40th Regiment of Foot?

[Jebber]

I would suspect that your great-grandmother was either confused of prone to fabrication. If Gabriel was a labourer in 1841 and 1851 it doesn't sound as if there was much money in the family, at that time a commission would have had to have been bought, requiring a substantial financial backing, something beyond the reach of an ag lab.

Jebber

[melasia]

Thanks, everyone, for all your advice and help. I suspect that either my great-grandmother or her mother made this story up, or possibly my great-grandmother's eldest sister (who was born out of wedlock before my g-g-grandparents married) was the illegitimate daughter of an army officer and my great-grandmother got her wires crossed.