Billets and Hospitality

Abstract

Soldiers passed from the landscape to the doors of strangers. In his recollections of military life, John Patterson of the 50th Regiment, who served as a subaltern officer during the Peninsular War, sets up a comical scene of what supposedly transpired when British officers arrived at their billet for the night. Tired and hungry from the day’ march, and impatient to rest in comfort, a British officer arrives at the private home in question, with an entourage in tow including military staff, a servant, a batman and several mules. The door of the unsuspecting Spanish landlord is then struck with the force of a ‘sledge-hammer’. The startled occupant opens the door to find the British officer demanding entrance, and expecting to have the best room in the house. Dialogue follows, in broken Spanish and English. The Spaniard is immediately .greeted by the officer with: ‘O, Senor, where is the bed? — I want the bed, I have a billet here; — it is good, Senor; make haste, make haste!’ The servant adds his bit, in a hybrid of Anglo-Spanish: ‘Make haste, Senor; — where is the room? — where is the bed? — good bed for English officer, — he is a good Christian; — we want bread, wine, butter, acqua- ardent [a spirit], for the soldiers; — we want milk, oil for the lamp, — do you understand? -1 speak good Spanish, — be quick, be quick!’ The overwhelmed Spaniard merely shrugs his shoulders, but finally yields to the ceaseless barrage of demands and awful Spanish, and takes the ‘invaders’ upstairs. The Englishmen need no encouragement, taking it upon themselves to burst through every door and look into every nook and cranny, hoping to find the best apartment. The officer finally rests in comfort, ‘taking every means to attend to number one’.¹