Note 1 — REGIMENTAL LISTS.

76Aftds. Maj.-Gen. Sir Frederick Cavendish Ponsonby, K.C.B. and K.M.T., Gov. of Malta. 2nd son of Frederick, 3rd Earl of Bessborough, by Lady Henrietta, 2nd dau. of 1st Earl Spencer. Bn. 6th July, 1783. Cornet 10th Lt. Dgns. 1800. Maj. 23rd Lt. Dgns. 1807. At head of this regt. distinguished himself at Talavera, in 1809. Lt.-col. of the regt. 1810. At Barossa, with a squadron of German dragoons, he charged the French cavalry covering the retreat, overthrew them, and took two guns. Lt.-Col. 12th Lt. Dgns. 1811. Again signally distinguished himself at the battles of Salamanca and Vittoria. His experiences at Waterloo were almost unique, as when lying grievously wnded. on the field, after a most gallant charge, in the French lines, a lancer who was passing by and saw Ponsonby move, exclaimed: “Tu n’est pas mort, coquin,” and struck his lance through the English officer’s back. “My head dropped” (wrote Ponsonby in his subsequent narrative of his experiences), “the blood gushed into my mouth, a difficulty of breathing came on, and I thought all was over.” But the bitterness of death was not yet past. Soon after, a tirailleur came up and roughly searched him all over, robbing Ponsonby of what money he had about him. He was hardly quit of this scoundrel before another appeared with the same intent. At last a good Samaritan appeared in the shape of a French officer, who administered brandy to the apparently dying Englishman, and then passed on “to pursue the retreating British”! What followed is best given in Ponsonby’s own words: “Presently another tirailleur appeared, who came and knelt and fired over me, loading and firing many times, and conversing with great gaiety all the while. At last he ran off.” The evening came, and with it the Prussians. “Two squadrons of Prussian cavalry, both of them two deep, passed over me in full trot, lifting me from the ground and tumbling me about cruelly. A German soldier, bent on plunder, came and pulled me about roughly before he left me.” An English private next appeared, and on Ponsonby telling him who he was, the soldier picked up a sword and stood sentry over him. Next morning Ponsonby was removed in a cart to a farmhouse, and laid in a bed from which poor Sir A. Gordon had just been carried out dead. Col. Ponsonby had received seven wounds; a surgeon slept in his room, and he was saved by continual bleeding—120 ounces in two days, besides the great loss of blood on the field.—Narrative. M., 1825, Emily, youngest dau. of 3rd Earl Bathurst, and had issue. D. 11th Jan., 1837.