'With Courage and Energy Labour Conquers All’: Military masculinities and civilian transitions in the British Corps of Commissionaires, 1859-1895

The Corps of Commissionaires was founded in 1859 as an employment agency for army veterans. This was a group of men who often encountered prejudice on their return to civilian life, and this left some socially marginalised and unable to secure work, and the organisation was established to offer ex-servicemen the prospect of a different outcome. The Corps was established by Edward Walter, and this study focusses on the period from 1859-1895. Walter conceived the commissionaires as a quasi-military spectacle to emphasise the men’s former careers, and this creation was predicated on controlling the men’s lives; their army-style uniforms, the barracks they lived in and the parades they took part in all signified this control. This study’s analysis illustrates the impact that this spectacle had on the men’s lives, and the role it played in publicly promoting the commissionaire system.
This disrupted cultural norms around veterancy ; the commissionaires were respected for their prior military service, valued by employers, and admired for their self-reliance as civilians. By considering the gender and class status of the commissionaires, and examining the business practices that Walter adopted to promote the commissionaires, this study forms a bridge between cultural, social and business history. As a result, this thesis opens up new areas of enquiry into the limited studies of the lives and representations of Victorian ex-servicemen, it extends the body of work on working-class life during this period, and it illuminates the role of played by marketing in promoting commercial service