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army received the alarm, the Highland reserve had anything
up to half a mile to march before reaching its battle position
much the same distance, in fact, as that to be covered by
the royal army in taking up its own. As for Johnstone's
statement that by this time the Highland front line was
already formed, this can only have been true of the left
wing; as will soon be seen, the right wing was then still
on the march.
Having called in his out-guards. Cope immediately ordered
the royal army to face the enemy. To do so as rapidly as
possible, the infantry was wheeled to the left by platoons,
and led by Major Talbot of Murray's, the Field-Officer of
the Day, it marched off in a northerly direction, roughly
parallel to the line of march of the Highlanders. It was
now becoming lighter, and from his position at the head
of the column Talbot caught sight of the enemy ' extending
their Line towards the Sea', thus disproving Johnstone's
statement that the Highland front line was fully formed.
On halting and turning right into line, the royal infantry,
three deep, faced east, with its left towards Cocken2ie,
and its right pro- tected by the large ditch. Drawn up from
left to right were 9 companies of Murray's, 8 of Lascelles's,
2 of Guise's, and 5 of Lee's. To the right of Lee's companies,
and separated from them by an interval sufficient to leave
room for two squadrons of cavalry, was the artillery. With
the guns on the left, and the mortars on their right, it
was dressed in line with the infantry, with 6-feet intervals
between the pieces. Immediately to the right of the mortars
was posted an artillery guard of 100 men, most of whom belonged
to Capt. Cochran's company of Murray's regiment.
Meanwhile the dragoons had been ordered to mount, and riding
up to the front of Gardiner's regiment Brigadier Fowke called
out: 'My lads, this is the Day, in which I doubt not, your
Behaviour will do us Honour.' He was soon to be disillusioned.
To take full advantage of his cavalry superiority. Cope
had ordered the squadrons to form two-deep instead of the
customary three-deep, and having left a squadron of each
regiment in reserve, the remaining two squadrons of Gardiner's
and Hamilton's moved up to take position in the line. Hamilton's
on the extreme left had no difficulty in doing so, but on
the right it was found that there was insufficient room
between Lee's and the artillery for Colonel Gardiner's and
Lieut." Colonel Whitney's squadrons. This was due to the
return of the 300
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