"The Iron Duke." Topic

"I spend a fair bit of my spare time looking at early photographs as I am fascinated by them and the proliferation of 'colourised' B/W images does in many cases really help to bring the subject back to life although often the colours are not totally accurate. This one just staggered me, an 1844 Daguerreotype of The Duke of Wellington taken on his 75th Birthday 175 years ago. It has been sensitively coloured."

From here
link

Amicalement
Armand

Certainly brings him to life.

Before long, we will see images like this colourised, de-aged, and inserted into films, to enable films about historical subjects that features the actual recreated faces of the principals. It's going to be breathtaking.

Like "The Irishman"? God forbid.

The voices and accents are the real trick for that.

Glad you like it my friend!.

Amicalement
Armand

I agree. Voices and accents- perhaps plus syntax and vocabulary. As far as the officer classes' lingo is concerned it would be very elaborate and flowery to our ears, but liberally peppered with obscenities of the most lurid and inventive kind- certainly in the c17th and c18th. Common soldiery with regional dialects might be virtually unintelligable to modern ears.

Great find Tango. Many thanks.

I'm not so sure that Napoleonic era British officers' use of language would be particularly 'elaborate and flowery to our ears'. I've read a great many memoirs, diaries and letters by such men, who would have written much as they spoke – only without the swearing – but, perhaps, slightly more formally, and their use of language is not dramatically different. Some words, of course, have through modern usage effectively changed in meaning – 'gay' for example – and others have fallen out of everyday use.

Their attitudes – racist, sexist, prejudice against Roman Catholics and Jews – are the main difference: an educated Scottish private soldier described a Spanish girl performing a dance in a tavern that was so disgusting that the lowest English woman would have blushed to do so – but probably only meant a Flamenco!

It was very much a PC incorrect time. Mercer's memoirs show such an anti-Papist view, as he travelled through Belgium and Northern France, which would be totally unacceptable now. Again, the documented comments about Jews, from 1815 and the Retreat for Moscow,….but that was what they all felt and indeed even experienced. It is called history.

Bad language by officers though? Funny thing is that Picton was regularly cited as a foul mouthed character, suggesting he was not short of an invective or two…..more than expected, is the implication.

But we are back to an Anglocentric view. This is important. We all know about "Merde" at Waterloo, I know about "Morte au Cons" for the first into Paris August 44, but these are the best I can swear in any language (Including Gaelic, to my shame). Did Russians, Prussians, French etc not use their version of "strong language"?

Finally that image of Wellington. Incredible. I was lucky enough to see the original, in a very dark room, in the National Portrait Gallery, London, a few years ago. The image is tiny. For some reason I had the small room to myself and spent ages there. This is a real, the only real (strange that), image of him. Not one "photo" of Anglesey, who lived longer. I still find this picture so moving, it is so unique. The French veterans are "staged" in later Empire reconstructions of their rig, to allow for the ravages of time on their waists. DOW seems not to have gained a pound.

Yes, perhaps by the c19th, language was used in a more straightforward way, but in the c18th there was still quite a bit of what we might consider circumlocution.

As far as bad language is concerned- two that jump immediately to mind are Generals Henry Hawley and 'Jolly Jack' Mostyn who are very colourful and inventive in the original correspondence. Among particularly vivid examples are a suggestion from Hawley for how troops winter billeted in Flanders can keep warm once their firewood allowance is used up, and one from Mostyn describing a physical manifestation of his eagerness to assume the Colonelcy of a prestigious Regiment……

There is also one of Marlborough's Whig leaning officers, I forget which, letting forth a torrent of profanity on the subject of the Tory politician Robert Harley, which still makes me chuckle because it is quite clever. I must try to find that one.

The point about Anglocentricity is a good one. I'm sure there are excellent examples from other armies but my languages aren't good enough easily to spot such colloquialisms. We do have some excellent linguists on TMP though, I'm sure that they will have some examples- provided we all keep it clean of course.

I do recall one about Frederick William I (Fred the Great's dad), turning down a request for state funds for some presumably non-military project (he certainly splashed the cash on his army) by pointing out that not even the King of Prussia was able to produce ducats through his bodily functions.

Anyway- that's all the upper class obscenity that I can muster immediately.

As you say deadhead- it is called history.

Look into his eyes. Those eyes have seen history in the making, tragedy, triumph, and troublesome times in politics. Would we like to see the historic imagery that they had seen?

'an anti-Papist view, as he travelled through Belgium and Northern France, which would be totally unacceptable now'- except possibly in certain quarters of the Royal Regiment of Scotland and the Royal Irish

Of course, the notion of bad language was very different when 'damn' and 'hell' were written 'd--n' and 'h--l, and what was regarded as blaspheming was still shocking to some ears.

Patrick O'Brien's books were the best modern attempt at diction and word choice I have come across, and he apparently immersed himself in Jane Austen and the literature and newspapers of the time to pick it up. Forester is good, but the conversation style, particularly the brevity, feels more modern.

I can remember reading a cartoon – Cruikshank, Rowlandson, I can't remember who- contrasting the pre-Revolutionary Frenchman ("he suis tres contente pour faire votre connaissance") with the revolutionary ("baiser mon cul"). I doubt they would have published that language in English, but interesting to read what I think of as a late Twentieth century salutation in the 1790s.

@ Nine pound round

Exactly the point I was going to make about Jane Austen. She was Napoleonic, upper-middle-class, and her brother was an army officer, so she is the authentic voice of the time.

Another is Frederick Marryat, whose Mr. Midshipman Easy was written by a former Georgian naval officer about a Georgian naval officer during the Napoleonic wars. As well as being authentically contemporary, it is also very, very funny.

@ deadhead: I found those 1848 veteran photographs moving too. These were the actual faces of people who had marched to Moscow with Napoleon and possibly looked on him; perhaps had spoken to him. It is as dislocating as somehow seeing a photo of one of Caesar's legionaries or Hannibal's Libyans.

D__n autocorrect to h__l. That was supposed to "je," not "he."

Unfortunately, they were the last generation that could only be recorded on paper and in oil. I have heard Edison recordings of Gladstone and von Moltke the elder, who were born in 1809 and 1800, but they were among the first to be recorded, and I suspect it was done to immortalize their voices before they, too, vanished forever. So you are hearing men who may have watched the armies pass as boys.

I once read that John Wayne often saw Wyatt Earp hanging around the stages in Hollywood with his friend Tom Mix, no doubt enjoying the idea that his life had become a suitable topic for drama (rather than shooting or imprisonment). Wayne said later that he deliberately and consciously modeled his talk, his walk, and his persona on Earp, so that may be the closest we ever come to knowing that particular personage. There must be some of that in the first generations to be filmed and recorded, and that may in some ways be a better guide to the essentials than recordings. I remember how stunned I was the first time I saw the elder George Bush in person; he seemed very different from his television persona.

Having seen this daguerreotype before, I always wonder- was this the picture George McDonald Fraser had in mind when he penned his portrait of Wellington for "Flashman?" Because, comic novel or not, that description felt pitch-perfect to me (right down to his reactions to Flashman's sucking up).

4th Cuirassier, Jane Austen's bother Henry Thomas Austen was an officer in the Oxfordshire militia from 1793 to 1801, and spent most of his career as paymaster.Her brothers, Francis William Austen and Charles John Austen, however, were both distinguished naval naval officers who saw active service.

The daguerreotype is truly wonderful – you are reaching back to a man (a genuinely great man) who was born in 1769 – a time when America was still a rational, sensible country!

Twenty years earlier on the process, and we might have had one of Napoleon. There cannot have been too many men born earlier than Wellington who were captured by it.

I well remember going to the baccaulaureate service when my sister graduated from William and Mary 25 years ago. Margaret Thatcher was the chancellor of the university, and the service was high-church Episcopalian. No objections there, but I can remember thinking, as they asked God's favor for "our bishop, John; our chancellor, Margaret," "if they say ‘our Queen, Elizabeth, I am LEAVING."

I believe one or two young soldiers of the AWI just made it into the age of photography.

@Nine pound round

Anyway, the correct form of address from a true loyalist would have been "our Sovereign Lady, Queen Elizabeth" or simply "The Queen"

For half a century the UK had two Queen Elizabeths, mother and daughter. It was therefore necessary until 2002 to distinguish between a Queen Consort and a Queen Regnant.

Indeed. The term 'dowager' has always meant the widow of the title holder. So the son becomes the new duke, his wife becomes the new duchess, and the old duchess who's still around is then the dowager.

I don't think this had happened with queens previously hence the 'Queen Mother' appellation (or 'Queen Mavva' as London cab drivers always called her).

Something I missed by being born an American, I suppose. I have only ever met one titled royal, but she was a Swede and the conditions were decidedly informal even by American standards, so I did not get much prior instruction on etiquette or address. I didn't even have time to come up with questions like "so is the principality of Ponte Corvo still a collateral title in your family?"

I bet she hasn't ever gotten that one.

@Nine pound round

When you met the late Duke of Wellington, his grace was very fond or reminding you that you had just shook the hand of someone who had shook the hand of someone who had shook the hand of the 1st Duke!

In reality, as a child he knew an old family retainer, who himself as a child had met the 1st Duke just before his death.

@4th Cuirassier

Of course, for the 1st Queen Elizabeth the problem of what to call The Queen Mother was neatly solved by her father having beheaded her!

"neatly solved by her father having beheaded her!"

Though not personally, you understand.

You can tell a lot about the esteem in which a man's memory is held from those kind of stories. Wellington certainly earned his place in history, and the awe that attaches to his memory is a tribute to his character. If I had to contrast him with Napoleon, I would say that the awe that attaches to Napoleon is a tribute to his talents.

I find both Napoleon and Wellington to be interesting and very human (I.e., imperfect) figures, in their very different ways.

Interesting observation

I once read that the difference was that a Queen Dowager was the widow of the previous monarch whereas a Queen Mother was, in addition, the mother of the present monarch. However, I'm not aware of any authority for making such a distinction.

As an aside, the most recent English Queen Dowager I can think of is Charles II's widow Catherine of Bragaza who survived him by about 15 years.