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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Exeter Times, 1892-2-11, Page 3I LINE OF BRAVE MEN. A Reckless Strain in Royal Blood, LORD Clill RES RERCESFOUD. iitr..G, AIIII1TOi;1ttTIE AND $'OPEtetlit. Repeated Acts of GatinedrSeelltitting Ex - Piens to Egypt, -Lord or rife Aa- nitralty. Ise malts A CaARAIED LIFT:, The Beresfords hare always been an un- common breed, and wherever any strain of their blood exists certain qualities of theirs are sure to display themselves. .Notwithstanding the high social position they lime held for centuries, there is some- thing wild and gypsy -like about them, whi li ]Hakes them quite different from the ordinary type of British aristocracy. They are not only courageous to the point of utter recklessness, but they actually love danger more than any other forin of excitement. When they can not find a legitimate outlet for this adventurous impulse, they give vent to it in. some : queer form of eccentricity. Thus, the notorious but curiously popular Marquis oesalfaterford, Lord Charles Beres - ford's grandfather, earned the name of "Spring -heeled Jack ," by his mad -cap ex- ploits in some sort of disguise, in which he used to terrify the country folks and carry en all kinds of audacious love affairs. Ho was supposed to wear springs on his feet, by the aid of which ho could jump clear from the ground into a first -floor window or leap over the highest wall ; and endless aro the stories told of his performances. Ho was also the originator of TIIE MIDNIGHT STEEPLECHASE. tlio most dangerous kind of sport ever in- vented;; and himself was always the leader of the wild rulers in their red nightcaps and white nightshirts, pulled on over their uni- form or evening dress. When the women of England erected the famous statue Duke of Wellington, t i from f guns cap- tured o h r m the metal o tus c- tured bythe duke ' n his 10 � warsagainst tthe French, Punch had a witty cartoon by the celebrated Ricihard Doyle, representing a statue of Apollo erected by the demimon- daines of London in honor of the Marquis of Waterford, from the metal of door knockers and bell handles wrenched off by this lordship in his nocturnal frolics. In short he was a thorough Mohawk and the great- est scapegrace in the three kingdoms. l et, with it all, be was an excellent landlord, a high-brevaentleman and a popular favorite. All his faults and vices were freely forgiven hila for the sake of his pluck, his open banded generosity, and his unmistakable goodness of heart. He died a natural death. That is to say, be broke bis neck in the hinting field—quite a natural death for him. His two'sat a gt Tons, Lord William and Lord Charles Beresford, aro wonderfully like him in appearance and also in many of the oltaracteestio family qualities. They would both have been Smit( 1IIELLED JM'ies and brazen Apollos if they had not found the legitimate outlet for their wild blood, ane in the army and the other ;in the navy. As for William, better known by his so- briquet of " Fighting Bill," he is a perfoet dare-devil,kor desperate enterprises. Moro cautious °facers, or rather officers with more regard for a whole skin, affect to sneer at him as a "medal -hunter;" and it is a feet that whenever there is a medal or a cross, or any Sort of distinction to be earn- ed byintrepid valor, Figntin; BW Beres- ford is bound to have it. If ho can not get it in the 'Winery course of service he resigns his „ay", olniinent and volunteers for the post of danger. That is how he got the Ir iotoria•eross in Zululand, and that is how he has covered his breast with decorations, each recording some deed of gallantry or some day of glory. 'Those who are disposed to sneer at lits medal hunting can not deny, 11owo-el•, that he shows quite to much abil- ity as courage. Ho seems to bear a charm- ed life, but in truth his judgment is excel- lent, and many a performance of his which looked like an act of foolhardiness, was prov- ed by the result to have been a brilliant piece of military wisdom. His real capacity is now so fully recognized that he has been appointed military secretary to three vice- roys of India in succession and seems likely to hold that important position permanent- ly, except when the takes a holiday to go medal hinting. He has got into a dozen frightful SCRAPES ABOUT WOMEN, or about money matters, for lie spends as much as two or three general officers, but the viceroy and the government have to take him tor what he is, a Beresford of the Beresfords, and they aro ready to overlook all his escapades rather than lose his ser- vices. Lord Charles is a better man and a more lovable man than Lord William, A braver ishan ho could not be, but his bravery is of bettor quality. It is invariably displayed :for , h e benefit of others ; while there is some truth in the charge against fighting Bill that he fights more for Bill than for any- body taT pine. LordCharlesor Charley Beres- ford as he is invariably called iu the navy, never seems to think of himself at Ile is the tree lrlgro, ever. ready to lay down his life for hi queen, his country, his comrade or his fellowman. He entered the navy at the age 02 12 and took to the sea as natur- ally as a fish. Never was there a more typi- cal sailor boy than this curly -headed; blue- eyed rosy -checked, mischievous, good natur- ed powder monkey. The British midshipman is sup used to be the ne plus ultra of impu- dence, and Charley Beresford was the ne plus ultra of a British Midshipman. He went perfectly wild with delight at being in the navy and on the sea, and no ship lie ever was aboard of was half big enough to eon- Iain tho stook of high splits and animal magnetism that he brought with him Luck- ily he had the faculty of communicating Itis exuberant hilarity to all ranks of his shipmates. Wherever he sailed he was a universal favorite. TTIE ELITE JACKETS ADORED HIM. in their blunt way, and though he kept his /wearier officers on pins and needles lest he should play some crazy trick that would. set him into - trouble, the more discern- ing among them had no. fear on. his account but predicted that he would one clay be a cause of Fide to the navy and the country. Notwithstanding all the influence that his family might have exercised, he made his way in the service by merit alone. He had been, ten years in the navy when he got his lieatennut's commission, and joined, the Galatea frigate, then commanded by the. Duko of wdinburg for a cruise round the world. .th. young officer of rank and wealth and'. sselfieking disposition could not pos- fibly Dace exposed to greater temptation io gose•<tes in every way, than Charley lieresfori encountered as one of "the fluke's gasf boys on the Galatea." Their royal exp .fender set them the worst pos- sible example, except in the single respect of strietly doing hie duty. as a.na•ral officer ; and wherever they went they were sopetted and pampered by the inhabitants, especially the woman folks, that they could hardly have been blamed if they lost their, head's and went bo the devil. Their whole cruise was one long round of furious c:issipation, and Charley 'Beresford was the gayest of them all. He had never, such.a chance to let Thune if out beforo, and he took his en- joyment in aliopathetic doses, But there was "a sweet little cherub perched up aloft" that took the very best ofcare of hint, With all his recklessness and INSATIABLE APPETITE FOR sur, the young follow had a simple minded honesty and a naturalgoodness of heart that always kept him perfeotly safe. Not one of the duke's companions went the pace more gorgeously than ho did. Yet not one of them left so fair a record; or such warm and lasting regard as he did in every place they visited. TheDuke of Edinburgh, who knows a good fellow when he meets one, as well as anybody living, took cordially to his junior lieutenant and formed for him one of those immovable friendships for which ho is noted. This, in spite of the fact that Charley Beresford was the plague of his life. Whenever a scampish antic was played on the Galatea it was quite unneces- sary to inquire who was the culprit. Charley was pretty sure to be at the bottom of it, and it be wasn't he was always ready to take the blame. Once, and once only, he same very near making the duke very angry indeed, The Duke of Edinburgh is an en- thusiastic musician, and Itis cabin on the Galatea was furnished with several superb instruments, among theta .a,partieularly fine harinonium, at which he spent almost all his leisure tinio when on board his ship, One Sunday in port, when he was supposed to be on a visit to rho Governor, he unex- pectedly returned and went straight down to his cabin. There he saw a scene which Might have led to the supposition that a torpedo had exploded in the interior of his harmonium. The precious instrument was all to pieces, and the pieces were scattered in hopeless confusion all over the cabin floor. To increase the Duke's bewilderment Charley Beresford, with hiscoat and waist coatoff and his • SHIRT SLEEVES TUCKED UP, was on his knees in the midst of the wreck working away at the keyboard or some other vital part, with an enormous screw- driver, while the ship's carpenter was la- borously inanipulatiug another fragment. "What the blankety blank aro you dong here, you young son of a sea cook," shouted the Duke, "and who the blazes has been smashing my harmonium ?" "Oh, is that yon, sir?" said Charley P,eres£ord, as cheery as a lark, jumping up from his knees and saluting. "You said she hadn't been steering as well as she ought Lately, so I got bold of Chips and we've been • unshipping her gear to see whether thet wecouldn't n a10 her ar1 it. If you hadn't conte oCi till to-niclttt, we'd have had her refitted, and you'll never have known, except for her going so- well after- ward." The evident sinecrity of the con- fession, and the comical figure of the lieut. enant, with his rod face and his "shes" and "hers" were too much for the Duke'sunger. lie burst out laughing, and with his really skilled assistance, Charley and Chips man- aged to put the disintegrated instrnmout to- gother without damaging "her" to any serious extent. At the same time the Duke warned his young friend that if ever he touched any of his musical belongings again he would assuredly throw him overboard, and ho knight think himself lucky if he didn't keelhaul him. Suolh a threat as that, however, even if it had been serious, would have had little terror for Lord Charles Beresford. He never yet has been made to understand that there can be any danger in salt water—for him. No ono is more keenly alive to the fact that other people aro liable to be drown- ed ; but for himself, it never strikes him in that way. 'Three times ho has JrsnorD OVEItnOARD and saved a life at the imminent risk of his own. On ons of those occasions 11e did a thing which, but for its success, would just ly have been tined culpably and absurdly rash. The ship was at Port Stanley, in the Falkland Islands, a very stormy place, and Lord Charles was just ready to go ashore on a shootingexpedition. He was dressed in a thick suit of clothes and long, heavy boots, and he had enough cartridges about him to weigh down a diver. At this mom- ent a marine lost his footing in the gangway fell over -board, and, not being able to swim was rapidly carried away by the tide. The moment the alarm was given Charlie Bero- ford leaped over the side, clothes, boots, cartridges, ah,d all. Down he went, but up he came again, and struck out lustily for the struggling marine, "Hold on Joey!" he shouted, "I'll soon be along -side of you." "Joey" managed to splutter and kick for a minute so, without actually going under, and by the end of that time Lord Charles had a strong grip of his collar and was swimming against the tido with hint like a 'Newfoundland dog with a lobster in its mouth. Both were as nearly as possible drowned before they wore picked. up, and nothing could have saved the marine if there had not been a brave and a powerful hand to hold his head above water during that terrible interval. Loyd Charles has gained enough meda.s for killing people to satisfy even Fighting Bill since then ; but none of them do him more good than the gold medals of the ROYAL HUMANE SOCIETY. the Liverpool Shipwreck and and L p 5 p Humane Society, respectively, which aro only given for saving life at sea at the actual risk of one's own. One other anecdote cif his merry youth may be mentioned here. Unlike most sail- ors, but jdst like all l3eresfords, he is an ex- cellent• hand with horses, and rides and drives just as well as he sails a ship or hand- les a gun. His favorite team is four-in-hand ; anti when the Galatea was at Auckland he undertt ok to drive a party of brother officers and la.iies to a picnic in one of the numer- ous hays in which that beautiful harbor abounds. All who knew anything of the locality assured hhn it was not practicable to get anywhere near it with a four in -handl drag, because it was nothing but a secluded beach at the foot of a steep cliff with no toad in either direction. Lord Charles in- sisted, however, that he had taken an ob- servation of it with his glass from the fri- gate, and that it was pm -petty feasible to drive there. The whole party agreed to risk it, amid peals of laughter ; for, some- how, everybody hada sort of blind faith in his good luck, The event showed that it was justified after afashion. Ile tationr110rD HIS ErxPents nearly out of their lives by driving then) down a zig zag track, through i thicket. of trees on the edge of a sheer precipice, and landing then] with a.tremendons bump on the sand, while the horses steed panting, up to their girths in the sea. "There," he said, with a beaming --smile "I told you we could get hereall safely." "Yes," some one replied, "but `low are you ever going to get the; coach and horses back again ?" " Ob, they can'tgn back by the road, of course," he explained, "bat what docs that matter ? AU r bargained for was to - drive you here safely." The result was that they had a deligitfnl picnic, but returned in the ship's boats And aaauneh lied to be sent to bring the coach and horses back to Auckland. Tait those days Lord Charles was as good a jockey as he was a whip, and nothing pleased him better than riding to win at any of the local .race -meetings.. But his play thine was nearly over, and the real work of his life lay close before hint. When the rebellion of Arabi Pasha took glace, in 1882, Charley Beresford held the rank of commander and had just been appointed tethe gunboat Condor, with the fleet at Alexandria under Sir Beauchamp Semour, now Lord, acestor. The bombard- mentof Alexandria t.nunediately followed, and then the young commander got his op- portunity. Hearty in th.' day the line of battle ship Temorahre grounded and was in great danger , but the Condor went to her under a galling fire and got her safely off ; with the result that the heavily armed Mara- bout batteries were LITERALLY POUNDED TO PIECES. by theshells from the two ships. The Temeraire was too big to close in, and would have been too much exposed to the Egyp- tian guns to make good shooting at short range. lint (Charley Beresford ran his lit- tle boat right in under the batteries and poured his fire into them till the astonished gunners bolted for their lives. The whole fleet saw it and sent up round after round of cheers, and Admiral Seytnour, a grim old sea -dog who never wasted a bit of sent] meat on anybody, could not refrain from running up asignal, " %Vell done, Condor," Later iu the day, the Condor was ordered in shore to defend the palace from Arabi's victorious troops, and Lord Charles per- formed this duty so well that he not only rescued the Khedive from pertain death, but saved the city of Alexandria from total destruction. For that day's work, Admiral Seymourgot he thanks t of Parliament, a Y , peerage,o, and .£ o,0tQ; wt"leCharley Beres- ford, who certainly did the best of the work, was proud and glad to get a silver medal and a peat -captain's commission. Two years later he was in the thick of'. the fighting of the Soudan, where he com- manded the naval brigade, and where he had an almost unique exPerience. At the terrific conflict of Abu Klea,where Sir Her- bert Stewart's force encountered an ever- whelming host of Arabs, Lord Charles and his /nen bad charge of the machine gun which mowed down the enemy in heaps,an.d did a great deal to save the whole force from annihilation. When the battle was ever and the appalling "butcher's bill" was taken count of, at was found that every Inan in charge (Atli() machine gun had been killed except Lord Charles Beresford. There Were no wounded. h fighting i d. fi. o fig ti ig lhad been too close for that. ALL WERE DEAD EXCi&PT TIlti CAPTAIN, who stood among rho piled up oorpsos, still ready to work his gun or do any—other duty that lay to his hand. He was not even touched, and it was no wonder that his men believed him invulnerable. When the remnant of the little army marched for- ward to Gubat, thepost of honor, that is to ay, of danger, namely , the command of the Zeroba, or desert fort, in which the wound- ed and disabled soldiers and all the muni- tions of war wore left, was intrusted to Lord Charles Beresford, who bravely and cheer- fully held it until relief arrived.. His greatest Exploit of all remains to bo recounted. Sailorlike, the firmly believed that the way to take Khartoum and rescue General Gordon was not by land, but by water ; and having helped to get the boats up the Nile, he took a little unarrnor- ed steamer, fitted with a couple of ma- chine guns, and boldly made for the forts of Khartoum. There he found another. at caner which had gone up before him and most foolishly returned, wrecked, inthe river aud in a most perilious condition. He rescued all of her people, and, as his boilers were by this time shot tht'hugh, he coolly anchored under the forts for a day and a night, keeping them tinder control with his machine guns, while his Scotch eugisfeer patched the boilers. Such another piece of work has never been done under such cir- cumstances in any part of the world, and it was nothing short of a marvel that a scut survived to tell the tale, To his infinite dis- gust his gallantry was thrown away, except for the example it gave to others. He was ordered to retire and the SEIQE OF KHARTOUM WAS abandoned ; whereas, if Lord Charles Beres- ford had been allowed his way, there is no doubtthe Mandi would have been driven out of Khartoum, Gordon would have been saved artd the course of history in upper Egypt would have been changed. Lord Charles had been a member of Pa r lanent for six years before this, but had been too much on active service to take any part in politics. On his return from the Soudan, however, he was elected by a me- tropolitan constituency, and aroused im- mense interest by his appearance in the House of Commous, with his honors fresh upon on him. The idea of Charley Beresford being a serious olittcis had never entered anybody's head; but he speedily took the House by storm by the ablest speech on the naval estimates that had ever been made. His broad -shouldered oratory and his nauti- cal phrases delighted his hearers, while his deep earnestness and complete mastery of the subject commanded their respect - He J ec P rose at once to the position of an authority, and the next year he was taken into Lord Salisbury's ministry as junior lord of the admiralty. Everybody begun to realize by this time that " Charley " Beresford was not by any means the thoughtless fiibberty-gib- bet that he seemed to be. Yet. at this most responsible period of his life he did a thing in his own style. He beth wasw had vv quitey married some years before a dear, good, pretty girl whom he was just as much in love with as ever; and being one day on board the Queen's yacht at Portsmouth, in his official capacity, with the Queen, he saw another yacht go past, on board of which he knew his wife was. Never thinking of what he was doing he ran up a private signal CONVEYING A MESSAGE TO HIS WIFE jus if he had been on his own quarter- deck on the Condor. What the signal was has never been made public, but those who know say it consisted of certain code words asking Lady Charles to keep two dances for hien at the ball to be given at Portsmouth that night. Tho next thing he knew he was under arrest for violating the regulation which forbids any private signal to bo made from a royal yacht. Ifs iminediately placed the resignation of his mini ter ial office and his naval rank in the queen's hands, only to receive them back next day with a gracious rebuke for his faux pas, This little bit of human nature made hint more popular than ever ; but a more serious matter was ahead. In 1898 he took astand Children Cry for Pitcher's Castoria. ,BbR��'m'� � LO1BO ALE AVD STOUT, .fir CWED• GOLD 3EDAL AT INTERNATIONAL EXHIBIT/01 JAMAICA, 1891. Only GelStatVie! _ Gold Medal Awarded for Ale t� t��,�a�,91��u or United Exhibitors. JOHNLABATT, LONDON CANADA eaa which is most unusual in so young a miuist- er. He required that financial provision should immediately be made for raising the strength of the navy to that of any other two naval nations combined. The cabinet were divided, but Lord Salisbury decided against theproposal at that time, and Lord Charles Beresford took the dignified course of retiring from the ministry. lie went to the Mediterranean in 'com mend of a magnificent ship, the Undaunt- ed, where he was probably much happier than at Whitehall. But his policy has since been fully adopted by Lord Salisbury's. ministry, mainly through Mr. Goschen's in- fluence ; and wherever a bold heart and a good, clear head in naval affairs are needed in future, whether in council or in war, the nation will not be at any loss to know where to seek them. The ourly-hearlod powder -monkey is unquestionably the man of tiro future in the British navy. When Baby was 'sick, wo gave her Castoria.. When shelas a Chiid, she cried for Castoria. When the became llIiss, she clung to Castoria, When she had Children, she gave them Castoria, Two Eye -Witnesses. Policeman --Who bunged your eye in that way ? Sufferer—Moilro Flynn. 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