Raglan, FitzRoy James Henry Somerset, 1st Baron

Raglan, Fitzroy James Henry Somerset, 1st Baron, 1788–1855, British general. He entered the army in 1804 and was made (1814) a lieutenant colonel for his services on the duke of Wellington's staff in the Peninsular War. He was secretary of the embassy in Paris when Napoleon reentered Paris (1815), and he lost an arm at the battle of Waterloo. Raglan became secretary to Wellington in 1818, retaining that position until the latter's death (1852) when Raglan succeeded him as master general of ordinance. He was raised to the peerage in the same year. As commander of the British force in the Crimean War, Raglan again showed himself a brave officer and was made field marshal after the battle of Inkerman. However, he was handicapped by his joint command with the French commander, Marshal Saint-Arnaud, by weather conditions, and by the inefficiency of government departments and became the object of bitter criticism because of slow military progress and the sufferings of the troops. The failure of the attack on Sevastopol hastened his death from disease before the end of the war. The raglan, an overcoat in which the sleeves go directly to the neck without shoulder seams, was named for Lord Raglan.

Bibliography

See C. Hibbert, The Destruction of Lord Raglan (1961, repr. 1963).

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Raglan (of Raglan), FitzRoy James Henry Somerset, 1st Baron

(born Sept. 30, 1788, Badminton, Gloucestershire, Eng.—died June 28, 1855, near Sevastopol, Crimea, Russia) English army officer. He served as aide and, later, military secretary to the duke of Wellington. Appointed commander in chief of British forces in the Crimean War (1854), he gave an ambiguous order in the Battle of Balaklava that led to the disastrous charge of the Light Cavalry Brigade under the earl of Cardigan. Raglan became the scapegoat for the campaign's lack of progress and the inadequate supplies to the troops in the winter of 1854–55. His name was applied to the raglan sleeve, probably designed to adapt his coat to the arm he had amputated after the Battle of Waterloo.