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100 The Regimental Journal of The King’s Royal Hussars
Terrace who expressed his appreciation for Pennington’s Hamlet, calling his portrayal ‘striking and original’. Thereafter he became known as ‘Gladstones’ favourite tragedian’ and the Prime Minister maintained a lively interest in his career. The scrapbook contains a few letters from the Gladstone fam- ily and one of Pennington’s daughters, Catherine Gladstone Pennington, was likely named after the Prime Minister’s wife.
At the first Annual Reunion dinner for survivors of the Charge in 1875 he recited Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s The Charge of the Light Brigade, which he often did while wearing the uniform he had supposedly worn in the Charge. He attended many of the following annual dinners and other commemorative events.
Around 1875 Pennington posed as the central figure in Elizabeth Thompson’s (later Lady Butler) famous painting ‘Balaclava’ or ‘After the Charge’. The scene is purely imagined as, due to his injuries, he was not able to dismount and had to be lifted from his horse. The other 11th Hussar on horseback is said to be Troop Sergeant Major George Loy Smith.
The painting was first shown to the public in April 1876 and today remains one of the most iconic and thought-provoking images of the Charge. While the painting was given a very positive reception, some saw Pennington’s figure as overly dramatic perhaps influenced by his status as an actor, with the Sunday Times describing him as appearing ‘dazed and drunk with the wine of the battle’. One critic is reported to have written:
‘Itwouldhavebeenaswellifyou,Mr.Pennington,had nevercomebackfromthecharge.Youaretheatrical-not dramatic-simplyruinouslyobtrusiveandunreal’
It appears Pennington could be difficult to work with however, as in her memoirs she recounts how years later she was helping a friend to arrange a tableau vivant, a static scene using actors or models, based on her painting. She wrote:
‘Themanwhostoodforhiminthetableauhadbeenmy modelforthepicture,buttothisdayIfeeltheirritation caused me by that man. In the picture I have him with hisbusbypushedback,asitcertainlywouldandshould have been, off his heated brow. But, while I was posing himforthetableau,everytimeIlookedawayherammed itdownatthebecoming“smart”angle.Igotquitecross, andinsistedonthenecessarypushback.Thewretchpre- tendedtoobey,but,justbeforethecurtainrose,rammed the busby down again, and utterly destroyed the mean- ing of that figure! We didn’t want a representation of Mr.So-and-Sointhebecominguniformofahussar,but mybatteredtrooper.Thethingfellveryflat’.
By the 1880s his acting career was waning, and he made his last dramatic appearance on stage at the Avenue Theatre on 12 December 1891. Years later, in 1900, a Grand Entertainment was held at Shoreditch Town Hall for Pennington’s testimonial fund, and unsurprisingly he recited Tennyson’s poem during the evening. One of the funds patrons was Sir Henry Irving, the first actor to be awarded a knighthood, and a long-time supporter of Pennington’s work.
From 1892 he became a teacher of elocution at several schools in London as well as giving touring lectures on Shakespeare. In 1906 he published his autobiography aptly titled ‘Sea, Camp and Stage’. Earlier, in 1887, he had sent an account of the Charge, titled ‘Left of Six Hundred’, to Queen Victoria, and Sir Henry Ponsonby replied from Balmoral thanking him. This account is still part of The Royal Collection today.
Even after his retirement from the stage Pennington continued to lead an eventful life. In September 1897 his medals were stolen from his house but the thief was overcome by his con- science and they were returned with a note which read:
‘DearSir–Ireturnyourmedals.Iwasvery,verysorryI hadtakenthem,notknowingwhattheywasatthetime. Theywouldonlyhavefetchedme4s,soyoucansendme onthemoneybyreturnofpost’.
Pennington promised the thief both the money and his for- giveness if he called again at the house in a legitimate fashion, although it has not yet been discovered whether the offer was taken up! A Turkish Crimea Medal engraved with his name is now in the Museum Collection.
By 1906, he was living in Tottenham and serving as a Justice of the Peace which led to his minor involvement in an event which became known as the ‘Tottenham Outrage’. In 1909 two Latvian immigrants staged an armed robbery and during a two-hour chase and firefight a police constable and a ten-year- old boy were killed, as well as 21 others wounded. Pennington was the foreman of the Jury for the inquest held at Tottenham, but as it happened after his autobiography his thoughts on it are not recorded.
He was a frequent guest of the 11th Hussars including attend- ing the first Old Comrades Association dinner in 1909 and sev- eral thereafter. Through this connection he met William Murrell Lummis, then an NCO in the regiment, who conducted exten- sive research on the Charge of the Light Brigade. His talks with Pennington helped compile a list of those who were known to have charged as well as many other details. Lummis’ work culminated in his co-authoring of ‘Honour the Light Brigade’ published in 1973.
William Pennington died at his home in Stoke Newington on 1 May 1923, aged 90, and was buried at Abney Park Cemetery. The funeral took place on 7 May with the coffin, covered with a Union Flag, being borne on a gun carriage from his home and a firing party from the 13th/18th Hussars marching with the cortege. The cemetery is now mostly a nature reserve and park and is cared for by the Abney Park Trust, with the walk near his grave being named after him. Several other Crimea veterans are buried there, most famously the Welsh nurse Betsi Cadwaladr.
Pennington was survived by just one other Charger, Edwin Hughes of the 13th Light Dragoons, nicknamed ‘Balaclava Ned’. Hughes died on 18 May 1927 and is buried in Blackpool.
Grave of William Henry Pennington
Pennington, later life
