Hi Bernard,
Thank you for covering the allied occupation of Paris in Sharpe’s Assassin.
It of interest to me as my 3 times great grandfather was a member of that occupation. His name was Primrose Douglas, a Scotsman from a small village near Aberdeen. He was a driver in the Royal Wagon Train, commonly known as the Newgate Blues, owing to their supposed place of recruitment.
Following him leaving the army, he joined the Bow Street Mounted Patrol, patrolling the approaches to London, to guard against highwaymen. There is a record of him giving evidence against a highwayman at the Old Bailey, who had been arrested at Hounslow in 1821. The felon was convicted and hanged at Newgate, following the trial.
I followed in his footsteps serving 30 years in the Met Police in London. Ten years having been spent in the London Borough of Southwark, the same Borough he died in in the 1867.
Regards
David Skinner