#telegraphs

"A few minute before my arrival this telegram came from Mother.

"Cable received seven thirty. Misentry. All well here."

That mean that the cable came at 7:30 this morning & Misentry signifies "Arrived safely, pleasant passage. Alice ill part of the time." and we agreed that that should imply your father was not ill."

Will's family had sat down before his parents departed and created their own version of what was generally known as a "commercial code" - assigning individual words to convey a list of much longer pre-arranged messages.

The prohibitive cost of long-distance telegraphy was such an issue in the increasingly globalized world of the late-19th century, that pretty much every trade and industry soon developed their own complex system of one word codes.

Many period travel guides contain travel-specific codes in the back. This one is from Cassell's Complete Pocket-Guide to Europe, published in 1890 and included unclaimed words for travelers to assign their own meanings to.

Quite a few ambitious attempts were made to create a universal code for cable communication but, rather than one unified code coming out on top, this seems to have only resulted in multiple competing universal codes.

You can peruse some of these online, such as "the ABC Universal commercial code", originally designed for merchants and businessmen in the 1870s, on archive.org.

It contains almost 13,000 single word codes ranging from the very practical - "waybill - delayed by bad weather" - to the slightly less so - "apricot - captain arrested for smuggling".

Their duties included siege warfare, map-making, and the construction of bridges, roads, fortifications, drainage systems and camps. [2] At home, Engineers and Sappers focused on upgrading Britain's defenses, particularly along the exposed southern coasts. [2] Captain William Ford of the Royal Engineers was the one who first suggested using Martello towers to protect against invasion during the Napoleonic Wars. [2,3]

The main problem with the Royal Engineers during the Napoleonic Wars is that there were never enough of them. [8; 73-47] There was training: officers of the Royal Engineers trained at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich, same as the artillery officers. [6] Training had not yet translated to numbers and it didn't include the Artificers/Sappers and Miners. [8; 74] In November 1809, when the war began, there were only 25 of the Artificers in the Peninsula, and of those two were missing and four were ill. [8;74] The horrific loss of life at the siege of Badajoz did finally prompt reform, including the name change, but it was slow to take effect. [8; 74] When Wellington attempted to siege Burgos in the autumn of 1812, he had only five engineer officers, eight men, and three siege guns. [7; 295-96]* Lord Mulgrave, the Master-General of the Ordnance, was not particularly helpful on the matter of increasing that number or giving him the requisite supplies, merely promising that Wellington's engineers at Burgos should be supplied before the engineers in America or the West Indies. [7; 295] Contributing to the issue were the alarming rate at which engineers became casualties: fifty percent of Wellington's engineer officers were killed or wounded during the siege of Badajoz. [8; 74] If I'm reading my source correctly, there were only 262 total Royal Engineers in the entire global British military in 1813, and that was more than twice what it had been before the war. [13; 350]

Some progress was made by the siege of San Sebastian in 1813. [12] Wellington managed to collect the largest quantity of artillery ever assembled under a British command. [8; 77] There were even 68-pounder carronades. [8; 77] Wellington also finally received 300 trained men for whom San Sebastian was their first action, but even then they were too few. [8; 74] Once more, ordinary line infantry was forced to make up the difference, digging siege trenches and dying in far too large numbers attempting assaults before defenses were fully down. [8; 74] For Pamplona, in contrast, they ringed the city in earthworks staffed in part with seized French field artillery from the battle of Vitoria. [8; 78]

Those engineers he did have were kept busy from the very beginning. [8; 75] As soon as they put to shore in 1808 they were worked from dawn to dusk making accurate maps and repairing roads to withstand military traffic. [8; 75] This continued in 1809 when Wellington returned; they made accurate maps of Portugal and the adjacent sections of Spain. [8; 75] Through the last offensive, which covered more than 600 miles in ten months, British topographical engineers were kept busy making maps and gathering route data. [8; 78] Roads, bridges, and fords were repaired using local labor under the guidance of British engineers. [8; 75, 78] After the Battle of Talavera, they began construction of the Lines of Torres Vedras, thirty five miles across and including miles of trenches and score of forts. [8; 75-76]

Most of the transport of Wellington's army relied on ox-carts and pack mules. [8;76] These were better suited to Peninsular conditions than British horses and wagons, but they did occasionally require new roads be cut; this too was job for the engineers. [8;76] High in the Pyrenees in the autumn of 1813, a gang of Spanish laborers directed by a British engineer worked to level some of the more dangerous sections of the road with bundles of wood and logs to weatherproof it for artillery. [8; 78] At other times, thwarting the French required destroying roads. [8;76] In 1810, they blasted the Estrada Nova between Guarda and Abrantes from the side of the mountain to the valley below so completely that it has never been replaced. [8;76]† The engineers were further tasked with opening the Tagus and the Douro to navigation for the first time in history. [8; 76] Drag-lines attached to teams of oxen scooped out thousands of tons of sand, tons of gunpowder were used to blast away rock, and at least one canal was cut to avoid a particularly tough stretch of river. [8; 76]

Bridges were also the Engineers responsibility, both building and destroying. [8; 77] The Roman bridges over the Tagus at Alcantara and Almaraz were destroyed early in the Peninsular fighting, one arch each blasted into the river more than 100 feet below. [8; 77] Colonel Robert Sturgeon was responsible for repairing these when Wellington wished them for his 1812 offensive. [8; 77] Sturgeon used a temporary suspension arrangement which relied on ship's hawsers and capstans: four massive robes were stretch across the road on both sides of the gap, secured firmly at one end to the bridge and tightened by the capstans at the other. [8; 77] These were held rigidly in place by cross members of oak and braced with spars to the bottoms of the blown arch. [8; 77] A solid floor was then placed over the missing section of the original bridge. [8; 77] This was installed first at Alcantara, then later at Almaraz, and was a huge advantage for the allied forces as it could be taken up and removed from one side or the other in an hour, if the French penetrated into the area, and replaced and working in another two. [8; 77] To cross the Douro, a similar suspension bridge was used at Miranda, although this one relied on a basket suspended by ropes-- a kind of small cable car-- which even carried Wellington at one point. [8; 77] Further, Wellington and his engineers created a new pontoon system which was lighter, travelled faster, and could quickly be installed and used. [8; 77] In 1814, a pontoon crew bridged the Garonne south of Toulouse after night fell and by dawn an entire division had crossed. [8; 77]

An even more impressive bridge was built across the Adour between Bayonne and the sea. [8; 78] It was required to be placed across the mouth of the river to avoid French artillery at Bayonne, but would be subject to the heavy seas and eighteen foot tides of the Bay of Biscay. [8; 78] The usual light pontoons would be insufficient due to sea and tides, and so someone came up with the idea of using coasting vessels of about seventy tons instead. [8; 78] At high tide when the wind was right these were gotten across the bar. [8; 79] They assembled five great hawsers, timber spreaders, oak planking, capstans, and all the miscellanea needed for a structure that would be strong enough to carry ox-carriages of siege artillery but flexible enough to survive the tide changes and waves from the Bay of Biscay. [8; 79] The whole was constructed in a matter of hours in February 1814 and was in use continuously until the end of the war. [8; 79] Crews manned the capstans around the clock to handle the changes in the hawsers due to weather, stress, and tides. [8; 79] The image above is supposed to be of this crossing. [11]

In 1814, after the war ended and he'd finally taken a visit to England, Wellington made a side trip to the Low Countries on his way to Paris to take up his position as ambassador. [7; 367, 9; 7] Topographical engineers accompanied him on this trip. [9;7] One drew up a plan of the ridge at Mont St Jean, and Wellington used the map to plan his dispositions for the battle of Waterloo a year later. [8; 79] This was probably the engineers' greatest contribution to the Waterloo campaign; it was too short a period for them to do much of anything else. [8; 79]

The Crimean War (1854-56) brought changes. [2] The Board of Ordnance was abolished in 1855 at which point both the Royal Engineers and the Royal Sappers and Miners transferred to the Commander-in-Chief's direct control. [2] The next year someone finally thought "hey, maybe these should be one corps not two" and merged them, keeping the Royal Engineer title. [2] Their headquarters moved from Woolwich to Chatham in Kent. [2] Engineers pioneered the military use of the telegraph and were responsible for the Army's postal service. [2] The image above is of field telegraph wire used in the Crimean war. [10] The laying of a 547 km submarine cable between Balaklava and Varna, to join the cable between Balaklava and Lord Raglan's headquarters at Khutor, enabled officials in London and Paris to communicate with their commanders in the Crimea within twenty-four hours. [10]

The Engineers also surveyed the British Isles, helping establish the Ordnance Survey and assisted in civil construction projects. [2] They helped with the building of railway, telegraph, canal and irrigation networks across the British Empire and even contributed to the construction of the Victoria and Albert Museum. [2] Over time, the unit picked up photography [used to document campaigns and archaeological expeditions] and were involved in surveying expeditions across the globe. [2]

In the early 20th century, Engineers were also involved in the beginnings of aviation. [2] This photo is of a Balloon Corps transport (they had a Balloon Section!) in the Boer War in 1899. [4] They also ran the Army's School of Ballooning. [2] In 1911, they formed an Air Battalion that would be spun off into the Royal Flying Corps a year later. [2] This was not the first, nor the only time that a technology which began its military service under the Royal Engineers banner branched off: the Royal Corps of Signals, for example, has a similar tale. [5]

Although they have always been important, their necessity only increased during the transition to modern modern warfare. In World War One their remit included tunneling, trench-building, forestry, quarrying, gas warfare, inland water transport, aerial survey, topographical photography and camouflaging techniques. [2] The size of the corps expanded accordingly, from 25,000 in 1914 to 315,000 in 1918. [2] The Second World War increased their duties further still: bomb disposal, mine clearance, airfield construction, building Bailey bridges, and the use of AVREs (Armoured Vehicle Royal Engineers), which were specialized tanks for battlefield engineering. [2] During the Normandy campaign they helped design, build, and operate Mulberry Harbour. [2]

After the war, the unit contributed significantly to the UK's atomic weapons development program. [2] Sappers served in most of the post-war campaigns, including in Northern Ireland where they played an important role in bomb disposal. [2] Meanwhile, Engineers designed and built fortifications around public buildings, barracks, and cross border posts. [2] These experiences were invaluable when they later had to counter IEDs in Afghanistan and Iraq. [2] These modern troops are subdivided into specialized regiments according to role, such as bomb disposal. [2] Each has a specific trade, such as electrician or surveyor, on top of which the Engineers still have combat engineering tasks. [2] No matter how far technology has come or how much warfare has evolved, at the end of the day sometimes you still need someone to build a bridge or destroy a wall. [2]

So what are our men actually doing in this print? And what are they wearing?

I think it's interesting that they're wearing red. Why, given that's the color we've seen most of the men wear so far? Because as we established earlier, these Engineers weren't under the Commander-in-Chief and the Horse Guards, they were creatures of the Board of Ordnance. And the Board of Ordnance, if you remember from our discussion of the Royal Artillery, wore blue, not red. The Royal Military Artificers wore blue jackets and changed them to red when they retitled in 1812. [13; 351] It seems as though the Royal Engineers may also have switched mid-war to red coats from dark blue ones. [14] A Canadian specialist in the war of 1812 dressed up for a talk as a major-general from the Royal Engineers, but wore dark blue with black facings and white pants. [15] I did see it suggested that the change may have been to reduce incidents of friendly fire, but I don't have a credible source on that one.

It looks like our officer has grey trousers with a red stripe and no gaiters, but they do seem to have a band around the bottom to keep them nice and tight. The coatee facings are blue, as the regiment is royal, and his lace color is gold. He has a rather dramatic bicorn with a plume. Notice his sword looks straight, rather than curved like some of the cavalry sabres. His sash is just visible above his hands and the map he's carrying.

I love that he's clearly in the middle of ordering the Sapper to do something, pointing off with the hand that's holding the spy glass. There's smoke all around, so perhaps this is a siege. If so, that would explain the digging tools-- mayhap they're making a trench. Or is the Sapper laying some kind of fuse?

Our sapper is a little harder to see, since he's in the background, but he has a similar uniform, perhaps without the stripe. He has lace on the chest, unlike the officer and a shoulder belt for something. He also has a shako instead of the bicorne. There's some kind of handle sticking up from his back, maybe a bayonet or a dagger? It doesn't look long enough to be a sword.

* It is possible that not all of these engineers were actually from the Royal Engineers as apparently there were other engineers who were part of the Royal Staff Corps. Longford doesn't distinguish.

† This may no longer be true, as it looks like there may be a road completed in the early 2000s which connects the two cities mentioned. I'm not sure when the article was originally written, but if it is of a piece with many of the other Wellington articles and books, this was at least probably true as of the 1960s or 70s.

Sources: [1] https://collection.nam.ac.uk/detail.php?acc=1950-11-33-21 [2] https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/corps-royal-engineers [3] https://collection.nam.ac.uk/detail.php?acc=1996-04-7-1 [4] https://collection.nam.ac.uk/detail.php?acc=1998-01-135-43 [5] https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/royal-signals [6] https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/sandhurst-officers-and-role-history [7] Longford, Elizabeth. Wellington: The Years of the Sword. Vol. 1. Harper and Row, 1969. 2 vols. [8] Weller, Jac. On Wellington: The Duke and his Art of War. Ed. Andrew Uffindell. London: Greenhill Books, 1998. [9] Weller, Jac. Wellington at Waterloo. London: Greenhill Books, 1992. [10] https://collection.nam.ac.uk/detail.php?acc=1965-10-202-4 [11] https://warhistory.org/article/british-engineers-1813 [12] https://collection.nam.ac.uk/detail.php?acc=1971-02-33-550-19 [13] MacArthur, Roderick. “BRITISH ARMY ESTABLISHMENTS DURING THE NAPOLEONIC WARS (PART 2) CAVALRY, ARTILLERY, ENGINEERS AND SUPPORTING UNITS.” Journal of the Society for Army Historical Research, vol. 87, no. 352, 2009, pp. 331–56. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/44231710. Accessed 25 July 2026. [14] https://thisreilluminatedschoolofmars.wordpress.com/the-dress-of-the-kings-german-legion-1-some-primary-sources/14-engineers/ [15] https://niagaranow.com/slider.phtml/red-and-blue-the-different-colours-of-the-british-army-during-the-war-of-1812/