‘Ground seems fine and firm here to me.’
Steel was in no mood to be teased. ‘Shut up, Jacob and dress the damned line.’ He paused, regaining his better humour. ‘We must make ourselves pretty for the enemy gunners.’
Steel turned back to the front and stared at the army before him. In the centre he saw a puff of smoke and an instant later a single cannon shot broke the silence. He watched as the ball arced from the French lines towards the allied centre. Hansam reached into his pocket and brought out the gold half-hunter that he had taken from the body of a dead Bavarian at Blenheim. One of the few timepieces among the officers of the regiment, while it could hardly be called accurate, it was now his most prized possession. He flicked it open.
‘One o’clock, precisely. You would not suppose that your Frenchman would be quite so exact. Do you not think, Jack? Sloppy fellow as a rule, you’d say. And you’d be damned right.’ Hansam replaced the watch in his pocket.
Steel smiled and shook his head. ‘Never underestimate your enemy, Henry. The French may seem to care more about their food and their women than their fighting, but you should remember. In the thick of it and at their best, they’re just as good as you or I.’
Hardly had the echo of the single French cannon died away than a battery of six English twelve-pounders in the centre of the allied line opened up in reply, sending a hail of round-shot into the enemy infantry. It seemed to Steel that the instant that they fired the French guns too opened up and he watched mesmerized as the balls criss-crossed in a mid-air ballet. There was a curious beauty to it. But all too fleeting, for the reality soon came upon them. He reckoned the range at around a thousand yards. Long, but not quite long enough to spare them from harm.
To his right Slaughter growled a command: ‘Steady.’
Steel watched the black dots of the six cannonballs grow larger as they drew ever closer. As always their progress seemed to be slowed down, until in the last fifty yards he lost them as their true speed became evident.
Slaughter growled again: ‘Steady now.’
The French gunners, aware of the boggy ground, had fired high for impact rather than attempting to bounce their cannonballs before the enemy for greater effect. Two of the roundshot flew over the heads of the company but four found their mark, crashing into the line of redcoats and cutting bloody paths through the ranks. One of them took the head off a grenadier and carried it open-mouthed into the rear ranks, mitre cap and all, gouting blood, before smashing into the front two ranks of a regiment to their rear. Just behind Steel a young private, one of the new intake, threw up his meagre breakfast. He heard Slaughter calling to the leading men of the files: ‘Close up. Close the ranks. Someone get rid of that body. You, Jenkins. Move that bloody mess.’
This was how it always began. Standing in line, bearing the cannon fire until they were at last given the command to attack. It was the proving ground; what transformed a man into a soldier. And Steel knew that there were no better soldiers at standing under fire than the British and no better men among them than the Grenadiers. This was how you learned your trade.
Steel looked to his left along the line of the entire regiment. In the centre he could see the two colours of shining silk waving in the breeze, one the blue and white saltire of Scotland, the other the colonel’s own colour with the Farquharson arms in the centre of a red ground, crowned with the motto Nemo Me Impune Lacessit: ‘No one provokes me unpunished’. They would prove those words again today, he thought. Before the colours, mounted on a black charger and flanked by the adjutant, Colonel Sir James Farquharson raised his sword high above his head.
His colonel had grown up in the past two years, thought Steel. Blooded on the field of Blenheim he had earned the respect of his battalion, including that of Steel. The arrogant, vain colonel had given way to a new man, a man hardened to the reality of battle, alive to the responsibilities of raising a regiment. Farquharson was aware at last that this regiment he had paid for, clothed, equipped and trained was no plaything, but a finely honed tool of war, an instrument to be cherished; nurtured. Yes, thought Steel, you deserve to be our colonel now old man, and we deserve you. As he watched, Sir James brought down the sword, its point levelled towards the enemy. Even above the gunfire, Steel caught the words of command. ‘’Tallion will advance … Advance.’
As Sir James finished the six drummers positioned directly behind the Grenadier company along with those on the left flank began to beat the regiment into the attack.
‘Rat tat dum, rat dum tidi dum. Rat ta dum, rat tum tidi dum.’ The unmistakable tattoo of the ‘British Grenadiers’.
Behind him, Steel sensed the men growing restless, swelling with pride and adrenalin. Now they would move on his command.
‘Grenadiers, with me. Let’s be at them, boys.’
Slaughter, his sergeant’s halberd with its gleaming axe-head poised at the diagonal above the end of file man, offered his own words of gentle encouragement. ‘Come on you lazy buggers! Get on. They won’t bloody wait. This is what we’re here for,’ ain’t it? Let’s get into them.’
As one the battalion stepped off. The slow march to attack, at a pace calculated to be just sufficient to preserve order in the ranks, yet as fast as possible on a field of battle. Hardly fast enough, thought Steel, and he waited for the French cannon to adjust their range for maximum effectiveness. There was the dreadful lull as they did so and then seconds later the balls came screaming in again. The drums were hammering harder now, urging the men on, their rhythm insistent even under the bombardment. Looking briefly to his left he saw the entire line of Orkney’s brigade swinging across the plain and down the hill towards the stream. We must cross that, thought Steel. Just get through those marshes and we will be fine. Just have to make it that far. Was that so much to ask? Dear God, he prayed, to no being in particular. Whatever you might be, grant me just that one wish. Get us across the stream and let us be at the French. And do not let me die. But if I must be hit then do for heaven’s sake please let me die. Do not let me be crippled. Let me live, for God’s sake, let me live to carry the battle to my enemies. Your enemies for all I know. The Queen’s enemies. Marlborough’s enemies. Let me live to kill the French. As he repeated the gruesome litany in his head, Steel realized that they had made it to the foot of the slope and were now on the edge of the marsh, close to the stream.
He turned to Williams: ‘Tom, for God’s sake, keep the men close together. Don’t let them become bogged down. You must keep formation.’
Slaughter’s voice too growled out the familiar words above the din of battle: ‘Close up. Right shoulders forward. Close your ranks, you buggers.’
Steel looked back to the front, into the rain of shot and mouthed his useless prayer. Although in his heart he knew that if this miserable Whitsunday were to be the moment he would die, it was ordained already and there was nothing any words could change about that. But he knew that he could fight and that if the fates let him reach the French lines he would do his damnedest to make sure that this day would surely not be his last.
There was a trick in battle to keep your body engaged in the matter in hand, while your mind became detached from the grim possibilities of every passing minute. It was a ploy that Steel knew well, and had used many times. But this morning, for some inexplicable reason, it had as yet eluded him. He was sweating hard now. His thick coat felt ever heavier about him and the gun slung over his back seemed to drag him down and slow his pace. While he was relieved that their own guns were laying down a heavy bombardment, there had been no respite from the French cannon fire and with almost every step that they took towards the enemy it seemed to Steel that another redcoated figure tumbled from their ranks in a ragged heap. Ahead of him and to the left, he could see, through the thick white smoke, the tall frame of George Hamilton, Earl of Orkney, conspicuous in the plate armour which covered the upper half of his body, advancing on foot at the head of the brigade. Here, thought Steel, was a soldier to reckon with. A man towards whose station any officer would aspire. Not only was Orkney a