"... resplendent in his Hussar uniform ..." (February 1, 1814)

Justin joined the 15th (King’s) Hussars in 1807, just after they had been converted from a regiment of Light Dragoons on March 31. He exchanged to the Riflemen some time after April 1809.

 

This painting featuring their resplendent uniform, attributed to James Pardon, is held by the National Army Museum.  

 

The 15th Hussars were sent to Spain in 1808:

"On September 23 the 15th Hussars received orders to prepare eight troops, each of 85 men and horses, for service ; the troops selected were :

A Troop, Captain Seelinger

B Troop, Captain Dalrymple.

E Troop, Captain Griffith

F Troop, Captain Cochrane

G Troop, Captain Murray

H Troop, Captain Broadhurst

I Troop, Captain Thackwell

K Troop, Captain Gordon

The other officers embarking were Lieut.-Colonel Colquhoun Grant (who had only joined the Regiment on September 25), Lieutenants Buckley, Whiteford, Hancox, During, Knight, Penrice, and Carpenter; Cornets Jenkins, Laroche, Philips, and L. P. Jones, Lieutenant and Adjutant C. Jones, Paymaster Henslow, Surgeon Lidderdale, Assistant Surgeon Forbes, and Veterinary Surgeon Castley.

Of other ranks there were 7 quartermasters, 36 sergeants, 32 corporals, 8 trumpeters, 642 privates, and 682 horses.

Embarked at Portsmouth on October 28 and 30, most ships reached Corunna on November 8.

The Fifteenth commenced their journey up country on the 21st, but in order to give the horses time to recover from the effects of the confinement on board ship, the route to Astorga was divided into twelve easy stages with two halting days."  

(see Colonel H. C. Wylly, The 15th (King’s) Hussars, 1759–1913, London, Caxton, 1914)

 

I am not quite sure whether the author got Justin’s family name wrong – possibly because of the close relationship between the Gordons and the Sumnerses – and K Troop was under Justin’s command; or whether he forgot to list Justin among the cornets. After all, he lists the horses among the "other ranks"! Seriously, I left all this quite vague in the book because I am not sure if you went and bought a captaincy, straight off, or whether you started with a cornetcy and then served and bought your way up. It's been a while since I read Ian Kelly's wonderful Beau Brummell: The Ultimate Dandy (2005), which details Brummell's army career in Chapter 4, or Mark Urban's excellent study The Man Who Broke Napoleon’s Codes: The Story of George Scovell (2001). Would you recommend his book about the Riflemen, which I have yet to read?