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Field Marshal Evelyn WoodBy Mr Smoke Too MuchNapoleon has been quoted by many people as saying about his Generals "...but is he lucky?" Well if you want one of the most unlucky Generals in the world Evelyn Wood takes some beating. He was actually a quite good General when he lead his troops and was well respected by both his men and his fellow generals. He was just personally very accident prone. Wood was born in 1838 and joined the Navy in 1852, just in time to serve in the Crimea as a midshipman with the Naval Brigade. He commanded a 32 pdr Naval Battery during the siege of Sebastapol. He was fired on many times and despite many sailors being killed around him he came out unhurt but then promptly fell sick with dysentery. In June 1855 he was so sick he could barely stand but still took part in the assault on the Redan. During the attack Wood charged sword in hand against the Russian guns, but a bullet broke his sword in half, so he charged on unarmed. He was wounded in the hand and also a bullet smashed his left elbow and he passed out some twenty yards from the Redan. Wood was awoken by an Irish corporal who shook his injured left arm and told that the attack had failed and they had been ordered to retire. He was taken to an Irish doctor who told him that " I'll have your arm off before you know where you are..." Wood managed to escape from the doctor by climbing out the window of the hospital and keep his arm and returned to England and transferred from the Navy to 13th Light Dragoons. He returned to the Crimea as a cavalry officer via Turkey where he caught typhoid fever and inflammation of the lungs. Despite his misfortune he was a brave man and by the age of eighteen he had been twice mentioned in dispatches, earned the Crimean Medal with two clasps, the Legion of Honour and the Turkish Medal. He had also been recommended for, but did not receive the new medal called the Victoria Cross. In October 1856 Wood set sail from England with 17th Lancers to suppress the Indian Mutiny. On the way there he suffered from sea sickness and in the next two years Wood saw plenty of action in between his bouts of illness. During his stay in India he suffered from fever, several sunstrokes, indigestion, ague, toothache, intestinal complaints, neuralgia and an inflammation of the ear that cost him half of his hearing. In addition to this catalogue of illness Wood still managed to injure himself in a most unusual way. He was with a group of British officers being entertained by a friendly maharaja who was exhibiting his menagerie to them. On a bet from a fellow officer, Wood leapt from a balcony on to the back of a giraffe in an attempt to ride it. He did well until he tried to dismount, he slipped and fell under the hooves of the giraffe and suffered severe cuts to his cheeks and a broken arm, three cracked ribs and was thus put out of action for the rest of the mutiny period. Could any one be more accident prone? Well as we shall see in the next part, this was just the start of Woods career in disaster! |