Widows who Stayed with the Army: 10th Regiment and 35th Regiment

A popular bit of mythology concerning British army wives is that they were required to remarry within a few days (24 hours, 48 hours, 72 hours, or other durations depending upon who retells the story) or they would be abandoned by the army. Not only is this illogical given the important roles that army wives held in the military infrastructure, working as nurses, washer women and sutlers, but we've shown several examples of widows who stayed with the army for months or years after their husbands died. In those cases, we used information from marriage licenses combined with information from regimental muster rolls. We have several instances where a marriage license denotes the bride-to-be as "widow" belonging to a regiment, and found on the regiment's muster rolls a man with the same last name who had died anywhere from a few months to a few years before. Although British general orders in America frequently mention opportunities for soldiers' widows to return home on ships bound for Great Britain, these marriage licenses demonstrate that some did not.

Another source of evidence has come to light. In late 1782 or early 1783 there was an opportunity for people associated with the army to sail from New York to Great Britain. This was quite common, but in this instance a list survives, found by researcher Todd W. Braisted, of the people who applied for passage. The list includes a number of army widows, each one with the regiment listed alongside the woman's name. Comparing these names to muster rolls we can determine when the husband died.

Some of them are indeterminate, such as three widows of the 76th Regiment, Margaret Hay, Ann McDonald and Ann Bissett. Only a few muster rolls for this regiment survive, leaving no way to know whether their husband's died in garrison in New York, on campaign in Virginia, or as prisoners of war after the capitulation at Yorktown. We also have no way of knowing whether these women accompanied the regiment on campaign. Similar is the case of Eleanor ("Elinor") Paget of the 24th Regiment, who sought passage to Ireland for herself and one child; not enough information has been found to reveal whether her husband died on Burgoyne's 1777 campaign, or in prison during the subsequent years. And no man corresponding to Rachel Molloy of the 27th Regiment, who sought to go to England, has been found on the muster rolls.

A few, however, can be traced, and the results are surprising. Anne Carr of the 35th Regiment was the widow of William Carr, who had died on 28 October 1776. This was the date of the battle of White Plains, in which the 35th Regiment was heavily engaged, and we can assume that Carr was killed in that battle. The 35th Regiment was sent to the West Indies in late 1778 and was still there when Anne Carr applied for passage to England in late 1782.

Widow Huston, whose first name is not given, belonged to the 10th Regiment of Foot. She was the widow of William Huston, who died on 10 September 1776 when the regiment was on Long Island preparing for the assault on Manhattan. In 1778 the fit men of the 10th Regiment were drafted into regiments bound for the West Indies, the unfit men were discharged, and the officers and non-commissioned officers were sent home. But Widow Huston remained in New York, and applied for passage to Ireland with six children.

Another widow from the 10th Regiment was Mary Smith. There were two men named Smith in the 10th Regiment who died during that regiment's service in America between 1774 and 1778. Thomas Smith died on 2 February 1777, and Joseph Smith on 30 December 1777. We don't know to which one Mary Smith was married, but we do know that she was still in New York in late 1782 when she applied for passage to England.

What were these women doing all this time? Lacking specific information, we can only guess that they were gainfully employed, perhaps supporting the army as hospital nurses or sutlers. While don't know the reasons why they stayed in America, they do provide further proof that army widows were neither abandoned nor required to remarry.

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John Hall, 35th Regiment, on a three-day stupor

The 65th Regiment of Foot had been in North America for seven years when fighting broke out Massachusetts in 1775. Having been overseas for so long, they were due to return to Great Britain. The outbreak of war delayed this, and soldiers of the 65th participated in the opening engagements of the American Revolution. In June of 1776, however, when the British army was reorganizing in Halifax, Nova Scotia for an upcoming campaign, the decision was made to send the regiment home. As was customary, those men who were fit for service were drafted into other regiments remaining in America; by this means, many of the regiment's soldiers went on to fight in most of the major campaigns during the next eight years of war.

 

Some of the drafts were already veterans of extensive service. John Hall had joined the army in 1755, at the beginning of the Seven Years' War and before the 65th Regiment was created. When the 65th was drafted, he was sent to the 35th Regiment of Foot, a corps that had arrived in Boston just in time to participate in the battle of Bunker Hill. A twenty-year veteran was a valuable asset, and in July Hall was appointed corporal.

 

A year later, the 35th was among the regiments garrisoning New York City while much of the British army campaigned to seize Philadelphia. Although the regiment was posted in the area of Morrisania, New York, on the fringes of the contested no-mans land in Westchester County, there were still routine and mundane duties to be done. Corporal Hall was assigned to be the orderly for the regiment's tailors, who at that time were busy making woolen leggings in anticipation of colder weather in the coming months.

 

Regimental tailors could be an unruly bunch, and had a reputation for requiring supervision. Corporal Hall may have resented the regiment's quartermaster for assigning him to the task of overseeing them. On September 9, 1777, Hall went on an errand to procure rum for the tailors, and didn't come back.

Three days later, a Loyalist dragoon was patrolling in the neutral ground, the swath of Westchester County that was not held by either side. He came upon Corporal John Hall, "who told him that he was glad to meet with a friend, as he wanted to go back to the Regiment." Hall then "began to damn the Rebels." The dragoon, who most likely was in either civilian clothing or the green cavalry jacket that was used by both armies, was suspicious. He apparently knew that men attempting to desert were likely to make excuses when caught, and seem abnormally anxious to befriend anyone who caught them in the act. He tried a trick to test the wandering British soldier, telling Hall that he was already among the rebels. Hall replied, "Is it true?" The dragoon responded, "Yes, you may depend it is."

 

Hall took the bait. When the dragoon said that he was a serjeant, Hall went on a rant: "Give me a musket, and by Jesus I will go with you, damn the Bougers I’ll fight them, the Quarter Master has used me very ill." He did indicate to the dragoon that his anger towards the quartermaster was the sole reason for his desertion, and that he wouldn't have done so otherwise. The dragoon continued the charade in an effort to get more information: If Hall enlisted with the rebels, would he not desert? No, if he did he'd be shot, and would deserve it. Hall said that many others in the 35th Regiment wanted to desert, but stopped short of offering names.

 

The dragoon brought Hall back to British lines, and he was then taken to the encampment of the 35th Regiment where he was confined. Put on trial for desertion a few weeks later, Corporal Hall offered a defense that was popular and all too plausible: "he went to get some Rum for the Taylors, about an hour before Sun-Sett, and being in liquor, and stupefied with having been drunk for three or four days before, he missed his road on his Return." He plead that he had no intention of deserting, and pointed out that he'd been a soldier for twenty-two years during which service he'd been twice wounded.

 

Two non-commissioned officers of the 35th Regiment testified to Hall's good character during the time they'd known him. The court may have been predisposed towards lenience, for they did not ask typical questions about whether the defendant had taken clothing with him, attempted to escape, or exhibited any other behavior that suggested he'd planned to abscond. Hall was found guilty, but rather than being shot (as he feared he deserved), he was sentenced to receive eight hundred lashes and to be reduced to the ranks. This was a fairly lenient punishment for the crime, suggesting that the court believed his absence was, in fact, unintended.

 

Hall served as a private soldier in the 35th Regiment for the next year. In the autumn of 1778 the regiment was sent to the West Indies. A two-year gap in the regiment's muster rolls makes it impossible to determine Hall's fate, as he is not on the rolls prepared in August 1780. With such a long career, he may well have been discharged, but it is also possible that the fortunes of war caught up with him and he succumbed to hostility or disease.

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Edward Wade, 35th Regiment, jumps his bounty

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British regiments serving in America left a cadre of officers and soldiers in Great Britain to recruit the new soldiers that wartime attrition would necessitate. It was no easy job, particularly for those regiments that came to America in 1775; an order was given that June to increase the size of each regiment in America by 180 private soldiers. Some of those new men were provided by transferring ("drafting") men from other regiment in Great Britain, but many needed to be recruited. This meant that the recruiting officers had to raise many more men that the usual (but unpredictable) number required to make up for annual losses.

The 35th Regiment had arrived in Boston in 1775 just in time to participate in the battle of Bunker Hill. It's recruiting officers, in the mean time, set to work. On 3 March 1776, when the 35th was preparing to evacuate Boston with the rest of the British army, the recruiters enlisted a man named Edward Wade. Desertion, however, was a problem for recruiting parties: for a host of reasons, men changed their minds about the military as a career and absconded from their contractual obligation. Edward Wade did so, for reasons that we don't know. His desertion was advertised in the newspapers:

Deserted from Ensign Bevan’s Recruiting Party at Neath, near Swansea, South Wales, Edward Wade, Inlisted for the 35th regiment of foot the 3d of March, by trade a Shoemaker, sallow complexion, black hair, pitted with the small-pox, 5 feet 6 inches and a half high.  He had on, when he deserted, a patched black coat, white waistcoat, leather breeches, and white stockings, and wore a broad-brimmed hat, cocked up behind only, with a large brass button upon it.

Whoever apprehends the said Deserter, and secures him, so that he may be brought to justice, shall receive Twenty Shillings reward over and above the allowance by Act of Parliament, by applying to the Commanding Officer at Neath, or to Messrs. Gray and Ogilvie, Agents, in Conduit-street, London.

[London Chronicle, 11 April 1776]

Whether he was caught or returned of his own volition, he was back with the 35th's recruits in time to embark for America that summer. He was among those who arrived in New York in October, having spent some two months on board a transport ship crossing the Atlantic.

As a shoemaker, Wade had good prospects in the army. It was a common trade for soldiers, but if he was diligent at it he could earn significant extra income working within his regiment or taking outside work. Even British prisoners of war enhanced their incomes making shoes for the Continental Army. But it was not to be. For reasons not recorded, Edward Wade died on 25 December 1776, having experienced only a glimpse of the war that would occupy his fellow soldiers for many more years.

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Deserter: John Bolton, 35th Regiment of Foot

Muster rolls are a key source of information on the individuals who served in the British army. For regiments serving in America during the 1775-1783 war, rolls were prepared once every six months for each company of each regiment. One muster roll covered the period from 25 December to the following 24 June, the next roll from 25 June to 24 December. Ideally, muster rolls were prepared very soon after each six-month muster period; in practice, regiments sometimes fell behind by months or even years, they caught up with the missing rolls all at once; for this reason it is not unusual to find rolls for several muster periods all prepared on the same date.

Each roll listed the names of each officer and soldier in the company. Next to each name was an annotation of anything that occurred during the muster period to change the man's status in the company - notations such as "joined", "discharged", "deserted", "died", as well as indications of transfers to or from other companies or regiments - along with the date that the event occurred. If a man had no changes, then of course nothing was annotated. These annotations are quite useful, but there are many nuances that can be misleading; these will be discussed at another time. The level of detail varies from regiment to regiment. For example, the rolls of the 22nd Regiment meticulously indicate where each new man in the regiment came from, whether "from the English Additional Company", "from the Irish Additional Company" (referring to recruiting parties in Great Britain), "German recruit", "from 53rd Regiment", or what have you; the rolls of the 33rd Regiment, on the other hand, refer to all new men as "inlisted" regardless of whether they are recruits, drafts, or even men from the regiment who escaped from captivity.

Occasionally, the muster rolls completely let us down. Such is the case with John Bolton, a soldier of the 35th Regiment. The 35th prepared a set of rolls in Cork, Ireland in April 1775 shortly before they embarked for America. The next set of rolls was prepared in Boston in January 1776. This set of rolls includes men who do not appear on the April 1775 rolls, but have no annotation about where those men came from. Among the new men is John Bolton.

Two sets of rolls later, those prepared in January 1777, Bolton is listed as "prisoner with the Rebels" along with three other men in his company. He appears this way on the next two rolls as well, but on those prepared on 25 June 1778 he is listed as "on command", a common term applied to many circumstances. The 35th Regiment was sent to the West Indies later in 1778, and prepared no muster rolls until April 1780. Bolton and many other men no longer appear, and again there is no indication of what happened to these men.

For John Bolton, however, we have an alternative source of information that provides details of his career. Bolton stood trial by a general court martial in New York on 30 July 1778, for desertion.

Testimony in his trial reveals that Bolton was drafted from the 20th Regiment of Foot into the 35th in April 1775 when the regiment was preparing to embark. It was common practice to draft soldiers from regiments remaining in Great Britain to bring regiments bound overseas up to strength. Because the drafts are no recorded on the 35th's muster rolls we don't know how many drafts the regiment received; when the 22nd Regiment was preparing for embarkation the following month it received 19 drafts from five regiments including the 20th.

More interesting is testimony that, rather than having been taken prisoner, John Bolton deserted. The adjutant of the 35th Regiment testified that

on the Regt. being ordered to the Cedar Swamp on or about the 6th of Octr 1776 the Prisoner was sent on Command to New York to make Cartridges, and deserted from thence

This type of duty was a common one. Regiments were capable of making their own ammunition, but during operations with armies such as that in the New York area, ammunition was usually prepared in bulk at a laboratory under the supervision of the Royal Artillery. Regiments sent detachments of soldiers to handle the labor of rolling, filling and closing cartridges. The soldier who had commanded the cartridge-making party from the 35th Regiment elaborated on Bolton's desertion:

on the 5th of October 1776 he was Ordered with a Party of which the Prisoner was one to New York, to make Cartridges and when he paraded the Party in the Evening to return to Camp, the Prisoner was absent

Why the muster rolls indicate that Bolton was a prisoner, rather than a deserter, is a complete mystery. It does prove that the muster rolls are not always reliable (although, to be fair, my experience has been that they usually are accurate).

More surprising is some of the further testimony concerning Bolton's whereabouts. After he deserted in October 1776 he did not leave the British-controlled region but instead enlisted in a Loyalist regiment, the New York Volunteers. He served in that regiment for a little over a year. In January 1778 he got into some sort of trouble in that regiment and was due to be punished. In order to avoid the punishment, he declared himself as a deserter and was returned to the 35th Regiment. The Lieutenant-Colonel of the 35th pardoned Bolton, and he returned to the same company of the regiment in which he had served in 1776.

Bolton's troubles did not end here. The captain of the company took Bolton as a servant. In some cases this was a highly desirable position which could result in better quarters, clothing and amenities than were afforded to most soldiers. For Bolton things did not go so well; the captain "ill treated him and beat him." Given Bolton's already inauspicious record, it is possible that he exasperated his master; on the other hand, the captain's treatment of servants may be the reason why it was necessary for him to take men unwillingly for that duty.

In July 1778 Bolton lost one of the captain's keys, which resulted in a beating that was the last straw for Bolton. On 15 July the regiment moved from Long Island to New York City, and Bolton was among a detachment left in Brooklyn as a baggage guard. The next day he went missing from the guard, having absconded in uniform wearing his waistbelt, cartridge pouch and bayonet, but had left behind his musket and other clothing. About two weeks later he was detained by the provost in New York. The circumstances of his capture are not known, but clearly he had not left the region. During his trial for desertion all of the above circumstances were related, and Bolton offered nothing in his defense except that he was drunk both times he deserted, and would not have deserted had he been allowed to remain in the ranks as a soldier rather than being employed as a servant. The court was not impressed by these arguments, and the man who had avoided punishment for his past transgressions was sentenced to death. We've been unable to learn whether or not the sentence was carried out.

The story of John Bolton is unusual in that the muster rolls of his regiment give a completely different impression of his career than what is revealed in the record of his court martial. Fortunately, this seems to be a rare case; usually the various sources of information on British soldiers correlate reasonably well. But a deviation as great as John Bolton's is a good reminder that things are not always what they seem.

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