" His experience was more
likely to serve him in such matters than the untrained calculations of
men who were, moreover, naturally concerned to magnify the defeat of the
King's troops as much as possible; while it is clear from the tone of
his own despatch, which is singularly literal and straightforward, that
he had no wish, and did not even conceive it necessary, to excuse his
disaster. But here again the estimate helps us little, owing to the
vague use of the terms battalion and squadron. For the same reason we
can but guess at the strength of the royal force. In the writings of the
time Claverhouse's command is indiscriminately styled a regiment and a
troop. It is certain that he was the responsible officer, so that,
whatever its numerical strength, he stood to the body of men he
commanded in the relation that a colonel stands to his regiment. But it
is probable that his regiment, with those commanded by Home and Airlie,
were practically considered as the three troops of the Royal Scottish
Life Guards of whom the young Marquis of Montrose was colonel. From a
royal warrant of 1672, it appears that a troop of dragoons was rated at
eighty men, exclusive of officers, and that a regiment was to consist of
twelve troops. But it is hardly possible that this strength was ever
reached. From a passage in the third chapter of Macaulay's history it
does not seem as if the full complement of a regiment of cavalry can
have much exceeded four hundred men; but, I repeat, the indiscriminate
use of the terms troop and regiment, battalion and squadron, makes all
calculations theoretical and vague.
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