But such was the code of honour at the time that his captain, and the dying corporal himself, aided his escape with money for a journey to Glasgow. During the fight he gave the corporal a mortal wound, and because duelling was illegal had to flee for his life. Donald's honour as a soldier was at stake and he challenged the corporal to a duel. Shortly afterwards his corporal accused him of absence off guard, and punished him with a beating. He got no further than Perth before he enlisted in the Earl of Angus's Regiment to serve as a pikeman. he did not want to carry on with his apprenticeship, and so with his mother's blessing, twenty shillings and a new suit of clothes, he set out to seek his fortune. In 1697 at the Peace of Ryswick his company was disbanded again so he went home to Inverness. Next year, at Rotterdam, he was discovered by his former Captain, who exchanged Donald for two other men and took him back to Fort William. Here he attached himself to Lord Orkney's Royal Regiment and in 1695 as a Royal Scot he stormed Namur with the other British regiments and recovered from his wounds at Brussels. From there he marched to Maestricht and thence to Brussels, where the British Army was camped. Then, on a mission to escort a draft of soldiers bound for Flanders he got carried off from Leith (at Edinburgh) to Haversluys by mischance. Publicly beating the other fencing scholars. "I then became master of my own pay - and his likeways"īy 1692 Donald owned his own sword and practised at the fencing schools, Undeterred, Donald took more lessons in small sword versus broad sword, and another bout ended in Donald's victory - and his sword was returned. When he complained to an officer he was told to fight out the dispute, as was the custom at that time.ĭonald thereupon paid a sergeant for private instruction in swordsmanship, borrowed a sword,and then fought his "govenor", who beat him, took his sword and pawned it. Again his unit was disbanded, and he joined Colonel Forbes's Regiment, where an old soldier was ordered to take care of Donald and "manage his pay" for him, with the result that Donald saw little of it. When his company was disbanded he took service in Colonel Grant's Regiment in the pay of King William, who had to oppose the Highland clans fighting for King James at the Pass of Killiecrankie. He indulged in some fighting between the clans of Macdonald and Macintosh, who used sword and target, and Lochaber axes, and wooden-handled bayonets in the muzzle of the guns. THE BEGINNINGS OF DONALD McBANE.ĭonald McBane hailed from Inverness, and in 1687 ran away from his apprenticeship as a tobacco spinner to enlist in one of the Independent Companies within the Army, Captain Mackenzie's Company. Illustrated with 22 etched copper plates. To which is annexed, The Arts of Gunnerie. With all Account of the Author's Life and his Transactions during the Wars with France. The full title of this now most rare book is: The Expert Sword-man's Companion or the True Art of Self-Defence. Twenty years later at the age of 63 sat down to remember and write. At first he tramped for seven weeks along the Rhine and the Main, over the Pass of Geislingen into the valley of the Danube, down that river to the Schellenburg, over that river into the heart of Bavaria, and back again to Blenheim village in the year 1704. The War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) was the first major "world" war of modern times. The author, Donald McBane, (also known as McBain) kept an ale-house and a School of Arms in London.ĭonald McBane's book portrays with gritty realism the life of a soldier of The Royal Scots in Europe under Marlborough. The Expert Swordsman ONE OF MARLBOROUGH'S MEN, AN EIGHTEENTH CENTURY SOLDIER.Įxtracts from an autobiography published in Glasgow in 1728
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