Sergeant Major Edward Cotton

7th Hussars

Edward Cotton was born on the Isle of Wight in 1792. He enlisted in the year of 1812 and saw service in the Peninsular War in 1813 and 1814 and at Waterloo. He distinguished himself at Waterloo by saving fellow Hussar, Private Edward Gilmore, as he lay trapped under his wounded horse in front of the main battle line.

 

He left the army after 21 years service in 1828 with the rank of Troop Sergeant Major and returned to Waterloo, married a local girl and set himself up as a battlefield guide, innkeeper, museum curator in a large big house facing the Ohain Road on the battlefield. That house is still standing today.

 

He amassed an incredible collection of Waterloo relics for the museum – literally hundreds of exhibits – swords, muskets, bayonets, buttons, all manner of cavalry accoutrements, pictures, books, skulls with bullet holes in them etc. Of course, it wouldn’t have been difficult to acquire these artefacts locally in the 1830s, bearing in mind the degree of battlefield plundering carried out by local peasants on the night of battle.

 

From the many fellow Waterloo veterans who visited the battlefield, Cotton built up a formidable knowledge of the battle and published a book called “A Voice from Waterloo”, which was still in print at the time of the First World War, possibly the biggest selling Waterloo book ever written.

 

In 1845, the Naval and Military Gazette described him as “an intelligent, active and good looking man of fifty-three and the very cut as a Hussar”. He was obviously an imposing figure even in middle age.

 

Edward Cotton died on 24 June 1849, aged 57. He had been ill for some time but had soldiered on and, only two days before his death, he had shown an English family around the battlefield. He was originally buried in the garden of Hougoumont on the battlefield, a very fitting place for him, and rested there until 1890 when he was disinterred for reburial at Evere Cemetery in Brussels. He is reputed to have died a rich man.

Cotton’s house, museum and hotel as it was in the late nineteenth century and as it is today

The orininal resting place of Edward Cotton (nearer the tree) in the garden of Hougoumont. The other grave was that of Captain John Lucie Blackman who was killed at Hougoumont during the battle and burried on that spot. The remains of both men were removed to the Evere Cemetery in Brussels in 1890.

Edward Cotton rescues Edward Gilmore at Waterloo

 

by Ray Kirkpatrick © Waterloo Battlefield Tours

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