ABSTRACT
Charles Dibdin (c. 1745–1814) was an actor, playwright and composer. The highlight of his ensemble theatre career was spent in London at Drury Lane, but he also had a successful solo career in the last decades of his life. Most of his writing exhibited an honest appreciation of the value of military service to the state. His ability to convey this in his music eventually led the government to commission a new patriotic song from him, to be produced monthly from June 1803 to January 1804. Dibdin’s music was on everyone’s lips in this period, and served as a sort of soundtrack for the volunteer movement of the Napoleonic wars. The Chelsea Pensioner was one of the earliest examples of Dibdin’s fervent patriotism. It followed a collaboration with Bickerstaff on The Recruiting Sergeant (above), which contrasted with this work in its more negative potrayal of the army.
