“He became an ensign in the Black Watch and within a few months his battalion was sent abroad.”

By Rosslyn Macphail

“The enemy had a gun on our flank. We were formed into a square. A man was tardy and slow in turning and I took hold of him by the arm and said  ‘Come up, Sir’ I felt the wind of a ball whiz through the air and it struck the man, knocked his head off. The brains spattered about, some on my coat. The French cavalry were only a few yards off and I gave a yell and shouted ‘Charge!’ and we did so and drove them off.”

This was Captain John Orr’s note about an incident in the Battle of Quatre Bras. I found it in a cabin trunk of family papers together with his Peninsular War journal. John was my great-great-grandfather. Reading his journal and other notes he wrote set me off on a long research journey as the papers in the trunk were only fragmentary. I was determined to try and find out what John was like as a person. It was like trying to do a jigsaw without all the pieces.

I also discovered documents about the Scottish Naval & Military Academy, which John ran as superintendent for over 30 years from 1831. It was Scotland’s only military academy and sent over 1,300 young men into the forces. I wondered why Scotland no longer had a military academy.  So many questions I wanted answered.

John was born in Greenock, Inverclyde on 3 April 1790 and was early orphaned. He was commissioned into the local militia as he did not have funds to buy his commission into a British regiment.  When the Edinburgh militia were ordered to the Colchester Barracks in England, he found the 42nd Regiment were commissioning young men without their having to pay for a commission. He became an ensign in the Black Watch and within a few months his battalion was sent abroad to the Peninsular War.  He starts his journal whenever he arrives in Lisbon and keeps it up for the eighteen months he was in the Peninsula. He describes it as a campaign diary — he simply writes one or two sentences each night. This gives great immediacy.

He was a 22-year-old, who had never been abroad before and was excited about the adventure.  In between battles and skirmishes when the battalion stopped in a town, he went out to explore, like a tourist would do today.  

He liked Lisbon, although it was dirty.  He marvelled at the “scriptural paintings in the churches” and “went to the opera and saw some fine dancing.”

He fought at the Battle of Salamanca: “In short the French seldom or ever got such a drubbing.”

He was at the siege of Burgos: “Was in the trenches all night as a covering party and was pretty hot work of it.”

He also took part in the skirmishes in the mountains when they were driving the French of Spain: “Attacked the village with the light companies and carried it, then drove the enemy off the hill and took a number of prisoners.”

In early November 1813, he got leave to return home following his uncle’s death. John then served with the Black Watch in Ireland. In May 1815 his battalion was ordered to go to Brussels for the forthcoming confrontation with the French army under Napoleon. He was an adjutant at Quatre Bras and wrote a note in old age describing an attack by French lancers, quoted at the start of this article.

Two days later John suffered a musket ball wound to his left knee at Waterloo and was carried from the field. Not long after the regiment’s return to Glasgow in 1816 he married Jean Pollock on 2 December. Three weeks after that the regiment was reduced, and John was put on the half-pay list. He must have been devastated. He managed to get two brief commissions during the next five years, but each of the regiments was disbanded shortly after he joined. There followed 10 difficult years with no other appointments and four of their children dying.

In 1831, realising he would not be getting another commission with the British army he was recommissioned into the Edinburgh militia. Shortly after that his life took on a new and unexpected turn as he became superintendent of the Scottish Naval & Military Academy (SNMA) in Edinburgh.

The academy had suffered a down-turn in its enrolments due to a breakdown in discipline; the first superintendent had been a poor appointment. Under John’s management discipline improved and enrollment increased. The Duke of Wellington became one of the school’s Presidents and King William IV the patron.  John enjoyed his role as superintendent.  His military experiences gave him the knowledge, resilience and discipline that helped turn the only military academy in Scotland into a successful college. The pupils accepted the discipline as it was tempered with his good humour. The academy would send over 1,300 young men into the services.

It was not a residential institution so John, and other masters took in boarders. The published diaries of Joseph Panton, a pupil who boarded with the Orr family, reveal what life was like in their household. He tells amusing stories showing how well John got on with most of the boys, though indiscipline was not tolerated. Sometimes the older boys, staying with the Orr family, would ask John to go out with them for a “fish supper” or “a reeking steak hot from the grill.”

John died in his 90th year and was buried in Warriston Cemetery, Edinburgh. He was the last Black Watch officer who had fought at Waterloo.

In the end I had found most of the pieces of that jigsaw. There is more about John’s life in my book From Fighting Napoleon to the Scottish Military Academy: The Life of Captain John Orr.

Rosslyn Macphail is the author of From Fighting Napoleon to the Scottish Military Academy: The Life of Captain John Orr. She has gives lectures about Orr and the Scottish Naval & Military Academy in the Watt Library in Greenock, John Orr’s hometown and to the Renfrewshire Family History Society in Paisley. Rosslyn Macphail lives in Edinburgh, where the Academy was also based.