"While in Clonmel, a young Irishman of our regiment deserted, taking with him his arms and accoutrements; but he was afterwards taken, tried by brigade court martial, and sentenced to received one thousand lashes" (Cooper 2007, 11).
"During our march to Abrantes a Portuguese fingered an officer’s cloak. Unfortunately for him he was caught, tied up and well flogged. Under his torture he roared out at the top of his voice for Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, But nobody came to assist the rascal" (Cooper 2007, 18-19).
"At this time punishment in the army was generally flogging, and the number of lashes dreadful. Frequently from 200 to 500 were give; nay, sometimes more for bad crimes. In some cases half the sentence was inflicted at once, and the remainder when the culprit’s back was healed. It may be imagined that the second lashing would be worse than the first" (Cooper 2007, 19).
"A man of ours was flogged for breaking into a Church and stealing some silver candlesticks. By some neglect his back festered. Being in the hospital one morning, I saw the poor fellow brought in to have his back dressed. He was laid upon the floor, and a large poultice taken off the wound. Oh! what a sickening sight. The wound was perhaps eight inches by six, full of matter, in which were a number of black-headed maggots striving to hide themselves. At this scene those who looked were horrified" (Cooper 2007, 19).
"Before this I saw a poor sickly fellow, more fit for hospital than the triangles, receive 500 lashes at once. I think his crime was stealing from his comrade" (Cooper 2007, 19).
"A practice, also most fearful, had been introduced of flogging by beat of drum. The manner was ten taps were beaten on a drum between each stroke. Many were lashed into insensibility, and one who was a Brunswicker into insanity. It required strong nerves to look on. Indeed, many fainted during those prolonged punishments" (Cooper 2007, 19).
"In 1807, I saw two artillery men receive 400 lashes each in Colchester Barracks, during a hard frost, the snow being three or four inches deep. Their crime was attempting to rob their commanding officer" (Cooper 2007, 19).
"One night a party of our Brunswickers committed a robbery, in which one of them lost his scimitar. This being found in the morning, led to the detection of the whole concerned. Ten of them were flogged, and it was reported that one of them became insane in consequence of his punishment" (Cooper 2007, 33).
"During this stir several men who had broken into deserted houses were being flogged in the street with ropes, cats not being at hand" (Cooper 2007, 40).
"In Clonmel, Serjeant Bishop married a young Irishwoman, who had just before been married to a drummer belonging to a regiment ordered on foreign service. She accompanied Bishop for three or four years in the Peninsula. Being one day caught stealing, the provost-marshal flogged her on the breechc" (Cooper 2007, 91).
"Poor old Styles loved drink too well, and had at different times received about two thousand lashes" (Cooper 2007, 92).
"After we crossed the tropic, every man was frequently required to drink a pint of salt water on parade. One man, an old soldier named William Crumpton, said he could not swallow it. He did not drink any, and for this disobedience he received 150 lashes" (Cooper 2007, 112).
"In Seville, without leave to, I absented myself from guard for 24 hours and landed myself in a fine scrape. When I returned I was put into the guard-room, and a drum-head court-martial was ordered on me. It was my first offence but that did not screen me -- my sentence was 400 lashes.
On hearing this I felt ten times worse than I ever did on entering a battle-field. My life seemed of very little consequence and I thought of home and my days as an apprentice. Had I been sentenced to be shot, I would have not despaired more. The guards brought me to the square of the convent where my sentence was to be carried out and where the regiment was already assembled to witness my punishment. The judgement was read over me by the colonel and I was ordered to strip. Hardened by that time, I did so without the help that was offered and was lashed to the halberds. The colonel gave the ordered for the drummers to commence. Each drummer gave me 25 lashes in turn. I bore it well but, by the time I had received 175, I became so enraged with pain that I pushed the halberds. They were only planed on stones and did not stand firm so I moved them right across the square amid the laughter of the regiment.
The colonel, judging that I had had sufficient, ordered ‘the sulky rascal down.’ Indeed I was sulky for although the blood ran down my trousers I had not given vent to a single sound. I was unbound and the corporal hove my shirt and jacket over my shoulders, then conveyed me -- a miserable spectacle -- to the hospital.
Perhaps the flogging was a good thing in preventing me from committing greater crimes, which might have earned me even more severe punishments. Nevertheless, it was a great trial for me. A lot of that kind of punishment could have been abandoned by the army. It is hard to believe that 400 lashes could be ordered on a man as young as I, one who had undergone all the privations of a most bloody war, for a first offence, which could have been overlooked or dealt with by a severe reprimand.
I was in hospital for about three weeks. When I came out -- still in a very marked state, of which I bear the remembrances on my back to this day--I was transferred from the Light into the Grenadier company." (Lawrence 1996, 35-36).
"It was near Rodrigo that one of our cavalry men was flogged for selfishly trading his horse’s corn to buy himself grog. His poor horse was miserably thin, but then most of the horses looked like that, probably for the same reason. This was the first man to be caught and he was made an example of. He was tried by court-martial and sentenced to 50 lashes" (Lawrence 1996, 64).
"It was a Sunday morning and the drums beat for assembly in the town square where the punishment was to be witnessed by the regiment, and by the inhabitants. We joined them. The two men were brought in and their sentence of a 100 lashes each read out. Then the first man was led to the halberds. Before the drummers could begin, five or six gentlemen of the town made their way into our square and begged the colonel to let the men off. They said it was the wish of the inhabitants. The colonel was persuaded and dismissed the victims with a reprimand. The two men thanked the colonel; he told them that had it not been for the timely interference of the gentlemen, he would have given them every lash" (Lawrence 1996, 98-99).
"Here, several of the wounded rejoined us from Brussels, and with them was Bertram. As soon as I saw him I put him in the rear-guard as a prisoner and reported him to my captain. Next day a court-martial was held at which I was the chief, but no the only witness against him. As a punishment for absenting himself from the field of action, he was sentenced to 300 lashes. He was tied up and received every lash. This may seem a harsh punishment, but if there had been many like Bertram, the battle of Waterloo would have ended in favour of the French.
He was sent to the hospital for three weeks and when he returned, the captain ordered me to examine his kit. I found his knapsack completely empty, his pouch containing no ammunition. I reported the circumstances to the captain and Bertram was again ordered back to the rear-guard as a prisoner. The next day another court-martial was held on him for making away with his kit, and he was sentenced to another 300 lashes. He received every one without crying out, which was odd because the drummers did not fail in their duty--there was no one they felt more strongly about than a coward. Bertram seemed to have no feeling.
He spent another three weeks in the hospital. Afterwards, the poor fellow was shunned by his comrades. Not only that, he had sixpence a day stopped to pay for his new kit and for the 60 rounds of ball-cartridge which had been supplied to him. As he received only 13 pence a day from which sixpence had been stopped for food, he had only one penny left. Consequently, he was always without money and went missing again, but returned after two or three days. He had been into Paris and sold his kit to maintain himself for those few days. He was again sent to the rear-guard, reported, court-martialled, and given another 300 lashes. He went on better for a while but later, when our regiment was in Scotland, he transgressed again and was flogged for a fourth time. When he came out of the hospital this time, the colonel ordered his coat to be turned, and a large sheet of paper pinned on it. It read: ‘This is a coward, a very bad soldier, and one who had been whipped four times.’ He was then drummed out of the barracks" (Lawrence 1996, 115-116).
"A triangle was erected, composed of three poles, fastened at the top with an iron bolt. To two of these the legs and hands of the sufferer are designed to be fastened, while a board is placed across for the breast to lean upon. The troops were then marched out, and formed a large hollow square around the place of punishment. I was then brought to the place, under guard of a file of soldiers, commanded by an officer. My clothes were so far removed as to leave me naked to the waist, and I was bound to the triangle. Turning to the first soldier on the file, the officer directed that he should proceed to duty. He laid aside his coat, and applied twenty-five lashes, with the cat-o’-nine-tails, to my back. These blows were counted by the officer. After twenty-five had been applied, I was asked if I would give up; I answered, ‘No!’ The blood was already flowing freely from my back, yet I resolved to die rather than submit to what appeared to me so unjust a requirement. The next soldier then took the lash, and struck twenty-five times. Again the officer asked if I would yield, and received the same reply; and this was continued until the whole three hundred had been inflicted. I was then taken down, more dead than alive, and sent to the hospital to be cured of my wounds, -- a process usually requiring from six weeks to three months. The cat--the instrument with which this punishment is inflicted--is composed of nine small cords, twisted very hard, and having three knots on each cord; sometimes the ends of these knots are bound with wire. The whip is usually about eighteen inches long, and the handle fifteen" (O’Neil 1851, 47-48).
"I have said the Colonel is adverse to flogging, yet he has been under the necessity of whipping one man since I joined. This fellow had deserted when the Regiment was under order for Corunna. He was sentenced five hundred lashes he only received 75 he was taken down, our ranks opened, and the poltroon, as the Colonel justly called him, was ordered to march between the ranks. At the same time Colonel M----- [Mainwaring] kept shouting ‘soldiers spit on the cowardly poltron, you should all p-----over him if it were not too indecent.’" (Wheeler 1951, 11)
"During his command of about 6 months he flogged no less than 74 men and boys, many of whom were not by any means able to endure such cruel punishment, of from 200 to 1000 lashes, it not only prevented the young from growing but rendered them totally unfit to serve His Majesty. I have seen [on] more than one instance their backs mortifying partly from neglect on the part of the surgeon and more so on his, the commanding officer, for inflicting the punishments in so cruel and unprecedented manner as to cause a right and left flanked drummer to punish alternately so as to cross cut the flesh to bare bone and should the doctor interfere by saying that the boy's growth would be stopped, then ‘take down his breaches’ was [the] inhuman expression of this gallant hero." (Jeremiah 2008, 7-8)
"...I may say universal crime among soldiers of being absent 10 minutes after tattoo beating for which offence I was with 5 men more for a similar offence confined, tried and sentenced to receive on the bare back 300 lashes. I was then 2 months past my 17 years of age and believe there was none out of the 6 offenders had seen 18 years old. I have before mentioned that in some cases doctor would interfere, I was one in whose the doctor interfered by saying that my growth would be stopt [sic] by the severity and the premeditated cruelty of this right and left flanked punishment. We were after the custom of the army brought to the hospital and there remained under the care of the doctor who might be married to humanity or sympathy for he was by no means related to either, but the interference of this good gentleman did not prevent this brute to execute his vengeance upon as helpless and inoffensive soldier who had no means of redress or retaliation, no father or mother to complain to. This was the fate of a soldier who was unfortunate enough to be under the command of an arbitrary commander who did not scruple to see my posterior to be layed bear to the skin when they reserved their severity by giving me on the last mentioned place 75 lashes, the remainder of the 30 which I received on my back. In 9 days & was in the military doctor's opinion fit to return to my duty..." (Jeremiah 2008, 8)
Cooper, John. Fusilier Cooper - Experiences in the 7th Fusiliers. London: Leonaur Limited, 2007.
Jeremiah, Thomas. A Short Account of the Life and Adventures of Private Thomas Jeremiah, 23rd or Royal Welch Fusiliers 1812-1837 including his experiences at the Battle of Waterloo. Ed. Gareth Glover. England: Ken Trotman Publishing, 2008.
Lawrence, William. A Dorset Soldier : The Autobiography of Sgt. William Lawrence 1790-1869. Ed. Eileen Hathaway. New York: Spellmount, Limited, 1996.
O’Neil, Charles. The Military Adventures of Charles O’Neil. London, 1851.
Wheeler, William. The Military Travels of Private Wheeler. Ed. Captain B. H. Liddell Hart. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1951.