rorkesdriftvc.com :: View topic - REGINALD BRETT (LATER 2nd VISCOUNT ESHER)

Posted: Thu Dec 08, 2011 12:01 pm

Paul

Thanks, but no apology necessary

KIS

Posted: Mon Dec 12, 2011 6:08 pm

G

If there is, indeed, no suspicion of any retrospective nature in the entry of 11th Feb., then we must, presumably, conclude that Brett was merely making assumptions regarding the loss of the Colour(s), based on his own guesses or on the gossip of his contacts, emanating from the wording of Lord C's despatch which emphasised the loss of officers, men, artillery, all supplies and transport, etc. So if they had been overwhelmed and had lost all the equipment and officers & men that Lord C mentioned, then they must - someone presumed - have lost the Colours too, although they would also have had to assume that an African foe had followed a European understanding of its importance and the need to "capture" it - an anomaly in itself, even in such a vague or "throwaway" remark.

I'd also concede that the remark about not feeling up to work today suggests a genuinely contemporaneous feel about the entry. The statement about the Colours, though, is still - at first sighting - a remark which catches one's attention immediately, given that we can be 100% certain that no-one in England on that day had any knowledge at all of their loss.

Thanks, too, for the details from the online catalogue. Your use of the term "keenies" certainly took me back a few years - hadn't heard that since school!

Peter

Posted: Tue Dec 13, 2011 8:54 am

Well, I would incline towards the idea that loss of colours was a supposition, but one probably and reasonably aligned to a ready asumption that "the Colours" were with the Bn(s) on the occasion of their reverse and therefore their assumed loss.

As to the rest of your analysis the Intelligence Corps or something with river views perhaps beckons.

G