I’ve just finished re-reading Sharpe’s Regiment, followed by a viewing of the TV episode and both were highly enjoyable. I liked the plot regarding the sale of recruits and crimping scandal. However, I’m still left confused. I can see the motive for selling recruits from the perspective of Fenner, Simpson et al as the profits on such a scale would have been lucrative. Though why would officers from other regiments want to buy recruits anyway? As far as I’m aware most regiments had their depot battalion doing the recruiting and training before sending drafts out to the Peninsular or wherever the overseas battalion was. This being the case why would regimental officers wish to spend considerable sums of money buying men when it was they already did their own recruiting? The only solution I surmised was that it was cheaper to buy a trained recruit than to train one from scratch. Yours thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.
David Benjamin