Major-General Herbert Taylor Siborne (18 October 1826 – 16 May 1902) was a

British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...

officer in the

Royal Engineers The Corps of Royal Engineers, usually called the Royal Engineers (RE), and commonly known as the ''Sappers'', is the engineering arm of the British Army. It provides military engineering and other technical support to the British Armed Forces ...

and a military historian. Siborne was born in 1826, the second son of the officer and historian Captain

William Siborne William Siborne, Sibourne or Siborn (15 October 1797 – 9 January 1849) was a British officer and military historian whose most notable work was a history of the Waterloo Campaign. Early life William Siborne was the son of Benjamin Siborne, a ...

. He joined the Royal Engineers in 1846, and served in the

Kaffir War The Xhosa Wars (also known as the Cape Frontier Wars or the Kaffir Wars) were a series of nine wars (from 1779 to 1879) between the Xhosa Kingdom and the British Empire as well as Trekboers from the Dutch colonial empire in what is now the Ea ...

1851–53, and also in the expedition against the Basutos in December 1852, when he had charge of the pontoons by which the troops crossed the

Orange Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower ** Orange juice *Orange (colour), the color of an orange fruit, occurs between red and yellow in the vi ...

and Caledon rivers. He was present at the action of the Berea, and was mentioned in General Orders. In 1855 he was promoted to

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...

, and in 1877 to

colonel Colonel ( ; abbreviated as Col., Col, or COL) is a senior military Officer (armed forces), officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, a colon ...

. He retired from the service with the rank of Major-General in 1882. It is thought he designed many of the Forts in the

River Medway The River Medway is a river in South East England. It rises in the High Weald AONB, High Weald, West Sussex and flows through Tonbridge, Maidstone and the Medway conurbation in Kent, before emptying into the Thames Estuary near Sheerness, a to ...

, including

Fort Darnet Fort Darnet is a nineteenth-century military installation on the River Medway in Kent, England, that formed part of the defences of Chatham Naval Dockyard. Fort Darnet, like its twin Hoo Fort upstream, was built on the recommendations of the ...

. He was the British member of the European Commission of the Danube 1873–1881. Siborne edited and published in 1891 some of the letters his father had received in his research for his

Battle of Waterloo The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815, near Waterloo, Belgium, Waterloo (then in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now in Belgium), marking the end of the Napoleonic Wars. The French Imperial Army (1804–1815), Frenc ...

model as ''Waterloo letters: a selection from original and hitherto unpublished letters bearing on the operations of the 16th, 17th, and 18 June 1815, by officers who served in the campaign''.Nigel Sale A second volume ''Letters from the Battle of Waterloo'' was published in 2005 by Gareth Glover. He married a daughter of Mr. Julian A. Watson, of

Constantinople Constantinople (#Names of Constantinople, see other names) was a historical city located on the Bosporus that served as the capital of the Roman Empire, Roman, Byzantine Empire, Byzantine, Latin Empire, Latin, and Ottoman Empire, Ottoman empire ...

. Siborne died at

Rapallo Rapallo ( , , ) is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Genoa, in the Italy, Italian region of Liguria. As of 2017 it had 29,778 inhabitants. It lies on the Ligurian Sea coast, on the Tigullio Gulf, between Portofino and ...

, on 16 May 1902.

References

External links

*, with information on his son. British Army major generals British military historians Historians of the Napoleonic Wars 1826 births 1902 deaths Royal Engineers officers {{UK-army-bio-stub