Stapleton Cotton, 1st Viscount Combermere

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Stapleton Cotton, 1st Viscount Combermere; Oil painting by Mary Martha Pearson .

Stapleton Stapleton-Cotton, 1st Viscount Combermere (born Cotton , born November 14, 1773 in Lleweni Hall ( Denbighshire ), † February 21, 1865 in Clifton near Bristol ) was a British field marshal .

Life

Early life

Stapleton Cotton was the second son of Sir Robert Salusbury Cotton, 5th Baronet and Frances Stapleton. He received his training at Westminster School and joined the army early. At the age of 16 he was second lieutenant of the 23rd Regiment (Royal Welch Fusiliers) . In February 1793 he was bought the post of captain in the 6th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Dragoons , with whom he took part in the campaign of the Duke of York and Albany in Flanders from August 1793 and especially at the Battle of Le Cateau (March 29th 1794). In September 1794 he rose to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in the 25th Regiment of (Light) Dragoons (later 22nd Regiment of (Light) Dragoons ). When he and his regiment did the guard duty for Georg III. in Weymouth , he became a favorite of the king. In 1796 he went with his regiment to India and on the way there participated in the military operations in the Cape Colony in July and August 1796 . Three years later, in 1799, he served in the war against Tipu Sultan and took part in the storming of Seringapatam , where he first met Colonel Arthur Wellesley , who later became the Duke of Wellington.

Soon afterwards he was allowed to return home to England as his father's designate heir, according to his father's wishes, where in February 1800 he received the rank of commanding officer with the 16th Light Dragoons , which were then stationed in Brighton . With his regiment he went to Ireland in 1802 and took part in the suppression of the Robert Emmet uprising in 1803 . On January 1, 1800 he had been promoted to colonel ; and on November 2, 1805 he was appointed major-general . From 1806 to 1814 he was a member of the British House of Commons for the Borough of Newark-on-Trent . In 1809 he inherited his father's lands and his title of nobility as 6th Baronet , of Combermere in the County Palatine of Chester.

Role in the Napoleonic Wars

During the Napoleonic Wars on the Iberian Peninsula , Cotton was sent to Vigo in August 1808 . In the course of his deployment in Portugal, he soon advanced to the position of commander in Wellington's cavalry. Here he showed such courage and judgment that he gained fame as a major cavalry officer. He took part in the Second Battle of Oporto in May 1809 and in July 1809 in the Battle of Talavera . Due to the death of his father (August 24, 1809), he succeeded him as baronet and returned briefly to England to inspect his property. In May 1810 he went back to Portugal, became commander in chief of the entire cavalry united under Wellington, and in autumn 1810 covered the retreat of the Anglo-Portuguese forces behind the lines of Torres Vedras .

Promoted to Lieutenant General on January 1, 1812 , Cotton distinguished himself on July 22, 1812 in the Battle of Salamanca in such a way that Wellington personally thanked him for his service. The next day, he was dangerously injured in his right arm by a stray bullet from a Portuguese guard, but the arm did not have to be amputated as feared. In recognition of his bravery, he was named Knight Companion of the Order of the Bath on August 21, 1812 . After a temporary return home, he again commanded the Allied cavalry in the campaigns in Spain and southern France until the conclusion of peace, including in July 1813 in the Battle of the Pyrenees , in February 1814 in the Battle of Orthez and in April 1814 in the Battle of Toulouse . For his military services he was raised as Baron Combermere on May 3, 1814 to a peer , whereby he resigned from the House of Commons and received a seat in the House of Lords . As part of the reform of the Order of the Bath, he was elevated to Knight Grand Cross of this order on January 4, 1815 . In the Battle of Waterloo (June 18, 1815) he did not take part, since the command of the cavalry had been transferred to Lord Uxbridge at the instigation of the Prince Regent . After the latter was wounded, he took over his command and remained in France until the army of occupation was reduced in 1816.

Later career and death

Equestrian statue of the 1st Viscount Combermere in Chester

In March 1817 Cotton became Governor of Barbados and Commander of the West Indian Armed Forces, which post he held until June 1820. From 1822 to 1825 he was in command of Ireland. On May 27, 1825 he was appointed general and in the same year as the successor to Edward Paget to commander in chief of all armed forces in India . As such, he conquered the solid, impregnable appearing Bharatpur in January 1826 , for which he was awarded the title Viscount Combermere on February 8, 1827 .

On November 21, 1827 he changed his family name from "Cotton" to "Stapleton-Cotton" after his mother's family with a royal license.

In 1829 he was appointed Colonel in the 1st Life Guards . In 1830 Cotton returned to England, where he continued his life and was politically active. In the House of Lords, for example, he opposed the equality of Catholics and various reform laws. In October 1852 he followed Wellington after his death as constable of the Tower and Lord Lieutenant of the Tower Hamlets . On October 2, 1855 he was promoted to Field Marshal and on August 19, 1861 appointed Knight Companion of the Order of the Star of India . He died on February 21, 1865 at the age of 91 in Colchester House in Clifton, near Bristol, and was buried in St Margaret's Church in Wrenbury . A bronze equestrian statue, the work of Baron Carlo Marochetti , for which the Field Marshal had repeatedly modeled in the last year of his life, was erected in Chester at the expense of the Cheshire residents and unveiled in October 1865. His title of nobility was inherited by his son from his second marriage, Wellington Stapleton-Cotton (1818-1891). His third wife and widow Mary Woolley, b. Gibbings, whom he married in 1838, wrote a biography of him together with Captain WW Knollys under the title Combermere Correspondance (2 vols., London 1866).

literature

Web links

Commons : Stapleton Cotton, 1st Viscount Combermere  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Charles Mosley (Ed.): Burke's Peerage, Baronetage & Knightage . Volume 1, Burke's Peerage (Genealogical Books) Ltd, Wilmington 2003, p. 873.
predecessor Office successor
Robert Cotton Baronet, of Combermere
1814-1865 		Wellington Stapleton Cotton
New title created Baron Combermere
1814-1865 		Wellington Stapleton Cotton
New title created Viscount Combermere
1827-1865 		Wellington Stapleton Cotton
personal data
SURNAME Cotton, Stapleton, 1st Viscount Combermere
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Stapleton Cotton, Stapleton, 1st Viscount Combermere; Cotton, Sir Stapleton, 6th Baronet; Cotton, Stapleton, 1st Baron Combermere
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British Field Marshal
DATE OF BIRTH November 14, 1773
PLACE OF BIRTH Lleweni Hall ( Denbighshire )
DATE OF DEATH February 21, 1865
Place of death Clifton near Bristol