had made a copy of a letter the regiment received following the defence of Corunna:

London, February 3rd 1809

Sir, 

I enclose by Order of the House of Lords, the unanimous resolutions of their Lordships, and by Order of the House of Commons, the resolutions of the Commons, declaring their approbation of the of these bodies respectively, of the conduct of the General and other officers, noncommisioned officers and soldiers, composing the Army lately under my command in Portugal, while serving in that country.

\I beg you will communicate to the Officers, noncommisioned officers and soldiers under your command, these honourable marks of the approbation of both the Houses of Parliament for their exemplary conduct.

Officer Commanding

Arthur Wellesley

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the history of the era, Arthur Wellesley is probably better known to you as the Duke of Wellington! Very cool, but people at this time really didn't like full stops did they? 

The copy of The Duke of |Wellington's Letter