joining the Army could still mean effectively joining for life, which was frequently brutally cut short. For instance, a posting to the Caribbean in 1790 was seen as a near death sentence, as thousands of men died or were disabled by disease there. The Army still struggled to raise the troops required to replace the discharged, wounded and dead as the war against France continued. As early as 1794, 18,596 soldiers died on active service and another 40,639 men were discharged. This would remain a constant theme during the Napoleonic wars, and the British Army also used foreign volunteers, such as French Royalists, Germans, Greeks and Corsicans to supplement its forces. In 1813 one fifth of the army, 52,000 men, were such volunteers. The British Army in 1813 contained over 250,000 men, though this was much larger in comparison to the army at the beginning of the war, the all volunteer British army was still much smaller than that of France, which with conscription had an army over 2.6 million. Reform From 1798 onwards, structural, training and logistical reforms implemented or authorised by the Duke of York (as commander-in-chief of the army) slowly improved the lot of the ordinary soldier. York oversaw a crackdown on corruption and removed the threat of corporal punishment for a large number of petty offences (while it was still retained for serious derelictions of duty). He also stamped down on the abuse of buying officer commissions, making it necessary for officers to serve two full years before either promotion or purchase to captain and six years before becoming a major The establishment of the Royal Military Academy for officers was instigated due to York's influence, while regular recruits to the army were allowed to join under contract for limited periods, rather than for life. Men such as Sir John Moore, Thomas Sydney Beckwith and Rowland Hill characterised the new breed of officers who sought to improve the relationship between officers and men, motivating troops through mutual respect, reward and promotion rather than by relying on punishment. The Shorncliffe System for light infantry was established, being devised by Lt-Col Kenneth Mackenzie, and trained soldiers to think for themselves and act on initiative while the light infantry officers drilled alongside the men fostering comradeship. In addition, the introduction of new tactical and organisational flexibility contributed a great deal to the successes of the Peninsula and Waterloo. Post-Napoleonic