Death of Lord Cardigan

Adeline Horsey Recollections. One fine March morning he told me that he was going to ride and see a gamekeeper who had accidentally shot himself.

He asked me and Sir Henry Edwards [aged 55] to accompany him, but when we reached the keeper's cottage he told us to return to Deene [Map], saying that as he intended to sit an hour with the man he would come on later. We declared our willingness to wait, but Cardigan would not hear of it, and so we somewhat reluctantly rode home without him.

The luncheon hour arrived, but Lord Cardigan did not come; the afternoon dragged on, and still there were no signs of him. I had a horrible presentment that something must have happened, and at once ordered some of the servants to go in search of his Lordship.

My fears were only too well grounded; my husband was found lying insensible on the roadside, nearly lifeless. A roadmender told us afterwards that Lord Cardigan had passed him and spoken a few words and seemed apparently quite well; the horse he was riding shied at a heap of stones and commenced to rear and plunge rather wildly, but my husband kept the animal well under control, for the roadmender saw him ride quietly away. The effort must, however, have afterwards brought on a seizure, for Cardigan fell from his horse, and lay helpless until he was found and brought back to Deene [Map].

For three dreadful days and nights he lay quite unconscious, gasping for breath, and the knowledge that he could not speak to me and did not recognise me intensified my grief a thousandfold. But mercifully his suffering was not prolonged, and on March 28, 1868, my beloved husband passed away.

There are some griefs that are too deep to speak of, even after Time's soothing touch has taken away the first deadly pain of a great sorrow. When I look back and remember the kindness and love which my husband lavished on me, I feel proud to think he often said that the happiest period of his life was after he married me, and that his great possessions and military fame were as nothing compared to the wife he adored.

Lord Cardigan's body lay in state in the ballroom at Deene [Map] for twelve days, during which time six thousand people came to look their last at the remains of the leader of the Charge of the Light Brigade. On April 9 he was buried in Deene Church [Map]; the whole regiment of the 11th Hussars attended the funeral, and he was carried to his last resting-place by eight of his old officers.

When the will was read, it was found that he had left everything to me.