Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 34.djvu/196

Lowe corps, and put at the head of two hundred Corsican emigrants, who were dressed as riflemen and styled the Corsican rangers. Their training was a matter of difficulty, but they ultimately became ‘a credit to the country of the First Consul of France.’ Lowe held the rank of major-commandant from 1 July 1800. He commanded the corps in Egypt in 1801 at the landing and in the operations before Alexandria and the advance on Cairo, and repeatedly won the approval of Sir John Moore, who remarked on one occasion ‘When Lowe's at the outposts I'm sure of a good night.’ For his services in Egypt he received the Turkish gold medal. The Corsican rangers were disbanded at Malta on the peace of Amiens, when Lowe was put on half-pay, but he was soon afterwards brought into the 7th royal fusiliers as major.

In 1803, on the recommendation of Sir John Moore, Lowe was appointed one of the new permanent assistants in the quartermaster-general's department, and stationed at Plymouth, whence, in July, he was despatched to Portugal on a military mission. He inspected the troops and defences on the north and north-eastern frontiers, and reported the practicability of defending the country with a mixed British and Portuguese force. He was then sent to Malta to raise a new and larger corps of foreigners, to be called the royal Corsican rangers, of which he was appointed lieutenant-colonel-commandant from 31 Dec. 1803. He was sent on a mission to Sardinia, and by his report on the state of that island saved a proposed subsidy. He went with his corps to Naples, under Sir James Henry Craig [q. v.], in 1805, and commanded the advance during the movement from Castellamare towards the Abruzzi (, Narrative, pp. 193–212). When the British retired to Sicily, Lowe was detached to Capri with part of his corps. The rest proceeded to Calabria, and did good service at the battle of Maida, but afterwards rejoined Lowe at Capri. There he was reinforced later by the Malta regiment. On his own responsibility, he humanely appealed to Berthier, chief of the staff of the army of Naples, against the frequent French military executions of Calabrese fugitives (Brit. Mus. Addit. MS. 29543, f. 2). Lowe occupied Capri from 11 June 1806 until 20 Oct. 1808, when, after thirteen days' siege, the Malta regiment having been made prisoners at Ana-Capri, and the defences of Capri breached, he surrendered the place to a French force under General Lamarque, marching out with the remaining garrison and the arms and baggage (, i. 397–419). Lowe referred the disaster to absence of naval aid and the misconduct of the regiment of Malta. He was much hurt by the omission from the ‘London Gazette’ of his (very lengthy) despatch, and thought of leaving the service. He is severely blamed by Napier for the loss of Capri (Peninsular War, revised edit. i. 392), but his conduct appears to have been fully approved by officers better acquainted with the circumstances (, i. 92–100, 418–21). An independent account of the affair has been left by Sir Henry Edward Bunbury [q. v.], who was quartermaster-general in Sicily at the time (Narrative, pp. 343–58).

Lowe was with his regiment in the expedition to the bay of Naples in 1809, and did good service at the reduction of Ischia (ib. pp. 359–82). He was second in command of the expedition to the Ionian islands, was present at the capture of Cephalonia and Ithaca, and was appointed civil administrator there. Afterwards he was present at the reduction of Santa Maura, was put in command of the left division of the troops in the Ionian islands, and was entrusted with the provisional government of Cephalonia, Ithaca, and Santa Maura, which he framed and administered without remuneration for two years. He addressed a general report on the Ionian islands to the colonial office. On leaving, the inhabitants presented him with a sword of honour. On 1 Jan. 1812 he was promoted from lieutenant-colonel-commandant to colonel of the royal Corsican rangers, which post he retained until the corps was ordered to be disbanded at the beginning of 1817. Lowe returned home on leave in February 1812, ‘never having been absent from his duty a single day since the beginning of the war in 1793, and having been in England during the whole of that time for six months only, at the peace of Amiens’ (, i. 103).

In January 1813 Lowe was sent to the north of Europe to inspect the Russian-German legion, a force composed of German fugitives from the Moscow retreat, which was to be paid by England. Lowe went to Stockholm with Sir Alexander Hope [q. v.], whose mission it was to induce the crown prince Bernadotte to join the allies. He then crossed the Gulf of Bothnia on the ice to inspect the legion, which was scattered along the Baltic coasts, and was to be put under Bernadotte's orders. Afterwards he repaired to the czar's headquarters at Kalisch in Poland, and was present with the Russian army at the battle of Bautzen, where he first saw Napoleon (ib. i. 105), at Würschen, and until the armistice of June 1813. Lowe was then ordered to inspect the various levies in British pay in North Germany, numbering about twenty thousand men. He joined Lord