I try to steer clear of the titled when it comes to Staffordshire portrait figures, but I can’t help liking Lord Raglan or to give him his full moniker Field Marshall Fitzroy James Henry Somerset.
Part of the appeal may be that he was a West Country man and was M.P. for Truro, but really it is down to his duty and because he ‘took one for the team’ despite his elevated position. He lost an arm at Waterloo in 1804, was stabbed five times during the Peninsular War in 1810 and was first over the wall at Badajoz.
A Staffordshire pottery portrait figure of Lord Raglan
Just as he ought to be retiring he headed the expeditionary force to the Crimea in 1854 and after initial successes in Alma and the debacle at Balaclava he became bogged down at Sebastopol and Malakoff. He took the can for the logistical failings of the campaign – though the blame lay closer to home. It was not the blade or a bullet, but dysentery that killed him.
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A Staffordshire model of Malakoff, a hard nut to crack
