Soldier Artificer Company The Soldier Artificer Company was a unit of the British Army raised in Gibraltar in 1772 to work on improving the fortifications there . It was the Army ' s first unit of military artificers and labourers – the existing Corps of Engineers was entirely made up of commissioned officers – and it replaced the traditional but unreliable practice of employing civilian craftsmen . The company was an immediate success and was responsible for upgrading the British fortress ' s defences before the Great Siege of Gibraltar . During the siege between 1779 – 83 , the Soldier Artificer Company played a key role in repairing the damage caused to the fortifications by Spanish bombardments . They also excavated tunnels inside the Rock of Gibraltar to enable the defenders to fire down into the Spanish lines . After the siege , they assisted in rebuilding the civilian settlement at Gibraltar . The Soldier Artificers ' numbers were increased several times to a peak of about 250 men organised in two companies . Their success was such that similar units were raised back in Britain to form the Corps of Royal Military Artificers , a predecessor to today ' s Royal Engineers . The Soldier Artificer Company merged with the Royal Military Artificers in 1797 . History . Establishment . The Soldier Artificer Company was established by Lieutenant Colonel William Green to assist his programme of improvements to the fortifications of Gibraltar . He was posted to the fortress in 1761 as its Senior Engineer and in 1769 he put forward improvement plans which were eventually accepted after much debate . The go - ahead was given in October 1770 , when the British Government authorised a major programme of construction works . The works were initially carried out by civilians recruited from England and elsewhere in Europe . They were not subject to military discipline , which made them difficult to manage . The only punishments available for misconduct were reprimands , suspension and dismissal ; the latter incurred costs and disruption in having to find replacements . These problems caused significant delays and extra expense in completing the works . To remedy this situation , Green proposed that a company of military artificers should be raised to work on the fortifications . The garrison had occasionally used the artificing skills of individual soldiers , especially artillerymen , over the previous 70 years . Green ' s suggestion was welcomed by the Governor and Lieutenant - Governor of Gibraltar and was recommended by them to the Secretary of State for endorsement . It was duly agreed and on 6 March 1772 Royal consent was granted . A warrant was issued authorising the raising of a 68 - man company consisting of one sergeant - adjutant , three sergeants , three corporals , one drummer and 60 privates working variously as stonecutters , masons , miners , lime - burners , carpenters , smiths , gardeners and wheel - makers . Officers of the existing Corps of Engineers ( which consisted entirely of commissioned officers ) were put in command of the newly established Military Company of Artificers . It was almost immediately renamed the Soldier Artificer Company . Many of the civilian engineers , including almost all of the non - English ones , were dismissed when the Company was established , though a few of the better qualified and more reliable ones were retained . None took up an offer to join the Company . There was little difficulty in finding enough men to make up the numbers , as men from the garrison volunteered to join it . The Company soon proved to be a great improvement on the civilian workforce and a fresh warrant issued on 25 March 1774 authorised its expansion to 93 members , the additions comprising one extra sergeant and corporal and a further 23 private artificers . This proved to be a great improvement on the previous arrangements . General Robert Boyd , the Lieutenant - Governor of Gibraltar , commended the work of the Company in a letter to Lord Rochford , the Secretary of State : " We can depend only upon the artificer company for constant work , and on soldiers occasionally . Had it not been for the artificer company , we should not have made half the progress in the King ' s Bastion , as well as in the other works of the garrison . " The building of the King ' s Bastion was one of the most important projects carried out by the Company . It was a key fortification positioned on the waterfront between the fortress ' s old and new moles . The bastion ' s foundation stone was laid in 1773 but the progress of its construction was slow at first . It was hindered by the departure of foreign artificers and the loss of manpower resulting from the withdrawal of three Hanoverian regiments which had provided a number of artificers to supplement the Company . It was decided to expand the Company to make up for the shortfall and this was authorised on 16 January 1776 , bringing its numbers to 116 non - commissioned officers and men . The Company worked on the bastion " from gun - fire in the morning to gun - fire in the evening , as also on Sundays " and completed it in 1776 . The bastion , which mounted over 20 guns and had bomb - proof casemate s capable of housing 800 men , demonstrated its military worth only a few years after its completion when it withstood several years of heavy bombardment during the Great Siege of Gibraltar , which began in June 1779 . The Great Siege . The Soldier Artificers played a central role during the siege in successfully defending Gibraltar against the besieging Spanish and French armies . They were divided into three groups to direct works to strengthen the fortifications after the start of hostilities with Spain . At the height of the siege in 1782 – 83 , nearly 2 , 000 men of the garrison were put to work on the fortifications under the direction of the Soldier Artificers . On 27 November 1781 , after the Spanish had set up their own siege lines , the artificers participated in a highly successful British raid to demolish the Spanish entrenchments and spike their cannon . The Governor , General George Eliott , subsequently praised in a despatch the role they had played in the sortie : they had " made wonderful exertions , and spread their fire with such amazing rapidity , that in half an hour , two mortar batteries of ten 13 - inch mortars , and three batteries of six guns each , with all the lines of approach , communication and traverses , & c . were in flames and reduced to ashes . Their mortars and cannon were spiked , and their beds , carriages and platforms destroyed . Their magazines blew up one after another , as the fire approached them . " The artificers were also responsible for providing the gunners with a supply of red - hot shot to be fired at the besieging forces , which they accomplished by building kilns around the fortress to heat 100 pieces of shot at a time . Despite British counter - fire , the Spanish were able to advance slowly along the isthmus linking Gibraltar with Spain by extending their trenches towards the British lines . The closer they came , the more difficult it was for the British to aim their cannon down into the Spanish lines . The near - vertical cliff of the North Front of the Rock of Gibraltar greatly restricted the space in which the British cannon could be deployed . By May 1782 the Spanish had been able to knock out many of the British batteries on the North Front without the British being able to return fire adequately . General Eliott offered a bounty of 1 , 000 Spanish dollar s to " any one who can suggest how I am to get a flanking fire upon the enemy ' s works " . In response , the Company ' s Sergeant - Major , Henry Ince , proposed to tunnel a gallery through the Rock to reach an outcrop called the Notch , so that a cannon could be mounted there to cover the entire North Front . His suggestion was immediately approved and the Soldier Artificers began tunnelling on 25 May 1782 . As the works progressed , the tunnellers decided to create an opening in the cliff face to provide them with ventilation . It was immediately realised that this would offer an excellent firing position . By the end of the siege , the newly created Upper Gallery – known today as the Great Siege Tunnels – housed four guns , mounted on specially developed " depressing carriages " to allow them to fire downwards into the Spanish positions . The Notch was not reached until after the siege had ended ; instead of mounting a gun above it , the outcrop was hollowed out to create a broad firing position . Apart from the tunnelling work , the Company was kept busy during the siege by repairing damage caused by the Spanish bombardment of the fortress . Its single worst loss of life during the siege occurred on 11 June 1782 when a Spanish shell hit the magazine of Princess Anne ' s Battery , causing a devastating explosion . The magazine was completely destroyed and debris was ejected down the slope into the British lines below , causing heavy casualties in the vicinity . Fourteen soldiers were killed and another 15 were wounded . By July the Company had lost 22 men through various causes , six of them killed by enemy action , with the rest falling victim to illnesses . Replacements and an increase in numbers were urgently requested from England . Under a fresh Royal Warrant issued on 31 August 1782 , the company ' s numbers were increased to one sergeant - major , 10 sergeants , 10 corporals , 209 privates and four drummers . The new recruits , numbering 141 men , were quickly despatched to Gibraltar and arrived there in October . The Company also included two boys , Thomas Richmond and John Brand , dubbed " Shell and Shot " by their older comrades . They were sons of Company sergeants and were trained as , respectively , a carpenter and a mason . They were put to work in the fortifications to look out for enemy shells being fired and give warning of their approach . Their keen eyesight enabled them to save many lives , earning them a fair amount of celebrity within the garrison . The pair were given a proper education after the siege and in due course were commissioned as second lieutenants . Both were posted to the West Indies but died there of yellow fever in 1793 . Rebuilding and merger . By the end of the siege in February 1783 , seven men of the Company had been killed and a further 23 had died from sickness , with an additional two men executed in May 1781 for looting . However , it had suffered no desertions during the siege , unlike several of the other British formations in the garrison . The great success of the Company ' s tunnelling work led to a large - scale programme of further tunnelling leading to of tunnels being excavated by 1790 . Ince remained in charge of the work . The Soldier Artificers were also occupied with the rebuilding of the civilian settlement at Gibraltar , which had been reduced to ruins , and repairing and further strengthening the fortifications . Their numbers were replenished with men transferred from regiments stationed at Gibraltar . They were uniquely privileged among the garrison ' s lower ranks ; they were exempted from guard duty and their cleaning and cooking was done for them by soldiers of the line . The structure of the Soldier Artificer Company underwent major reform in June 1786 when it was divided into two companies , in recognition of its increased size . It also underwent a major turnover in personnel , with 86 members being discharged – over a third of its numbers . Apart from disciplinary problems with some Soldier Artificers , the main reason for the mass discharge was that many of them were simply too old and weak to be able to bear the rigours of their work . As experienced craftsmen were required , this meant that their average age skewed much higher than regular units . Due to military necessity , recruits had generally been admitted between the ages of 35 – 45 and occasionally as old as 50 . The older members were replaced with younger men aged 35 or under , primarily masons and bricklayers , and the overall number of Soldier Artificers was increased again . However , the journey of the second batch of new recruits – 58 men , 28 wives and 12 children – ended in disaster on 24 September 1786 when their ship , the " Mercury " , was shipwrecked on a sand bank off Dunkirk . Only three men were pulled from the water , two of whom died soon afterwards . The following year , the Master - General of the Ordnance , the Duke of Richmond , proposed to Prime Minister William Pitt that six companies of 100 soldier artificers should be raised in Britain along the lines of the Soldier Artificer Company . Richmond was intent on a major programme of building and renovating fortifications , just as Green had been in Gibraltar 15 years earlier , and like Green he was dissatisfied with the existing system of hiring civilian labourers and artificers . Although the proposal was strongly opposed by those who argued that it was ridiculous to put labourers under military discipline , it was approved by Pitt and King George III and a warrant was issued in October 1787 authorising the creation of the Royal Military Artificers and Labourers . The Soldier Artificers in Gibraltar were asked if they wanted to change their existing scarlet uniforms for the new blue uniforms of their British - based counterparts . They agreed and from 1788 all the soldier artificers in the British Army wore the same uniforms . In June 1797 the Soldier Artificers were amalgamated with the Corps of Royal Military Artificers , a predecessor to today ' s Royal Engineers . By this time they comprised two companies with two sergeant - majors , five sergeants , five corporals , two drummers and 125 private artificers in each company ( though the actual numbers on amalgamation were somewhat lower than this ) . Their discipline had deteriorated during peacetime and drunkenness was frequent , as were courts - martial for misconduct . Even so , the quality of their work remained high as long as they were kept under the close scrutiny of their officers and NCOs , who were particularly good foremen . Their incorporation into the corps brought its numbers up to a nominal total of 1 , 075 men of all ranks . A statue on Gibraltar ' s Main Street commemorates the Soldier Artificer Company . It bears the inscription : " Presented to the people of Gibraltar by the Corps of Royal Engineers to commemorate the continuous service given by the corps on the Rock of Gibraltar from 1704 , and the formation here in 1772 of the first Body of Soldiers of the Corps , then known as the Company of Soldier Artificers . ( 26 March 1994 ) . " In 1972 , the Gibraltar Philatelic Bureau issued a stamp commemorating the Soldier Artificers and the bicentenary of the Royal Engineers in Gibraltar .