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ADRIAN GREENWOOD
HISTORIAN & BIOGRAPHER
COLIN CAMPBELL, LORD CLYDE
Born the son of a cabinetmaker in Glasgow in 1792, by the time of his death in 1863 Colin Campbell was a field marshal, a peer and the most famous soldier in Britain.
His military career was unparalleled. Within weeks of joining the army as an ensign aged fifteen he saw action at the Vimeiro, the first major battle of the Peninsular War. He went on to fight in more than twenty battles over half a century, and was wounded eight times. His service included
- The Peninsular War 1808-1813
- The War of 1812
- The Demerara Slave Revolt of 1823
- The Irish Tithe Wars 1830-31
- The Chartist Disturbances in Newcastle 1839
- The First Opium War 1842
- The Second Sikh War 1848-49
- The Crimean War 1854-56
- The Indian Mutiny 1857-59
- The Second Opium War 1860
His most famous exploits were his command of the original 'Thin Red Line' at Balaklava, and the rescue of the British garrison from Lucknow. As Commander-in-Chief in India he pacified a sub-continent and changed the fate of the British Empire. Celebrated in his day as Britain's foremost general, he has been unjustly forgotten. A complex, mercurial man, loved by his troops and admired by Queen Victoria, but despised by many of his military contemporaries, he was Britain's first 'working-class' field marshal.
Click below to see the scene of the Battle of the Alma in the film The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968). Watch out for Michael Miller playing Campbell about six minutes in.
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