Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Waterloo 1815 (Lieut. C. Bowers, 13th Reg. Light Dragoons) fitted with steel clip and silver bar suspension, edge bruising and some contact wear, otherwise nearly very fine £2500-3000

Charles Robert Bowers was born around 1792 or 1793, probably at Bath where his elder brother Mansell was born in 1790. Charles Bowers followed his brother into the 13th Light Dragoons as a Cornet on 18 January 1810, becoming a Lieutenant in October the same year. He did not serve with the regiment in the Peninsula but was present at Waterloo where he was severely wounded:

‘Lieutenant Doherty received a severe wound: a grape-shot contusion in his groin, which only missed killing him owing to his watch. The watch, a double-cased one, was flattened. He was also severely wounded in the head by a musket-shot. Lieutenant Bowers was similarly shot in the head. For nearly three months these two officers lay sick at Brussels, and even when they did join the regiment were not completely cured for some time after.’

His brother, Mansell, also fought with the regiment at Waterloo, as a Captain, and died as a Major in 1831. Charles Bowers, meanwhile, continued his career in the army, becoming a Captain in the 23rd Foot in December 1818, on the half pay of the Sicilian Regiment in April 1820, and a Captain in the 37th Foot in August 1825. He appears thereafter to have been on the half pay or unattached but nevertheless rose to the rank of Lieutenant-General. He died at Little Tew, Oxfordshire, where the inscription can still be seen on his tombstone in the churchyard:

In memory of
Lt. General Charles Robert Bowers
Late of the 13th Light Dragoons
Died 9th October 1870 aged 77 years
He served and was wounded at the
Battle of Waterloo