An Ambition for Glory:
The Undaunted Royal Highlander Alexander McLean, 1759

2nd Battalion 42nd Highland Regiment firing and retiring by company, 1758 (Regimental Museum). The first company retiring in the sequence (right) is likely the Grenadier company. Absence of sergeant's halberts supports this.

 
 WHEN LIEUTENANT ALEXANDER MCLEAN OF THE 42ND ROYAL HIGHLAND REGIMENT LANDED NEAR BASSE-TERRE IN JANUARY 1759, THE TOWN WAS STILL BURNING.  The previous day, Royal Navy bomb vessels had pounded French positions with mortar shells and incendiary rounds called carcasses.  

     No one opposed the landing of British troops.  French troops had retired northeast through tall sugar cane fields to the interior’s rocky high ground. The condition of Basse-Terre left the Highlanders little choice but to encamp outside the town.  Tents and camping equipment were landed while troops took possession of the town’s abandoned citadel.  Humanitarian aid was offered to the homeless inhabitants of Basse-Terre, who were “real objects of pity.”

Encampment of the 63rd (Watson's) Regiment of Foot on the glacis of the Citadel in Basse-Terre, 1759. (Map of attack on Basse-Terre found here.)

     Meanwhile the 3^rd (Old Buffs) Regiment of Foot pushed into the interior along riviere des Peres. They were greeted with volley fire from armed black slaves hiding in the sugar cane fields. At one point the troops had to set fire to the fields to dislodge their assailants. 

     Four miles out of Basse-Terre, the 3^rd Foot reached the abandoned plantation of Madame Ducharmoy (16°01'04.8"N 61°42'49.1"W).  Deemed a good spot for an outpost, the regiment took up residence there.  To make the outpost more defendable, the sugar cane fields around it were burned.

     Incensed at the British occupying her home, Madame Ducharmoy with her armed servants and slaves attacked.  Ducharmoy proved a determined adversary.  Inflicting casualties but unable to dislodge the British at her plantation, Ducharmoy entrenched her force on an adjacent hill across the river (possibly 16°01'23.6"N 61°42'56.4"W or

6.0348811, -61.713950).¹  Compared with the mythical Amazon Queen Thalestris, Ducharmoy also had several armed women insurgents in her entrenchments.

Storming the Trenches

Map of Basse-Terre in 1760 with route of attack by McLean

     On February 4^th 150 troops² including the Highland grenadiers with Lieutenant McLean were ordered to storm the trenches of Ducharmoy.  With musket in hand, Mclean at the head of twelve Grenadiers climbed the “steep precipice”, under fire, towards the enemy’s position.  Ducharmoy had not been idle, and had built an eight-foot-high earthen mound or parapet to protect her trenches.  Ten feet before the parapet was a slope of rock that could not be scaled while carrying a musket.  Out of view of the enemy, McLean climbed up first and his Grenadiers passed their muskets up before joining him.  

     McLean appearing at the base of the parapet greatly surprised Ducharmoy’s force of irregulars and threw them into confusion.  Sensing an opportunity, McLean ordered his men to fix bayonets and charge up the parapet.  Reaching the top, the Highlanders drove the enemy “like a flock of sheep with push of bayonet before us.” 

     Confronted by another rock to scale and with only three grenadiers left not dead or wounded, McLean halted.   Soon he was joined by forty other Highlanders. For half an hour they worked to climb the rock to get at the enemy above.  Again, in the lead, Mclean reached the top and charged the enemy with musket and bayonet: “I was pushing my bayonet into a fellow, who, falling back, drew his trigger; the ball entered at my elbow and came out close to the shoulder, shattering the bone all the way but before I left the field, I had the pleasure to see them spitted like Larks, and the place our own.”   In total the British suffered twelve killed and thirty wounded in the battle. A number of women were made prisoner, but Ducharmoy had escaped.

42nd Highland Grenadier (Morier, c1751).
It is likely they wore their bonnets in the attack due to the heat and terrain.
This regiment had buff collar and cuffs until the end of 1759.

 

The Surgeon’s Saw

     Upon returning to camp, McLean was rushed to the Surgeon.  It was clear to McLean he had to have his arm amputated but he refused.  McLean described his “ambition was pretty great” and he did not want his army career ended by being sent off to a regiment of invalids. McLean was choosing death over giving up his hopes for continued active military service.

     McLean’s refusal brought Brigadier General George Haldane to his bedside.  Haldane assured him that McLean would not be put with the Invalids and would be made a captain in the first available vacant company.  McLean recounted: “Having this assurance I did not care a farthing for the arm (it was but the left), and now, contrary to the belief of the Surgeons, I am so well that in three weeks I shall be able to take care of my Platoon again… my stump is in a fine way.”

    
Arm Amputation (from A General System of Surgery in Three Parts by Laurence Heister, 1743)
After using a small scalpel to cut the skin, a large curved knife is employed to cut to the bone. Then a bone saw is employed.

While convalescing on Guadeloupe, McLean turned his ambitions to affairs of the heart.  It appears McLean's attack on Madame Ducharmoy did not injure the esteem of the women of the island towards him: “He was particularly noticed by the French ladies for his gallantry and spirit and the manner he wore his plaid and regimental garb.”  McLean’s ambition appeared not to be confined to army promotion.

     While his Battalion prepared to depart for New York, news arrived that McLean had been given one of three newly raised Royal Highland companies in Perth, Scotland. In August 1759, these companies were embodied into a new regiment: 87^th (Keith’s) Highland Regiment of Foot.  In the new corps, McLean was senior Captain, meaning he was next in line for promotion to becoming a Major. It was not long before his unit was shipped out to war.  But it was Germany, not America where McLean would seek glory.

 

To War in Germany

Captain James Gorry, 87th Highland Regiment of Foot

The 87th saw its first action in January 1760 and fought in numerous engagements throughout that year and the following.  During the surprise attack on Zierenberg, McLean was again in the fore of the attack. While another officer distracted the enemy sentry in French, McLean approached and stabbed the guard.  Then McLean lead his 150 Highlanders with drawn broadswords through the gate and stormed the French garrison to the utter surprise of the enemy.  

At the battle of Vellinghausen, the Highlanders were also conspicuous in their bravery:

“The soldier-like perseverance of the Highland regiments in resisting and repulsing the repeated attacks of the chosen troops of France, his deservedly gain them the highest honour. The ardour and activity with which the grenadiers pushed and pursued the enemy, and the trophies they have taken, justly entitle them to the highest encomiums.  The intrepidity of the little band of Highlanders merits the greatest praise.”

No doubt McLean was in the thick of the battle. The Highlanders had become the Allied army’s “shock troops”. 

A mythology started to develop in Germany and Austria about the fearless Highlanders.  The Vienna Gazette in 1762 reported:

“The Scotch Highlanders …are a people totally different in their dress, manners, and temper from the other inhabitants of Britain.  They are caught in the mountains when young, and still run with a surprising degree of swiftness.  As they are strangers to fear, they make very good soldiers when disciplined… They discover an extraordinary submission and love for their officers, who are all young and handsome…”

The wounding of Major Archibald Macnab at Vellinghausen left McLean acting Major of the regiment.  This became permanent in April 1762.  But luck ran out for the bold McLean a few months later.  In September at Brucher Muhl the French were determined to put up a fight. After a constant fifteen-hour exchange of heavy artillery and small arms fire, and 600 casualties, the allies captured their objective. Unfortunately, Major Alexander McLean did not witness the victory.  He had been killed.  Two months later his men were ordered to return to Britain.  The Highlanders were treated as heroes, with women presenting laurel leaves to the them was marched through Holland for home.