Lieutenant (later brevet Captain) Cornelius Slingsby appeared in "Sharpe's Escape". At 31, he is old for a Lieutenant, but inexperienced, having served most of his army career in the East Indies. He is the brother-in-law of Col. Lawford's wife, Jessica, who pressures her husband to advance Slingsby's career in the South Essex (Sharpe's friend, Robert Knowles, confides that Jessica's sister was impregnated by a lover who abandoned her, and Slingsby was hastily "recruited" by her family to marry her and avoid scandal). He is assigned as second-in-command of the Light Company under Sharpe, who detests him. At Bussaco, after Sharpe rescues a detachment of the Light Company from one of Slingsby's blunders, Slingsby demands an apology for Sharpe using harsh language towards him. When Sharpe refuses, Lawford reluctantly reassigns Sharpe as a quartermaster and puts Slingsby in temporary command of the Light Company. Even Lawford quickly becomes annoyed with Slingsby, silently comparing him to a dog that barks too often, just to ensure that people are still paying attention to him. Under the pressures of his new position, Slingsby quickly breaks down, getting drunk on duty with hoarded rum. After another brief skirmish with the French in which Sharpe rescues the Light Company (again), Lawford quietly reinstates him to command, while leaving Slingsby's fate ambiguous.