Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Chalmers, William
CHALMERS, Sir WILLIAM (1787–1860), lieutenant-general, eldest son of William Chalmers of Glenericht, near Blairgowrie, Perthshire, was born at Glenericht in 1787. He entered the army on 9 July 1803 as ensign in the 52nd foot, becoming lieutenant on 23 Oct. of the same year. With the first battalion of his regiment, of which he was at one time adjutant, young Chalmers served in Sicily in 1806–7, and when an order was issued directing that eleven British regiments then stationed in that island should be augmented each by a company of Sicilians enlisted for seven years' general service under the British crown, it fell to him, as senior subaltern, to raise the regimental quota of men for that purpose. He became captain in the second battalion in 1807. He served with his regiment in Portugal and Spain in 1808–9; in the Walcheren expedition, including the bombardment of Flushing; and subsequently as a regimental officer and as brigade-major of various infantry brigades in the Peninsular campaigns from 1810 to 1814, in the course of which he was present in seventeen engagements, including the battles of Barossa, Salamanca, and Vittoria, and the various actions in the Pyrenees and on the Nivelle, and at the sieges of Ciudad Rodrigo, Badajoz, and San Sebastian; had altogether six horses shot under him; and on one occasion—the attack on the entrenchments of Sarre in 1813—was himself very severely wounded. He received a brevet majority for service in the field in 1813, and a brevet lieutenant-colonelcy for Waterloo. At the latter period he was serving as aide-de-camp to his uncle, Major-general Sir Kenneth Mackenzie, afterwards Sir Kenneth Douglas, bart., of Glenbervie, who was commanding at Antwerp, which was in a very critical state, but got leave to join his regiment before the battle, where he commanded the right wing of the 52nd, and had three horses killed under him. He was also present at the capture of Paris, and with the army of occupation in France until 1817, when he retired from active military life. He married in 1826 the daughter of Thomas Price. He became brevet colonel in 1837, was made K.C.H., and C.B. the year following. He became a major-general in 1846, a knight-bachelor in 1848, colonel of 20th foot Feb.–Oct. 1853 and of the 78th highlanders in 1853, and became lieutenant-general in 1854. He had the Peninsular medal with eight clasps, and the Waterloo medal. Chalmers, who was left a widower in 1851, died at his seat, Glenericht, on 2 June 1860. His age appears to have been given incorrectly in the ‘Gentleman's Magazine’ and other obituary notices.
[Army Lists; Moorsom's Hist. Rec. 52nd Light Infantry; Leeke's Lord Seaton's Regt. at Waterloo, vol. i.; Dod's Knightage; Gent. Mag. 3rd series (ix.) p. 104.]
Dictionary of National Biography, Errata (1904), p.60
N.B.— f.e. stands for from end and l.l. for last line
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