Early Life and Service
De Rottenburg was raised in what is now Gdańsk in Poland. He spent almost a decade in the French army which came to an end with the French Revolution. In 1795, de Rottenburg joined the British army, serving in Hompesch's Hussars, a unit of foreign-born troops. This unit later became part of the 5th Battalion of the 60th Regiment of Foot, the first rifle-armed unit of the British Army. De Rottenburg rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the unit, and commanded it during the Irish Rebellion of 1798 and the capture of Suriname in 1799.
De Rottenburg wrote a series of manuals (initially in German) which became the basis for the training of riflemen and light infantry under Sir John Moore. He later commanded a brigade of light troops in the Walcheren Campaign.
Read more about this topic: Francis De Rottenburg
Famous quotes containing the words early life, early, life and/or service:
“Many a woman shudders ... at the terrible eclipse of those intellectual powers which in early life seemed prophetic of usefulness and happiness, hence the army of martyrs among our married and unmarried women who, not having cultivated a taste for science, art or literature, form a corps of nervous patients who make fortunes for agreeable physicians ...”
—Sarah M. Grimke (1792–1873)
“In an early spring
We see th’appearing buds, which to prove fruit
Hope gives not so much warrant, as despair
That frosts will bite them.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“I sometimes have the sense that I live my life as a writer with my nose pressed against the wide, shiny plate glass window of the “mainstream” culture. The world seems full of straight, large-circulation, slick periodicals which wouldn’t think of reviewing my book and bookstores which will never order it.”
—Jan Clausen (b. 1943)
“Civilization is a process in the service of Eros, whose purpose is to combine single human individuals, and after that families, then races, peoples and nations, into one great unity, the unity of mankind. Why this has to happen, we do not know; the work of Eros is precisely this.”
—Sigmund Freud (1856–1939)