Before Beaumont Hamel: The Royal Newfoundland Regiment, 1775-1815
Description
Contains Photos, Illustrations, Maps, Bibliography
$11.95
ISBN 1-895387-58-2
DDC 356'.189'09'718
Author
Publisher
Year
Contributor
Dean F. Oliver is a postdoctoral fellow at the Norman Paterson School of
International Affairs.
Review
This handsome popular history recounts the exploits of Newfoundland
regiments in British service during the American Revolution and the War
of 1812. In search of great deeds done by his Newfoundland ancestors,
Fardy has strip-mined Canada’s military past, finding his compatriots
front and centre, and dying in droves, at many of the era’s most
famous battles: the siege of Quebec (1775–76), the naval battles of
Lake Erie and Sackets Harbour (1813), and the epic British–Canadian
victory at Queenston Heights (1812). Neither quantitatively nor
qualitatively do the island redcoats justify the author’s ebullient
praise, but their heroism and courage are seldom in doubt, as he
convincingly maintains.
Accepting the king’s shilling all too readily (a point of obvious
pride for Fardy), Newfoundlanders filled His Majesty’s ranks at times
when Nova Scotians and New Brunswickers, not to mention Quebeckers,
appear to have had far better sense. The grand futility of their
service, helping to save “Canada” notwithstanding, is attested to by
the mother country’s repeated refusal to defend its loyal colonials
adequately, by the brutal severity of regal justice, and by the ease
with which those other loyal subjects, the French at Plaisance
(Placentia), repeatedly captured and torched the island’s British
capital, St. John’s, during the 17th and 18th centuries. In the
book’s most interesting chapter, “Rebellion and Dishonour,” Fardy
bears witness to colonial grievances by recounting episodes of mutiny
and disloyalty among naval personnel and Irish-Newfoundland soldiers—
outbreaks that were, by and large, crushed with messianic zeal and
Stalinist conviction by Imperial authorities.
The book is poorly organized, with “Profile” sections that
frequently repeat, almost verbatim, material in the accompanying
chapters; but it is pleasantly written, with a commendable modesty and
patriotic verve that the academic caste might do well to consider.
Thinly researched, devoid of analysis, and filled with minor errors, it
is all but useless for the academic audience, but will find a ready
market among local-history buffs and military aficionados, as well it
should.