Dettingen
It commemorates the last battle in which a King of England was present in person, the last in which the Order of Knighthood was conferred on the field. The actual command was in the hands of the veteran Earl of Stair, a soldier who had learned the art of war under Marlborough. He had commanded a brigade at Ramillies and served on the great commander’s staff at Blenheim, Oudenarde, and Malplaquet.
The Honour is borne on the Guidon of the 4th Hussars.
Detail
In 1742 the War of Austria succession started and Rich’s Dragoons went into battle the following year at Dettingen.
Their third charge drove back the French and turned the battle in favour of the British while George Daraugh, a Dragoon from the 4th, won the Regiment and himself great fame.
He saw a French Officer riding off with a Regimental Standard, and followed him, cut him down and returned to the Regiment with the Standard. He was Promoted by King George II on the Battlefield to the rank of Cornet, and given a purse of guineas.
The Rich’s had only very light casualties, a different story to the encounter they had with the French in July 1745 when they were ambushed five miles short of Ghent, ordered to fight through the town and reached it with only 150 of the 400 with which they started.
During the subsequent attacks on Ghent, only 60 of Rich’s dragoons got away.
They were sent home and took no further part in the conflict until, they reconstituted and were sent back to Holland in 1747, and thrown against the French again at Lauffeldt where the cavalry saved the British from severe defeat.
