An Affair of Honour

Christian Davies was born Christian Cavenaugh in Dublin in 1667. In 1693 she enlisted as a footsoldier under the name of Christopher Welsh to search for her first husband, Richard Welsh, who had been tricked into enlisting in the army, and taken to Flanders to fight in the war between William III and Louis XIV of France. The following episode is supposed to have taken place in the winter of 1694–1695, while she was with her regiment in Gorkhum (Gorinchem), Holland. The Life and Adventures of Mrs. Christian Davies was published the year after her death. The title page claims that it was ‘Taken from her own Mouth’:

I was in Gorcum, where my grief for my husband being drowned in the hopes of finding him, I indulged in the natural gaiety of my temper, and lived very merrily. In my frolics, to kill time, I made my addresses to a burgher’s daughter, who was young and pretty. As I had formerly had a great many fine things said to myself, I was at no loss in the amorous dialect; I ran over all the tender nonsense (which I look upon as the lover’s heavy cannon, as it does the greatest execution with raw girls) employed on such attacks; I squeezed her hand, whenever I could get an opportunity; sighed often, when in her company; looked foolishly, and practised upon her all the ridiculous airs which I had often laughed at, when they were used as snares against myself. When I afterwards reflected on this unjust way of amusement, I heartily repented it; for it had an effect I did not wish; the poor girl grew really fond of me, and uneasy when I was absent; for which she never failed chiding me if it was but for half a day. When I was with her, she always regaled me in the best manner she could, and nothing was too good or too dear to treat me with, if she could compass it; but notwithstanding a declared passion for me, I found her nicely virtuous; for when I pretended to take an indecent freedom with her, she told me, that she supposed her tenderness for me was become irksome, since I took a method to change it into hatred. It was true, that she did not scruple to own she loved me as her life, because she thought her inclination justifiable, as well as lawful; but then she loved her virtue better than she did her life. If I had dishonourable designs upon her, I was not the man she loved; she was mistaken, and had found the ruffian, instead of the tender husband she hoped in me.

I own this rebuff gained my heart; and taking her in my arms, I told her, that she had heightened the power of her charms by her virtue; for which I should hold her in greater esteem, but could not love her better, as she had already engrossed all my tenderness; and, indeed, I was now fond of the girl, though mine, you know, could not go beyond a platonic love.

In the course of this amour, a serjeant of our regiment, but not of the company I belonged to, sat down before the citadel of her heart, and made regular approaches, which cost him a number of sighs, and a great deal of time; but finding I commanded there, and it was impossible to take it by a regular siege, he resolved to give a desperate assault, sword in hand. One day, therefore, while I was under arms, he came to her, and without any previous indication of his design, a fair opportunity offering, he very bravely, and like a man of honour, employed force to obtain what he could not get by assiduity. The girl defended herself stoutly, and in the scuffle she lost her cap, and her clothes were most of them torn off her back; but notwithstanding her resolute defence, he had carried the fortress by storm, had not some of the neighbours opportunely come in to her assistance, alarmed by her shrieks, and made him retreat in a very shameful manner. No sooner had she recovered, and dressed herself, than she went in search of, and found me, in my rank, standing to my arms. She told me what had passed, and begged me to revenge the insult offered her.

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from The Life and Adventures of Mrs. Christian Davies (1740)


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