450 
THE BROME-WALTON FAMILY. 
joined the artillery trayne in the south-east of England, at Greenwich, 
anno 1680, served with the Expeditions of Queen Anne to Virginia and 
Canada, and returned in 1718, to America, to command the artillery in 
Annapolis Royal, with the rank of Lieut. Fireworker, 1 2 under Royal 
Warrant of 1st February—dying in 1731, a few months before the 
birth of George Washington, in Captain Hughes's Company (now No. 
5 Southern Division, R.A., at Rawal Pindi). General Washington's 
penchant for the artillery Arm can thus be accounted for. 
While Field artillery decayed in the era of “ peace and retrench¬ 
ment," under the mischievous idea that it could be re-improvised in 
one day, the lessons of the Seven Years War taught the absolute 
necessity of reviving and developing Siege and Position artillery; and 
the period from the close of that war to the end of the XVIII. century 
is marked by intense activity in this department of the evolution of 
ordnance and materiel. “ Tubes of brass and iron " had obtained, in 
the land of nitre, in the days of Tubal Cain (whom the XX. century 
philologist may prove to have been “ Tubal Cannon"); and both metals 
were simultaneously employed for both field and siege ordnance from 
the dawn of artillery history to the XVIII. century; but, on account 
of the increasing cost of brass, iron gradually became the service pattern 
at the latter end of that century 3 —recoil being minimised by weight 
of metal. Borgard was the restorer of brass ordnance at the close 
of XVII. century, and all his mortars, howitzers, field and siege 
guns, were solely of this metal; but the extraordinary progress of the 
iron trade of our country in the latter half of XVIII. century, owing 
to the discovery of the Roman method of smelting iron ores, not only 
enabled it to add considerably to the number of our heavy ordnance 
by the re-substitution of iron for brass, but to greatly increase the 
calibres and effect. 3 To enter into details would be to write the history 
of the iron trade between 1750 to 1800, and of the successive experi¬ 
mental committees of field officers R. A., of whom Colonel Joseph Brome 
was throughout an active member, with his son, Thomas Walton, as the 
scientist and staticist of the Board of Ordnance (in conjunction with 
Dr. Hutton). Gunpowder, also, had become so much improved in 
quality that the 18-pr. (iron) of the Peninsular campaigns was of equal 
range and power with the 24-pr. (brass, i.e., bronze) of the XVIII. 
century, just as Borgard's 18 and 24-prs. (brass) had equalled the 24 
and 42-prs. of XVII. century. 4 
In these developments of XVIII. century Siege artillery and car¬ 
riages, the Brome-Waltons enacted minor parts in comparison with 
others whose names are household words in the Royal Artillery. 
The time has, therefore, now arrived for concluding, in the order in 
which introduced on second page of Chapter I., the Memoirs of the 
distinguished gunners who constituted the artillery members of the 
Brome- Walton family. 
1 Artillery List (Kane), p. 1. See also Appendix B. 
2 Ordnance Warrant Books. 
3 Scrivener, “Hist. Iron Trade.” Muskett, “ Papers on Iron and Steel.” Board of Ordnance 
Record Books. 
4 “ G-unnery ” (Greener). “ Our JEngines of War ” (White-Jervis). 
