The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1886-12-22
Army Panics.

Napier, Ill MS ~ lenlnSuld war,
devotes but some eight or nine lines to
an account of the most remarkable re-
corded incident of this nature, in which
Robert Crawford's celebrated Light Di-
misunderstanding of those three dis
tinguished regiments, the Fifty-third,
the Fifty-second and the Ninety-ffth-
were seized and put to flight by an at
tack of fear so sudden and causeless that
the historian makes no attempt what
ever to ascribe a reason for it, " The
Light Division" he writes, encamped
in a pine wood, where happened one of
those extraordinary panics attributed
in ancient times to the influence of
god. No enemy was near, no alarm
given, when suddenly the troops, as if
seized with frenzy, started from sleep
and disappeared in every direction;
nor was there any possibility of allay-
ing this strange terror until some per-
sons called out that the enemy's cav
airy were among them, when the sol
diers mechanically ran together and
the illusion was dissipated." 1t seems
odd that so diffuse writer should have
seen fit to say so little of so eXtraordin-
AIRY an occurrence, more especially when
we remember that this same Light Di-
vision was the flower of the British army
in the Peninsula, and that he writes of
it not many pages before " as composed
of three regiments singularly fitted for
difficult service. Long and carefully
disciplined by Sir John Moore, they
came to the field with such knowledge
of arms that six years of warfare could
not detect flaw in the system, nor
! t1,a,, ob Cd IL, nd
skill.n In South Africa the disaster of
Isandlhwana gave the soldiers nerves
a severe shaking, and it often happened
that false alarms at night led to reck
less discharge of firearms. In some
cases friendly natives or even comrades
were taken by the excited imaginations
of sentry for enemies; in others, I'M
offending cattle, even bush or shrub g,
became the innocent cause of fusilade
sufficient to have dealt widespread de-
struction to host of Iulus. An odd
accident, illustrative of the slightness
of the cause-or even perhaps of the
absence of any cause at all-that gives
rise to panic occurred on the night of
Tel-el- ebir, amidst a small corner of
the force that was bivouacking on the
battlefield. The narrator had crawed
into a marquee, in which, with other
commissariat stores, were the rum-casks
from which the troops had received
their liquor ration after the fatigue
and excitement of the days fight and
previous night-march. Besides one or
two commissariat issuers in charge of
the stores, several odds and ends -
of other corps had found their way into
the marquee, preferring to rest under
its shelter, amid the casks and biscuit
boxes, than under the open sky, with
the sand for bed. Suddenly, in the
middle of the night, when all were
sleeping, noise and commotion began
in the bivouac outside. Before the in
habitants of the tent were sufficiently
awake to understand its cause the cur
tains were thrust aside by red located
soldier, who shouted to us to get up:
g The Arabs are in camp-they are
upon usn' Then he disappeared as
rapidly as he had come. Every one
sprang to his arms, and probably eX-
perienced that especially uncomfortable
sensation that is caused by vague
feeling of an unseen though imminent
danger, against which one is ignorant
how to guard. Outside every one
around was aroused and up, eagerly
striving to discover from what quarter
attack was to be expected. Nothing
however, more unpleasant occurred
than the advent of staff officer asking
the cause Of the confusion. Probabl,
the truth did reach headquarters. After
ward, however, a report gained ground
no other or better reason was eve
electromagnetic the alarm arose from
the screams of a sleeping soldier who
overweight by the horrors of the day
had been fighting his battle over agail
, in his dreams - Chambers Journal