The Sun.
London, England, 1868-01-08 00:00:00

A NEW HELD-MARSHAL.

After a period of service unexampled, we should
think, in military history, Sir John Burgoyne pro-
poses at length to retire from active duty, and few
would deny that the rank of Field-Nlarshal, to which
he has just been elevated, has been well and fairly
earned. The length of his career, indeed, appears
almost incredible. It commenced in the last century,
and if at the time when be entered the army there
were any officers iu it as old as he is now, their re-
collections might have gone back to the days of
Marlborough. When the young soldier received his
first commission the Duke of Wellington was only
in the eleventh year of his service, and Buonaparte
was but a Republican General. Since that time
70 years have elapsed, and Sir John Burgoyne
still survives, not only hale and vigorous, but
actually on duty as before. It is, indeed, not the
least surprising feature in this unparalleled service
that it should have been performed without a break,
and there is probably no other army in the world
which could produce a soldier who had been on full
pay ever since 1798. Nor will the fact lose any of
its singularity if we remember the nature of the
service. For nearly twenty years it was a service
of the greatest difficulty and peril. Sir John Bur-
goyne belonged to the • Royal Engineers, and the
demands upon the corps in the Peninsular War
were heavy in the extreme. The war was in some
sense a war of sieges, and yet sieges were operation a
of which our armies had not the least experience
The history of those days can hardly even now be
read without emotion. Our troops sat down before
some of the strongest fortresses in Europe without
any adequate means of attack. Lord Wellington
was ill-provided with guns and stores, and the
engineers of his army were few and imperfectly
organised. In fact, the whole department had, as
it were, to be created for the occasion. So great
was the demand, and so short the supply of officers
in this branch of the service, that the War-office
freely offered commissions to any young men who
could produce evidence of a mathematical educa-
tion. As to the rank and file of the corps, it was
represented mainly by men draughted from the
line with such hasty training as the officers could
give them. What ensued might have been easily
anticipated. Our troops did take towns, just
as they won battles, but at a dreadful sacrifice of
life. Yet through all these days Sir John Burgoyne
served and lived, and the Engine er officer who had
commenced his career with the siege of Malta sur-
vived to conduct, above half a century later, the
siege of Sebastopol.
That name brings us to times with which the
present generation is familiar, and to events which
are still fresh in public memory. We read of Bada-
joz and San Sebastian as we read of Madgeburg
and Stralsund, but Sebastopol is a name of yes-
terday still. What that campaign really meant
Sir John Burgoyne explained to us. He told
his countrymen afterwards that the term "siege"
as applied to the operations of the British army
before Sebastopol was a misnomer. The Russians,
defended by formidable works, were confronted
by the Allies, and one army attacked the other
army, sometimes with success, sometimes defeated,
till at last the position of the enemy was forced,
and we remained victorious. Once more, however,
even at his advanced age, Sir John Burgoyne sur-
vived a campaign which, for its duration, was more
deadly and destructive than any on record, and re-
turned home to pursue a career which no peace ever
interrupted. It is the peculiarity of the Engineer
service that its duties are unintermittent, and the
retrospect of Sir John Burgoyne in this particular
must be without any counterpart in such experience.
The contrast between guns and forts as they are
now and as they were in 1798, or even in 1818,
could hardly be described. In no other respect has
the art of war been so completely revolutionised.
Upon the whole, we may say, perhaps, that an in-
creased value is placed upon fortifications, and a
greater importance attached to the service of which
Sir John is the head. We are even introducing, for
the first time since the days of the Romans, ela-
borate systems of fortification into this island. NV e
are constructing works of which a single redoubt
would absorb and consume all the engineers' means
at the disposal of an army in Sir John's early days.
A single gun of our own time would throw a pro-
jectile as heavy as all the shot of a Peninsular
battering train.

Peninsular veterans are becoming rare, but Sir
John Burgoyne was a soldier of experience before
these veterans began. The war in Spain only came
as it were in the middle of his active service. Ile
nad been to Sicily and to Alexandria before he went
to Portugal, and could, indeed, from his own per-
sonal recollections, have compared the landing in
the Crimea with the descent upon Egypt. If there
are others surviving whose mernpries coould go as
far back, there are none who could claim not only
to have served then but to have served ever since.
Sir John Burgoyne, however, first fought through
the wars of the Revolution, then pursued the duties
of his profession through the 40 years' peace, then
went again upon more active service, and only now,
more than 10 years after that last service was con-
cluded, bethinks himself of retirement and repose.
It is a most surprising retrospect, but if length of
years and weight of work ever entitled a man to
distinction, it must be allowed that such recompense
is the righteous due of the soldier whose career we
have been reviewing.—Times.

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