Pearson Denby

Pearson Denby was an American trader and trapper who in 1830 discovered various deserters from the Duke of Wellington's army while traveling through the Great Plains.

Years earlier the deserters - known to local tribes as the Half-Finished People - had been in Brussels during the time Jonathan Strange removed it to America to prevent it falling to the French. Having slipped outside the city during darkness to avoid the battle due to be fought the following day they were thus not transported back when Strange returned it to Belgium. Marooned in an unfamiliar land they were then obliged to seek the assistance of local tribespeople in order to survive, ingratiating themselves by offering what items of military hardware they happened to have with them, one being a small howitzer which they successfully traded for food.

Unfortunately what neither they nor the Lakota possessed was the means to create more ammunition, and thus a chief of the Lakota approached Denby in hopes he might be able to supply their wants. He could not, but was sufficiently intrigued by what he learned of these mysterious men to investigate them further[40], holding conversations with such as spoke English, including the loquacious Robert Heath[40].

Pearson Denby's Wild Look Upon Discovering the Quacking of a Regiment of Regency Soldiers