THE SCARLET FEVER, EXETER, 1843

 The Scots Greys who had distinguished themselves at Waterloo, reasonably fresh in the citizen's memory, were popular in Exeter and it was a standing joke, laboured by The Western Times, that the girls could not resist the troopers nor the ladies, the officers. Hence that newspaper reported the regiment's departure thus:

"This gallant regiment has left our good old city.  On Monday last 'head quarters' marched out in brave style,  the band playing that dear delightful tune of 'The Girl I left behind me,' and leaving the less honourable portion of the regiment,  the 'tail quarters,' if we may so designate it, in contradistinction to the head - to discharge any little arrears of tenderness in the farewell and adieu line of sympathy, which the first detachment had not had time to settle.

"The departure of these heroes had been the subject of several days' sighings, on the part of the damsels of the city of various classes:  gentle and simple were alike the victims of the scarlet fever.

"Society and 'polish' might have kept the patrician damsels within the bounds of decent resignation, but there was many a maiden of gentle birth who envied the interesting milliners on Monday morning, who, being the slaves of no false delicacy and refinement, enjoyed the delightful privilege of kissing their fair hands, and bidding amidst sobs and sighs - adieu to the heroes departing - for Norwich.

"To speculate on all the uses of a standing army is not our province - albeit that we might be tempted to see what effect it hath, in these changes of place, on the population returns  - locally considered."

The march, "The Girl I left behind me," is sometimes called 'Brighton Camp' (which nowadays is a pleasant combination of words)  because of  the stanza:    -     "Oh ne'er shall I forget the night/ the stars were bright above me/ and gently lent their silvery light/ when first she vowed to love me./ But now I'm bound for Brighton camp;/ kind heaven then pray guide me/ and send me safely back again/ to the girl I left behind me."  

Brighton camp, I think, signified a stage on the way to the wars.  But the Scots Greys and their splendid horses were only going as far as Norwich and it would be another ten years or so before the Crimean War meant they were again in action.  

Elsewhere in the same column I read the following delightful sentiments:

"Locks of hair enough to make wigs for the whole bench of bishops were exchanged - where the passion was particularly intense, the fragment of a moustache was parted with by the foredoomed hero - to be woven into some slender love token, to be worn in the bosom where the same moustache had reposed before - with a nose above it perhaps."

The Scots Grey's band used to play in Northernhay Gardens.  These days the good old Salvation Army band turns up once a year for Remembrance Sunday.  I love them but they don't quite send the same message as the band and drums of a regiment.  When did a military band last offer a Sunday concert or march through Exeter?  We ought to allow ourselves more cakes and ale and find some occasions a bit more classy than the underwhelming Winter Wonderland, the construction of which, I understand, will this year once again close the Gardens the citizens and detract from the dignity of Armistice Day.

Source: The Western Times, 6th May, 1843