STUDIES IN THE NAPOLEONIC WARS 084
The Right Man in the Right Place
11. The Right Man in the Right Place (3)
In 1802 the 49th were sent out to Canada, and there abode for the next thirteen years. This was absolutely the only part of the British Empire where, during the great war with Napoleon, a regiment had no chance of seeing active service. Colonel Brock therefore had, during the best years of his ripe manhood, no opportunity to show his military ability. His battalion was told off to the Upper Province, and was scattered in detachments over several forts and outposts, separated from each other by hundreds of miles—a condition of affairs that told terribly against regimental efficiency. The Colonel had always to be on the move, and never saw his whole ten companies assembled together on parade. On one occasion he had to quell by his sudden appearance a dangerous mutiny, caused by the senseless and capricious severity of his second-in-command, who had been left alone for some months in charge of the detachment stationed at Fort George, on the Straits of Niagara. The men had plotted to shoot their tyrant, and to abscond in a body to the opposite American shore. Fortunately Brock heard rumours of the prevailing discontent at his distant headquarters, and hurried up from York (the modern Toronto) just in time to prevent the outbreak and to arrest the ringleaders. He came accompanied by his sergeant-major alone, but his mere presence sufficed to render impossible a crime which would have left a very black spot on the history of the British Army.
Brock became a brigadier in 1808 and a major-general in June 1811: three months later he received a very honourable and arduous commission, which gave him a civil as well as a military status, by being made “President and Administrator of the Government of Upper Canada”. This appointment was one of the most profitable nominations ever made in the London Gazette, since it put the right man in the right place, just nine months before the crisis which was to arise from the outbreak of war with the United States in June 1812. Brock was given time to settle himself into the saddle, and to familiarize himself with his duties and his responsibilities before the time of trial came. He was already, from ten years’ residence in Canada, well acquainted with all the leading men of the Upper Province, official and non-official. He knew the land and waterways by which its thinly scattered population communicated with each other. He could gauge exactly its very limited resources in men and money. He could tell where he might expect apathy and where enthusiastic support, when the time of trouble should arrive. Best of all, he had time to impress his own cheery, energetic, resourceful temperament on those who were about him.
All accounts agree that Isaac Brock had a most dominating personality. He was now in his forty-third year, in the full vigour of robust middle age. He was of commanding stature, not less than six feet two inches in height, and was correspondingly broad-built. But he was neither heavy nor ungainly. In his youth he had been a noted boxer and swimmer; he was still a great athlete, capable of any endurance of fatigue, on foot or on horseback—though it was not always easy to find a charger up to his weight. He was of a fair and florid complexion, with a high forehead, a full face, a small mouth, and very lively and restless grey-blue eyes. Several of those who knew him note the habitual cheerfulness of his demeanour, and his winning smile. “His manners were courteous, frank, and engaging”, says one biographer; “in converse he was exceedingly affable and gentlemanly”, says another, “of a cheerful and social habit, partial to dancing, and (though he was never married) extremely sensible to the charms of female society.” A third speaks of him as having “a commanding bearing but a gentle manner—irreproachable in private life, universally respected by those who did not personally know him, and loved by those who did”.
One of the best monuments to his memory is the string of anecdotes concerning his thoughtful kindness, in the Memoirs of his favourite sergeant-major James Fitzgibbon, who by his patronage was promoted to a commission, and became one of the best and most daring leaders of light troops in the oncoming war.
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