Letters of Private Wheeler, 1809 - 1828

Rating:
Summary: Personal and immediate
Review: As accounts of the Peninsular War and Waterloo go, this is one of the most personal and immediate. It is a collection of letters which Private Wheeler sent to his family. They are goodnatured and peppered with incidents and moving references to life in the Peninsular.

There has clearly been a great deal of editing to these letters before the first publication in 1828 on which later volumes were based, for the letters are solely about life on the Peninsular and all family references have been removed. I point this out because they stand in stark contrast to Major George Simmons book on the Peninsular War, "A British Rifleman" - in which his letters are reproduced in their entirety, including all his questions and somewhat moralistic advice to his family.

Perhaps the descriptions of the Peninsular lose nothing from the removal of this information, but they would have been a lovely addition in order to get a better look at the character of Private Wheeler - as a more fully rounded person rather than an observer - but I digress.

His account is a vivid depiction of the nature of Napoleonic Warfare. He is not too keen on long descriptions of battles - a bit like Peninsular War veteran Harry Smith in that way - but his descriptions of life and detail leading up to events is lovely. I particularly like his account of walking down the road to Waterloo. For some reason I always imagine orderly rows of soldiers but he talks of 'roads literally choked with baggage' - and his regiment becoming so intermixed with cavalry, guns and sores as they marched on. That night it rained, "being close to the enemy we could not use our blankets, the ground was too wet to lie down, we sat on our knapsakcs until daylight without fires, there was no shelter against the weather; The water ran in streams from the cuffs of our Jackets..."

It is not surprising to know that Wheeler is used by many novellists writing about the Peninsular War and Waterloo - Wheelers his eye for detail is good and his writing is pleasant and sympathetic.

Rating:
Summary: A Revealing Look at a Soldier's Life
Review: Whomever the Duke of Wellington had in mind when he fulminated that his soldiers were "the very scum of the earth," he could not have been thinking of Private William Wheeler. Steady, good-natured and unaffected, Wheeler was rather the sort of man who formed the backbone of the Peninsular Army- as indeed he would have in any army in any age.

Wheeler served with the 51st Foot- a storied regiment in its time, as it had once been led by Sir John Moore, the hero of Corunna- from early in the Peninsular War to well after Waterloo. After he retired from active service, he collected and edited many of his letters home into an engaging and highly readable volume. Together, they offer insights into a British soldier's life that are indispensible to anyone interested in the Napoleonic Wars.

Tellingly, few bullets fly in Wheeler's letters. Devotees of Waterloo memoirs may be disappointed that he has little to say about the campaign. The 51st was not at Quatre Bras and stood mostly away from the main action at Waterloo, and Wheeler attests to little beyond his immediate angle of vision. Instead, he gives us much about what went on behind the lines- barracks life, mustering for overseas duty, palling around with friends of the moment, military and civilian alike.

One of the most affecting narrative threads from these letter begins late in the Peninsular War, when Wheeler befriends a French POW while recuperating from a nasty wound to his foot. No fanatical Bonapartiste, the Frenchman is actually the son of an Anglophile father and an English mother, and joined the army only to efface the anguish of an unhappy love affair. Two years later, Wheeler looks up his old friend when English troops occupy Paris after Waterloo, and they have a fine old time trolling about the city. This is a revealing look at war in fine detail, a useful reminder that even the greatest historical events are woven from threads of individual experiences.

As a stylist, Wheeler has his moments of plainspoken eloquence, and both Elizabeth Longford and Jac Weller have quoted him to fine effect in their books on Wellington. My own favorite moment is his definitive judgement on his old Commander-in-Chief, and stands, I think, as the last word in the debate over the merits of the greatest of the generals who labored in Napoleon's shadow: "If England should require the service of her army again, and I should be with it, let me have 'Old Nosey' to command.... There are two things we should be certain of. First, we should always be as well supplied with rations as the nature of the service would admit. The second is that we should be sure to give the enemy a d----d good thrashing. What can a soldier desire more."

Rating:
Summary: A Revealing Look at a Soldier's Life
Review: Whomever the Duke of Wellington had in mind when he fulminated that his soldiers were "the very scum of the earth," he could not have been thinking of Private William Wheeler. Steady, good-natured and unaffected, Wheeler was rather the sort of man who formed the backbone of the Peninsular Army- as indeed he would have in any army in any age.

Wheeler served with the 51st Foot- a storied regiment in its time, as it had once been led by Sir John Moore, the hero of Corunna- from early in the Peninsular War to well after Waterloo. After he retired from active service, he collected and edited many of his letters home into an engaging and highly readable volume. Together, they offer insights into a British soldier's life that are indispensible to anyone interested in the Napoleonic Wars.

Tellingly, few bullets fly in Wheeler's letters. Devotees of Waterloo memoirs may be disappointed that he has little to say about the campaign. The 51st was not at Quatre Bras and stood mostly away from the main action at Waterloo, and Wheeler attests to little beyond his immediate angle of vision. Instead, he gives us much about what went on behind the lines- barracks life, mustering for overseas duty, palling around with friends of the moment, military and civilian alike.

One of the most affecting narrative threads from these letter begins late in the Peninsular War, when Wheeler befriends a French POW while recuperating from a nasty wound to his foot. No fanatical Bonapartiste, the Frenchman is actually the son of an Anglophile father and an English mother, and joined the army only to efface the anguish of an unhappy love affair. Two years later, Wheeler looks up his old friend when English troops occupy Paris after Waterloo, and they have a fine old time trolling about the city. This is a revealing look at war in fine detail, a useful reminder that even the greatest historical events are woven from threads of individual experiences.

As a stylist, Wheeler has his moments of plainspoken eloquence, and both Elizabeth Longford and Jac Weller have quoted him to fine effect in their books on Wellington. My own favorite moment is his definitive judgement on his old Commander-in-Chief, and stands, I think, as the last word in the debate over the merits of the greatest of the generals who labored in Napoleon's shadow: "If England should require the service of her army again, and I should be with it, let me have 'Old Nosey' to command.... There are two things we should be certain of. First, we should always be as well supplied with rations as the nature of the service would admit. The second is that we should be sure to give the enemy a d----d good thrashing. What can a soldier desire more."