Robert Ellison (British Army officer)


Colonel Robert Ellison was a British Army officer who fought in the Peninsular War and at the 1815 Battle of Waterloo.

Life

The second son of Henry Ellison, of Hebburn, County Durham, and Henrietta, daughter of John Isaacson, he joined the 1st Regiment of Foot Guards as an ensign by purchase on 17December 1807. He became a lieutenant and captain on 20December 1812 then saw service at Cádiz, Spain in 1811 and during the Peninsular War from 1812–14. During the Waterloo Campaign he fought at Quatre Bras and Waterloo, for which he was promoted Brevet Major. At the latter battle he fought with the light companies at Hougoumont where "on one occasion, when he was forced to retreat from the orchard to the chateau, he would have been bayoneted by the French, had not the men, with whom he was a great favourite, charged back, and saved his life.
After Waterloo he was at the taking of Péronne on 26June 1815. Subsequently, he became a lieutenant-colonel on 15April 1824 and a major and colonel on 9January 1838
Ellison's profuse growth of dark facial hair earned him the regimental sobriquet "Black Bob".

Family

On 24May 1820, Ellison married the Honourable Mary Montague, sister of Lord Rokeby. His brother-in-law was Henry Goulburn, who in 1828 became Chancellor of the Exchequer. The names of the couples children are unknown.
Ellison's brother Cuthbert was Member of Parliament for Newcastle upon Tyne and was represented by Robert at the Newcastle upon Tyne Parliamentary election, 1820.

Death

At quarter to nine on the morning of 3June 1843, Ellison as Colonel of the Grenadier Guards, was on field duty in Hyde Park where a band was playing and the regimental colours flying. No sooner had he given the order to "present arms" when he had some sort of fit and fell from his horse. Despite the efforts of a surgeon present, twenty minutes later Ellison was dead and his body conveyed to his house in Norfolk Street, Park Lane. At the subsequent coroner's inquest, a doctor testified that although Eliison had "an organic disease of the heart" he believed "that the brain was more involved in the cause of death than the heart"; as a result the jury recorded a verdict of "Died by the visitation of God."