John Urquhart [A] was born in Scotland in 1751 or 1752 and went out to India to take up an East India Company cadetship on 26th June 1781 at the age of 29. There is no subsequent mention of him in either EIC or regular Army Lists until 1790 when he appears as a Lieutenant in the 71st Highlanders, commissioned 9th July 1789. Intriguingly however he actually took his seniority as a Lieutenant in the army from 21st June 1783.

In 1788 following some unrest in the Madras army, it was enacted that John Company officers commissioned from 1783 should receive Royal Commissions of the same rank. John Urquhart clearly took immediate advantage of this concession to exchange into the King's 71st which was at that time in India. According to the 1795 Army List he was promoted to Captain but news of this evidently failed to reach India in time, for his gravestone reveals that he died a Lieutenant at Karicop, Nagapatam (in the Madras Presidency) on 24th August 1794. He was incidentally in all probability the father of John Urquhart (C) below.

John Urquhart [B]

John Urquhart [B] for his part had an extremely varied and interesting career. Probably an ex-ranker he was born near Nairn in 1750 and appointed Quartermaster in the 40th Foot 6th February 1782 (1). He held the post for some five years and then drops out of the Army List for a time. On the strength of his earlier service however he obtained a Lieutenancy in the Strathspey Fencibles in 1793. His commission was dated 1st March though since this co-incided with the date of the regiment's letter of service it does not necessarily follow that he joined the battalion at this time. Posted to Captain John Grant of Auchindoun's no.5 Company he was sent at once to Edinburgh to collect 504 muskets and bayonets, 3 sergeants carbines, with bayonets [for the Light Company], 23 halberts and 16 drums for the regiment and the 19th of April found him esconced in one of the Rose Street brothels from where he sallied out to lobby the Commander in Chief, Scotland, Lord Adam Gordon, for the required arms. (2)

Later that same year Major Allan Cameron of Erracht was granted letters of service for the raising of a new marching regiment, the 79th Cameron Volunteers [erroneously referred to in some official documents as the Cameronian Volunteers]. Dated 17th August 1793 they contained an important clause;

All the Offrs, Ensigns and Staff Offrs excepted, are to be appointed from the Half Pay according to their present Ranks; taking care, however, to recommend such Offrs only as have not taken any difference on their being placed on Half Pay...."(3)

This was an entirely sensible stipulation aimed at ensuring that as many experienced officers as possible were employed in this new unit and the wisdom of it may be gauged by the alacrity with which Erracht stuffed it with his children, friends and dependents after it was lifted. In the event only seven officers joined the regiment from the Half Pay list, including Erracht himelf (4) but others were persuaded to transfer from other units- including John Urquhart.

In doing so however he had to follow a tortuous route. As a fencible officer he did not hold a regular commission and was therefore ineligible for a transfer. Nor under the terms of the Letters of Service could he join the regiment by purchase. Therefore on the 27th November 1793 he instead purchased a regular ensigncy in one of the "New Independent Companies" [Captain Powlett's] and then, probably by the next Gazette, effected the desired transfer into the 79th in his old rank of Lieutenant with his commission back-dated to the 18th August 1793 - thus on paper at least becoming a Lieutenant in the 79th three months before becoming an Ensign and while still an officer in the Strathspey Fenciblesl [how the Paymaster General sorted this out is not clear].

On the 2nd September 1795 he was appointed Captain-Lieutenant, just before the regiment sailed for Martinique but retired in the following year, his successor Neil Campbell being commissioned 1st November 1796 though news of this reached the War Office too late for inclusion in the 1797 Army List. In retiring John Urquhart [B] was faced with a problem. Since he had not actually purchased his commission in the 79th, a new corps, he was ineligible for Half Pay. [eligibility was not always as straightforward as it might seem]

He therefore solved this problem by exchanging, by purchase, into the defunct Royal Glasgow Regiment, one of a number of units disbanded in 1795, and now represented only by a dwindling collection of Half Pay officers (5), as a Captain. By this curious manoeuvre he was thus assured of a pension until his death in 1828. (6)

John Urquhart C

John Urquhart [C] was born in Edinburgh on the 26th September 1769, and became an Ensign in the 1st Battalion of the 1st [Royal] Regiment 26th January 1791 at the age of 21 - theoretically the upper age limit for a first commission. Although Ensigns are popularly seen as invariably being young boys this was by no means the case. (For another example of a 21 year old entrant at this period see Alan Carswell's article on Lt. Col. John Dalglish of the 21st [Scots Fusiliers] in Military Illustrated no.16)

The battalion was at the time in Jamaica [this fact alone would have made it easier than usual for him to obtain a vacancy] so Ensign Urquhart must have gone to the depot company in Ireland for he appears to have been married there and his eldest daughter was born in Limerick sometime in 1793. Whether he had by then joined his battalion does not appear, but since he was promoted to Lieutenant on the 16th October 1792. At any rate in 1793 he and four other Lieutenants from the battalion were given permission to raise Independent Companies in Ireland. His recruiting efforts were evidently unsuccessful for on the 1st November 1974 approval was sought for the appointment of Lieutenant John Urquhart of the Royals to be a Captain by purchase in the 106th (7) and the requisite commission was duly granted on the 5th November 1794. (8)

Although raised by the exertions of the citizens of Norwich and consequently also known as the Norwich or 106th Regiment, [and occasionally as the Norwich Rangers] the 1795 Army List shows that a significant number of the officers were, like John Urquhart, Scots, a circumstance which may probably be explained by the fact that the regimental agent was a Mr. Donaldson. The major attraction of the regiment to John Urquhart however was that not only was it not in the West Indies but it was conveniently stationed at Waterford. (9)

In August 1795 however like the Royal Glasgow Regiment and all others junior to the then 100th Foot [the Gordon Highlanders] all its rank and file were drafted. Most of the officers were still retained on full pay in the following year, presumably while the War Office decided whether or not to close the books entirely but John Urquhart is not among them. Since he does not appear on the Half Pay list either he must clearly have sold out before the regiment was drafted receiving from the government the value of his commission as a retirement fund. As a young man he could reasonably expect [as indeed eventually proved to be the case] to obtain other employment and a lump sum was therefore more attractive than an annual income which will at best have equated only to the interest on the value of the original commission.

With no mention of him whatever in the Army List for 1796 and 1797 it comes as something of a surprise to find a Captain John Urquhart in the Half Pay list for the 135th Foot in 1798, particularly since that regiment had been disbanded in 1796. It was however no ordinary unit. Its commander, Lieutenant Colonel Commandant Sir Vere Hunt bt. was the celebrated individual who progressed from a mere Ensign in the 37th Foot in the 1793 Army List to the lofty rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the 1794 edition.

The story unfortunately loses some of its effect when it is learned that he did not by this mighty bound overtake more deserving officers to take command of his own regiment but instead ended up as a temporary half colonel in charge of a recruiting regiment. (10)

Nevertheless Hunt was clearly adept at milking the system and since in 1798 he raised the Loyal Limerick Fencibles it is possible that he was acquainted with our hero and willing to help him out of some temporary financial difficulty by getting him on to his regiment's Half Pay list. Significantly he has no date of seniority attaching to him in the list which would have revealed the fraud - officers who sold their commissions were not, in theory, allowed to buy back in again.

Notwithstanding his joining the East India Company in 1800 he remained in the Army List until 1805, though this seems to be an error as there is no trace of him in the 1805 Half Pay Register (11). According to his EIC pension records however his initial appointment was Extra to establishment [and indeed remained so until 1809] but he was allowed, in 1819 to count his established or pensionable service from April 1804, presumably the point at which he actuary relinquished his Half Pay. (12)

In the careers of three men therefore, all called John Urquhart we have a remarkable picture of the Purchase and Half Pay systems in operation together with a pretty comprehensive set of examples of the abuses to which they were suspect.

Officer Uniform, 1/1st (Royal) Regiment 1795

Red coat, lined white with very dark blue facings and gold lace.
Epaulettes, breastplate, gorget, and sword hilt gold or gilt.
Light pinkish red sash.
White waistcoat with buckskin breeches.
White silk stockings
Soft black regimental pattern boots (lined light tan).
Unlaced black hat with black cockade and hackle.

The illustration is based on a portrait of Capt. John Clayton Cowell by Sir William Beechey. It appears, despite the European style of his uniform, to have been painting on Santo Domingo since his soldier servant, seen in the backgroun of the original, wears mosquito trousers. John Urquhart [C] will have worn this uniform before transferring to the 106th Regiment.

Footnotes

(1) No christian name is given for the Quartermaster of the 40th - suggesting en ex ranker - but when he joined the Strathspey Fencibles he was said to have been a QM in an "old regiment' during the American War.
(2) Scotish Record Office GD248/683/3
(3) W.O. 4/149
(4) Erracht's own career is a good illustration of the Half Pay list at its worst. He had been commissioned Lieutenant in a loyalist Ranger unit in June 1775 but was captured before any men could be raised for [it comprised at the time a Lt Col, his servant, and two Lieutenants]. In 1784 however he argued that shortly before his capture he had been promised a captaincy and if he had not been captured and subsequently crippled in an escape attempt he would assuredly have become a Major. The War Office appears to have been so astonished by his audacity to be unable to gainsay him and so a Half Pay major he became. Maclean, L. Indomitable Colonel pp15-44, 69-70
(5) The rank and file were drafted en m asse into the 44th Foot. Houlding,, J. A. Fit For Service p124
(6) John Urquhart [B] took his seniority as a Captain in the Glasgow Regiment from 2nd September 1795, the date of his promotion to Captain-Lieutenant in the 79th.
(7) WO 31/21 fl3
(8) Army List 1795
(9) See Strachen, H. British Military Uniforms 1768-1796 pp256-260 for extracts from the regimental standing orders on dress. Reading between the lines the officers may not have been the best available
(10) This may betp explain why authors seem relucant to name him and content themselves witb referring to him only in abstract terms.
(11) PMG 4/74
(12) India Office L/AG/23/3A/2

Bibliography

Army List- various years
Cannon, Richard Historical Record of the 1st [or Royal] Regiment [1847]
Guy, AG Oeconomy and Discipline Officership and Administration in tbe British Army 1714 - 63, Manchester University Press 1985
Houlding,J.A. Fit For Service: The Training of the British Army 1715-795 Clarendon Press Oxford 1981
Mackintosh, H B The Grant Strathspey or First Highland Fencible Regiment 1793-99 Elgin 1934
Maclean, L. Indomitable Colonel London 1986

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