Sergeant Hakeswill

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Obidiah Hakeswill is a fictional British Sergeant who appears in several of the Sharpe books by Bernard Cornwell.

[edit] Early life

Hakeswill's home town and county are never explicitly mentioned in the books but as a boy he assaulted the daughter of his parson and was, to keep the girl's honour intact, charged with sheep theft and sentence to death by hanging. On the day of his execution, the executioner paid little attention to the young boy and was content to make the other victims suffer. A severe rainstorm broke out allowing Hakeswill's mother to send her brother to cut the boy from the scaffold. Obidiah's uncle told him to run off and never look back. Having survived his execution Hakeswill found an army recruiting party and enlisted as a drummerboy in the 33rd Regiment of Foot. Since the execution Obidiah always held his mother in a high esteem. Although he never sees his mother after his escape, he appeals to her in difficult situations. It may be deduced that he considers all mothers to be sacred, since, in Sharpe's Enemy, he orders his men not to touch his hostage Josephina la Lacosta when he learns that she was in Adrados to pray for her mother.

Since the day of his escape from the gallows, he begins to suffers from uncontrollable face spasms, and never stops twitching until his death.

[edit] Army Career

Hakeswill quickly rose through the lower ranks of the British Army, mainly through co-operating with the foppish officers' every wish and also by manipulating his fellow soldiers. Soon he was a sergeant and enlisted a young Richard Sharpe to the 33rd. Serving in Flanders and then India Hakeswill's dislike for Sharpe intensifies when Sharpe becomes first a sergeant then an officer. Hakeswill has a reputation for being indestructable, at one point surviving a blast of grapeshot that kills the files of men directly behind them, and several attempts to muder him by Sharpe (by locking him in a cage with a tiger, having an elephant stand on him, and dropping him into a snake pit). Hakeswill himself belives his mother is protecting him from death - leading to his reverance not only of her but of mothers in general - stating that "mothers are sacred". Despite the facade of being the perfect soldier he puts on for officers, Hakeswill's aim in life is soley for his own benfit and in Sharpe's Tiger, Sharpe's Triumph and Sharpe's Fortress Hakeswill (respectively) betrays Sharpe's mission to save his own life, pilfers army supplies and deserts from the army, later claiming he was a prisoner.

Hakeswill surfaces again in Sharpe's Company as a sergeant in the new draft of the South Essex Regiment. He quickly strips Sharpe's riflemen of their rifles and green jackets, then gets Patrick Harper flogged and demoted for a theft he himself committed. Hakeswill is also obsessed with Teresa Moreno, Sharpe's soon to be wife, and during the sack of Badajoz he attempts to rape Teresa and kills Captain Robert Knowles before Sharpe rescues his wife and child. After this Hakeswill deserts again and joins Marshal Pot-au-Feu's band of cross-national deserters. When they kidnap two English ladies he meets the now Major Sharpe, in Sharpe's Enemy, who defeats the deserters and captures Hakeswill. However in the confusion of battle against the French, he escapes and tries to join them but not before he shoots and kills Teresa. He is captured by Colonel Alexandre Dubreton who, having a great deal of respect for Sharpe, hands him over to the major. Hakeswill at the close of the book is executed by firing squad and finished off by Sharpe with his rifle.