475 
MEMOIRS 
HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL. 
THE BROME-AVALTOX FAMILY. 
33Y 
MAJOR AND QUARTERMASTER R. H. MURDOCH, R.A. 
(Assistant-Superintendent of Records). 
Chapter III. 
Battle op Prestonpans. 
Before withdrawal from Flanders of the four companies of Royal 
Artillery, the battle of Prestonpans had been fought (21st September, 
1745), in which the English army was utterly routed by the clan 
regiments, without guns, under the Pretender, with the loss of all our 
field artillery. 
At the outbreak of the Rebellion there was but one company (field 
train) of Royal Artillery on the Scottish establishment—with the forces 
commanded by Sir John Cope—armed with eight 4-prs., bronze (termed 
“brass”), on travelling carriages, and four 5^-inch Royal howitzers 
(formerly termed hawbitzers”). This was Captain Archibald Cun¬ 
ningham's company, which now survives under designation of No. 1 
Company Western Division R.A., at Bermuda, under command of 
Major Arthur Tracey. 
The 4-pr. bronze gun—which was subsequently to win for the Royal 
Artillery unique renown at Culloden—had been designed and cast by 
Schalch, at Woolwich, in 1720 1 ; and others in 1738 by Bowen, in London ; 
yet, in June 1740, the field artillery train sent from Woolwich to 
Windsor (under Lieutenants Flight and Desaguliers) consisted of 3-prs. 
and 6-prs., as, owing to the excited controversy then raging on the 
1 No. 1 of this casting by Schalch, dated 1720, is now at Windsor Castle among' the Royal 
trophy guns. The castings by Bowen are dated 1738-1742, one of which is in the Museum of 
Artillery at the Rotunda, Woolwich. The Chevalier de Johnstone, A.-D.-C. to the Pretender, 
says these were of sufficient calibre “to force houses and petty fortresses” (“Memoirs of the 
Scottish Rebellion,” p. 113). The Chevalier’s narratives tally with Ordnance records; but his 
modern Editor’s notes are unreliable. 
9. VOL. xx. 
62 
