CHAPTER 7.
THE BATTLE OF LADYSMITH.
Sir George White had now reunited his force, and found himself in
command of a formidable little army some twelve thousand in number.
His cavalry included the 5th Lancers, the 5th Dragoons, part of the
18th and the whole of the 19th Hussars, the Natal Carabineers, the
Border Rifles, some mounted infantry, and the Imperial Light Horse.
Among his infantry were the Royal Irish Fusiliers, the Dublin
Fusiliers, and the King's Royal Rifles, fresh from the ascent of
Talana Hill, the Gordons, the Manchesters, and the Devons who had
been blooded at Elandslaagte, the Leicesters, the Liverpools, the
2nd battalion of the King's Royal Rifles, the 2nd Rifle Brigade,
and the Gloucesters, who had been so roughly treated at
Rietfontein. He had six batteries of excellent field artillery--the
13th, 21st, 42nd, 53rd, 67th, 69th, and No. 10 Mountain Battery of
screw guns. No general could have asked for a more compact and
workmanlike little force.
It had been recognised by the British General from the beginning
that his tactics must be defensive, since he was largely
outnumbered and since also any considerable mishap to his force
would expose the whole colony of Natal to destruction. The actions
of Elandslaagte and Rietfontein were forced upon him in order to
disengage his compromised detachment, but now there was no longer
any reason why he should assume the offensive. He knew that away
out on the Atlantic a trail of transports which already extended
from the Channel to Cape de Verde were hourly drawing nearer to him
with the army corps from England. In a fortnight or less the first
of them would be at Durban. It was his game, therefore, to keep his
army intact, and to let those throbbing engines and whirling
propellers do the work of the empire. Had he entrenched himself up
to his nose and waited, it would have paid him best in the end.
But so tame and inglorious a policy is impossible to a fighting
soldier. He could not with his splendid force permit himself to be
shut in without an action. What policy demands honour may forbid.
On October 27th there were already Boers and rumours of Boers on
every side of him. Joubert with his main body was moving across
from Dundee. The Freestaters were to the north and west. Their
combined numbers were uncertain, but at least it was already proved
that they were far more numerous and also more formidable than had
been anticipated. We had had a taste of their artillery also, and
the pleasant delusion that it would be a mere useless encumbrance
to a Boer force had vanished for ever. It was a grave thing to
leave the town in order to give battle, for the mobile enemy might
swing round and seize it behind us. Nevertheless White determined
to make the venture.
On the 29th the enemy were visibly converging upon the town. From a
high hill within rifleshot of the houses a watcher could see no
fewer than six Boer camps to the east and north. French, with his
cavalry, pushed out feelers, and coasted along the edge of the
advancing host. His report warned White that if he would strike
before all the scattered bands were united he must do so at once.
The wounded were sent down to Pietermaritzburg, and it would bear
explanation why the non-combatants did not accompany them. On the
evening of the same day Joubert in person was said to be only six
miles off, and a party of his men cut the water supply of the town.
The Klip, however, a fair-sized river, runs through Ladysmith, so
that there was no danger of thirst. The British had inflated and
sent up a balloon, to the amazement of the back-veld Boers; its
report confirmed the fact that the enemy was in force in front of
and around them.
On the night of the 29th General White detached two of his best
regiments, the Irish Fusiliers and the Gloucesters, with No. 10
Mountain Battery, to advance under cover of the darkness and to
seize and hold a long ridge called Nicholson's Nek, which lay about
six miles to the north of Ladysmith. Having determined to give
battle on the next day, his object was to protect his left wing
against those Freestaters who were still moving from the north and
west, and also to keep a pass open by which his cavalry might
pursue the Boer fugitives in case of a British victory. This small
detached column numbered about a thousand men--whose fate will be
afterwards narrated.
At five o'clock on the morning of the 30th the Boers, who had
already developed a perfect genius for hauling heavy cannon up the
most difficult heights, opened fire from one of the hills which lie
to the north of the town. Before the shot was fired, the forces of
the British had already streamed out of Ladysmith to test the
strength of the invaders.
White's army was divided into three columns. On the extreme left,
quite isolated from the others, was the small Nicholson's Nek
detachment under the command of Colonel Carleton of the Fusiliers
(one of three gallant brothers each of whom commands a British
regiment). With him was Major Adye of the staff. On the right
British flank Colonel Grimwood commanded a brigade composed of the
1st and 2nd battalions of the King's Royal Rifles, the Leicesters,
the Liverpools, and the Royal Dublin Fusiliers. In the centre
Colonel Ian Hamilton commanded the Devons, the Gordons, the
Manchesters, and the 2nd battalion of the Rifle Brigade, which
marched direct into the battle from the train which had brought
them from Durban. Six batteries of artillery were massed in the
centre under Colonel Downing. French with the cavalry and mounted
infantry was on the extreme right, but found little opportunity for
the use of the mounted arm that day.
The Boer position, so far as it could be seen, was a formidable
one. Their centre lay upon one of the spurs of Signal Hill, about
three miles from the town. Here they had two forty-pounders and
three other lighter guns, but their artillery strength developed
both in numbers and in weight of metal as the day wore on. Of their
dispositions little could be seen. An observer looking westward
might discern with his glass sprays of mounted riflemen galloping
here and there over the downs, and possibly small groups where the
gunners stood by their guns, or the leaders gazed down at that town
which they were destined to have in view for such a weary while. On
the dun-coloured plains before the town, the long thin lines, with
an occasional shifting sparkle of steel, showed where Hamilton's
and Grimwood's infantry were advancing. In the clear cold air of an
African morning every detail could be seen, down to the distant
smoke of a train toiling up the heavy grades which lead from Frere
over the Colenso Bridge to Ladysmith.
The scrambling, inconsequential, unsatisfactory action which ensued
is as difficult to describe as it must have been to direct. The
Boer front covered some seven or eight miles, with kopjes, like
chains of fortresses, between. They formed a huge semicircle of
which our advance was the chord, and they were able from this
position to pour in a converging artillery fire which grew steadily
hotter as the day advanced. In the early part of the day our
forty-two guns, working furiously, though with a want of accuracy
which may be due to those errors of refraction which are said to be
common in the limpid air of the veld, preserved their superiority.
There appears to have been a want of concentration about our fire,
and at some periods of the action each particular battery was
firing at some different point of the Boer half-circle. Sometimes
for an hour on end the Boer reply would die away altogether, only
to break out with augmented violence, and with an accuracy which
increased our respect for their training. Huge shells--the largest
that ever burst upon a battlefield--hurled from distances which
were unattainable by our fifteen-pounders, enveloped our batteries
in smoke and flame. One enormous Creusot gun on Pepworth Hill threw
a 96-pound shell a distance of four miles, and several 40-pound
howitzers outweighted our field guns. And on the same day on which
we were so roughly taught how large the guns were which labour and
good will could haul on to the field of battle, we learned also
that our enemy--to the disgrace of our Board of Ordnance be it
recorded--was more in touch with modern invention than we were, and
could show us not only the largest, but also the smallest, shell
which had yet been used. Would that it had been our officials
instead of our gunners who heard the devilish little one-pound
shells of the Vickers-Maxim automatic gun, exploding with a
continuous string of crackings and bangings, like a huge cracker,
in their faces and about their ears!
Up to seven o'clock our infantry had shown no disposition to press
the attack, for with so huge a position in front of them, and so
many hills which were held by the enemy, it was difficult to know
what line of advance should be taken, or whether the attack should
not be converted into a mere reconnaissance. Shortly after that
hour, however, the Boers decided the question by themselves
developing a vigorous movement upon Grimwood and the right flank.
With field guns, Maxims, and rifle fire, they closed rapidly in
upon him. The centre column was drafted off, regiment by regiment,
to reinforce the right. The Gordons, Devons, Manchesters, and three
batteries were sent over to Grimwood's relief, and the 5th Lancers,
acting as infantry, assisted him to hold on.
At nine o'clock there was a lull, but it was evident that fresh
commandoes and fresh guns were continually streaming into the
firing line. The engagement opened again with redoubled violence,
and Grimwood's three advanced battalions fell back, abandoning the
ridge which they had held for five hours. The reason for this
withdrawal was not that they could not continue to hold their
position, but it was that a message had just reached Sir George
White from Colonel Knox, commanding in Ladysmith, to the effect
that it looked as if the enemy was about to rush the town from the
other side. Crossing the open in some disorder, they lost heavily,
and would have done so more had not the 13th Field Battery,
followed after an interval by the 53rd, dashed forward, firing
shrapnel at short ranges, in order to cover the retreat of the
infantry. Amid the bursting of the huge 96-pound shells, and the
snapping of the vicious little automatic one-pounders, with a
cross-fire of rifles as well, Abdy's and Dawkins' gallant batteries
swung round their muzzles, and hit back right and left, flashing
and blazing, amid their litter of dead horses and men. So severe
was the fire that the guns were obscured by the dust knocked up by
the little shells of the automatic gun. Then, when their work was
done and the retiring infantry had straggled over the ridge, the
covering guns whirled and bounded after them. So many horses had
fallen that two pieces were left until the teams could be brought
back for them, which was successfully done through the gallantry of
Captain Thwaites. The action of these batteries was one of the few
gleams of light in a not too brilliant day's work. With splendid
coolness and courage they helped each other by alternate
retirements after the retreating infantry had passed them. The 21st
Battery (Blewitt's) also distinguished itself by its staunchness in
covering the retirement of the cavalry, while the 42nd (Goulburn's)
suffered the heaviest losses of any. On the whole, such honours as
fell to our lot were mainly with the gunners.
White must have been now uneasy for his position, and it had become
apparent that his only course was to fall back and concentrate upon
the town. His left flank was up in the air, and the sound of
distant firing, wafted over five miles of broken country, was the
only message which arrived from them. His right had been pushed
back, and, most dangerous of all, his centre had ceased to exist,
for only the 2nd Rifle Brigade remained there. What would happen if
the enemy burst rudely through and pushed straight for the town? It
was the more possible, as the Boer artillery had now proved itself
to be far heavier than ours. That terrible 96-pounder, serenely
safe and out of range, was plumping its great projectiles into the
masses of retiring troops. The men had had little sleep and little
food, and this unanswerable fire was an ordeal for a force which is
retreating. A retirement may very rapidly become a rout under such
circumstances. It was with some misgivings that the officers saw
their men quicken their pace and glance back over their shoulders
at the whine and screech of the shell. They were still some miles
from home, and the plain was open. What could be done to give them
some relief?
And at that very moment there came the opportune and unexpected
answer. That plume of engine smoke which the watcher had observed
in the morning had drawn nearer and nearer, as the heavy train came
puffing and creaking up the steep inclines. Then, almost before it
had drawn up at the Ladysmith siding, there had sprung from it a
crowd of merry bearded fellows, with ready hands and strange sea
cries, pulling and hauling, with rope and purchase to get out the
long slim guns which they had lashed on the trucks. Singular
carriages were there, specially invented by Captain Percy Scott,
and labouring and straining, they worked furiously to get the
12-pounder quick-firers into action. Then at last it was done, and
the long tubes swept upwards to the angle at which they might hope
to reach that monster on the hill at the horizon. Two of them
craned their long inquisitive necks up and exchanged repartees with
the big Creusot. And so it was that the weary and dispirited
British troops heard a crash which was louder and sharper than that
of their field guns, and saw far away upon the distant hill a great
spurt of smoke and flame to show where the shell had struck.
Another and another and another--and then they were troubled no
more. Captain Hedworth Lambton and his men had saved the situation.
The masterful gun had met its own master and sank into silence,
while the somewhat bedraggled field force came trailing back into
Ladysmith, leaving three hundred of their number behind them. It
was a high price to pay, but other misfortunes were in store for us
which made the retirement of the morning seem insignificant.
In the meantime we may follow the unhappy fortunes of the small
column which had, as already described, been sent out by Sir George
White in order, if possible, to prevent the junction of the two
Boer armies, and at the same time to threaten the right wing of the
main force, which was advancing from the direction of Dundee, Sir
George White throughout the campaign consistently displayed one
quality which is a charming one in an individual, but may be
dangerous in a commander. He was a confirmed optimist. Perhaps his
heart might have failed him in the dark days to come had he not
been so. But whether one considers the non-destruction of the
Newcastle Railway, the acquiescence in the occupation of Dundee,
the retention of the non combatants in Ladysmith until it was too
late to get rid of their useless mouths, or the failure to make any
serious preparations for the defence of the town until his troops
were beaten back into it, we see always the same evidence of a man
who habitually hopes that all will go well, and is in consequence
remiss in making preparations for their going ill. But unhappily in
every one of these instances they did go ill, though the slowness
of the Boers enabled us, both at Dundee and at Ladysmith, to escape
what might have been disaster.
Sir George White has so nobly and frankly taken upon himself the
blame of Nicholson's Nek that an impartial historian must rather
regard his self-condemnation as having been excessive. The
immediate causes of the failure were undoubtedly the results of
pure ill-fortune, and depended on things outside his control. But
it is evident that the strategic plan which would justify the
presence of this column at Nicholson's Nek was based upon the
supposition that the main army won their action at Lombard's Kop.
In that case White might swing round his right and pin the Boers
between himself and Nicholson's Nek. In any case he could then
re-unite with his isolated wing. But if he should lose his
battle--what then? What was to become of this detachment five miles
up in the air? How was it to be extricated? The gallant Irishman
seems to have waved aside the very idea of defeat. An assurance
was, it is reported, given to the leaders of the column that by
eleven o'clock next morning they would be relieved. So they would
if White had won his action. But--
The force chosen to operate independently consisted of four and a
half companies of the Gloucester regiment, six companies of the
Royal Irish Fusiliers, and No. 10 Mountain Battery of six
seven-pounder screw-guns. They were both old soldier regiments from
India, and the Fusiliers had shown only ten days before at Talana
Hill the stuff of which they were made. Colonel Carleton, of the
Fusiliers, to whose exertions much of the success of the retreat
from Dundee was due, commanded the column, with Major Adye as staff
officer. On the night of Sunday, October 29th, they tramped out of
Ladysmith, a thousand men, none better in the army. Little they
thought, as they exchanged a jest or two with the outlying pickets,
that they were seeing the last of their own armed countrymen for
many a weary month.
The road was irregular and the night was moonless. On either side
the black loom of the hills bulked vaguely through the darkness.
The column tramped stolidly along, the Fusiliers in front, the guns
and Gloucesters behind. Several times a short halt was called to
make sure of the bearings. At last, in the black cold hours which
come between midnight and morning, the column swung to the left out
of the road. In front of them, hardly visible, stretched a long
black kopje. It was the very Nicholson's Nek which they had come to
occupy. Carleton and Adye must have heaved a sigh of relief as they
realised that they had actually struck it. The force was but two
hundred yards from the position, and all had gone without a hitch.
And yet in those two hundred yards there came an incident which
decided the fate both of their enterprise and of themselves.
Out of the darkness there blundered and rattled five horsemen,
their horses galloping, the loose stones flying around them. In the
dim light they were gone as soon as seen. Whence coming, whither
going, no one knows, nor is it certain whether it was design or
ignorance or panic which sent them riding so wildly through the
darkness. Somebody fired. A sergeant of the Fusiliers took the
bullet through his hand. Some one else shouted to fix bayonets. The
mules which carried the spare ammunition kicked and reared. There
was no question of treachery, for they were led by our own men, but
to hold two frightened mules, one with either hand, is a feat for a
Hercules. They lashed and tossed and bucked themselves loose, and
an instant afterwards were flying helter skelter through the
column. Nearly all the mules caught the panic. In vain the men held
on to their heads. In the mad rush they were galloped over and
knocked down by the torrent of frightened creatures. In the gloom
of that early hour the men must have thought that they were charged
by cavalry. The column was dashed out of all military order as
effectively as if a regiment of dragoons had ridden over them. When
the cyclone had passed, and the men had with many a muttered curse
gathered themselves into their ranks once more, they realised how
grave was the misfortune which had befallen them. There, where
those mad hoofs still rattled in the distance, were their spare
cartridges, their shells, and their cannon. A mountain gun is not
drawn upon wheels, but is carried in adjustable parts upon
mule-back. A wheel had gone south, a trail east, a chase west. Some
of the cartridges were strewn upon the road. Most were on their way
back to Ladysmith. There was nothing for it but to face this new
situation and to determine what should be done.
It has been often and naturally asked, why did not Colonel Carleton
make his way back at once upon the loss of his guns and ammunition,
while it was still dark? One or two considerations are evident. In
the first place, it is natural to a good soldier to endeavour to
retrieve a situation rather than to abandon his enterprise. His
prudence, did he not do so, might become the subject of public
commendation, but might also provoke some private comment. A
soldier's training is to take chances, and to do the best he can
with the material at his disposal. Again, Colonel Carleton and
Major Adye knew the general plan of the battle which would be
raging within a very few hours, and they quite understood that by
withdrawing they would expose General White's left flank to attack
from the forces (consisting, as we know now, of the Orange
Freestaters and of the Johannesburg Police) who were coming from
the north and west. He hoped to be relieved by eleven, and he
believed that, come what might, he could hold out until then. These
are the most obvious of the considerations which induced Colonel
Carleton to determine to carry out so far as he could the programme
which had been laid down for him and his command. He marched up the
hill and occupied the position.
His heart, however, must have sunk when he examined it. It was very
large--too large to be effectively occupied by the force which he
commanded. The length was about a mile and the breadth four hundred
yards. Shaped roughly like the sole of a boot, it was only the heel
end which he could hope to hold. Other hills all round offered
cover for Boer riflemen. Nothing daunted, however, he set his men
to work at once building sangars with the loose stones. With the
full dawn and the first snapping of Boer Mausers from the hills
around they had thrown up some sort of rude defences which they
might hope to hold until help should come.
But how could help come when there was no means by which they could
let White know the plight in which they found themselves? They had
brought a heliograph with them, but it was on the back of one of
those accursed mules. The Boers were thick around them, and they
could not send a messenger. An attempt was made to convert a
polished biscuit tin into a heliograph, but with poor success. A
Kaffir was dispatched with promises of a heavy bribe, but he passed
out of history. And there in the clear cold morning air the balloon
hung to the south of them where the first distant thunder of
White's guns was beginning to sound. If only they could attract the
attention of that balloon! Vainly they wagged flags at it. Serene
and unresponsive it brooded over the distant battle.
And now the Boers were thickening round them on every side.
Christian de Wet, a name soon to be a household word, marshaled the
Boer attack, which was soon strengthened by the arrival of Van Dam
and his Police. At five o'clock the fire began, at six it was warm,
at seven warmer still. Two companies of the Gloucesters lined a
sangar on the tread of the sole, to prevent any one getting too
near to the heel. A fresh detachment of Boers, firing from a range
of nearly one thousand yards, took this defence in the rear.
Bullets fell among the men, and smacked up against the stone
breastwork. The two companies were withdrawn, and lost heavily in
the open as they crossed it. An incessant rattle and crackle of
rifle fire came from all round, drawing very slowly but steadily
nearer. Now and then the whisk of a dark figure from one boulder to
another was all that ever was seen of the attackers. The British
fired slowly and steadily, for every cartridge counted, but the
cover of the Boers was so cleverly taken that it was seldom that
there was much to aim at. 'All you could ever see,' says one who
was present, 'were the barrels of the rifles.' There was time for
thought in that long morning, and to some of the men it may have
occurred what preparation for such fighting had they ever had in
the mechanical exercises of the parade ground, or the shooting of
an annual bagful of cartridges at exposed targets at a measured
range. It is the warfare of Nicholson's Nek, not that of Laffan's
Plain, which has to be learned in the future.
During those weary hours lying on the bullet-swept hill and
listening to the eternal hissing in the air and clicking on the
rocks, the British soldiers could see the fight which raged to the
south of them. It was not a cheering sight, and Carleton and Adye
with their gallant comrades must have felt their hearts grow
heavier as they watched. The Boers' shells bursting among the
British batteries, the British shells bursting short of their
opponents. The Long Toms laid at an angle of forty-five plumped
their huge shells into the British guns at a range where the latter
would not dream of unlimbering. And then gradually the rifle fire
died away also, crackling more faintly as White withdrew to
Ladysmith. At eleven o'clock Carleton's column recognised that it
had been left to its fate. As early as nine a heliogram had been
sent to them to retire as the opportunity served, but to leave the
hill was certainly to court annihilation.
The men had then been under fire for six hours, and with their
losses mounting and their cartridges dwindling, all hope had faded
from their minds. But still for another hour, and yet another, and
yet another, they held doggedly on. Nine and a half hours they
clung to that pile of stones. The Fusiliers were still exhausted
from the effect of their march from Glencoe and their incessant
work since. Many fell asleep behind the boulders. Some sat doggedly
with their useless rifles and empty pouches beside them. Some
picked cartridges off their dead comrades. What were they fighting
for? It was hopeless, and they knew it. But always there was the
honour of the flag, the glory of the regiment, the hatred of a
proud and brave man to acknowledge defeat. And yet it had to come.
There were some in that force who were ready for the reputation of
the British army, and for the sake of an example of military
virtue, to die stolidly where they stood, or to lead the
'Faugh-a-ballagh' boys, or the gallant 28th, in one last
death-charge with empty rifles against the unseen enemy. They may
have been right, these stalwarts. Leonidas and his three hundred
did more for the Spartan cause by their memory than by their living
valour. Man passes like the brown leaves, but the tradition of a
nation lives on like the oak that sheds them--and the passing of
the leaves is nothing if the bole be the sounder for it. But a
counsel of perfection is easy at a study table. There are other
things to be said--the responsibility of officers for the lives of
their men, the hope that they may yet be of service to their
country. All was weighed, all was thought of, and so at last the
white flag went up. The officer who hoisted it could see no one
unhurt save himself, for all in his sangar were hit, and the others
were so placed that he was under the impression that they had
withdrawn altogether. Whether this hoisting of the flag necessarily
compromised the whole force is a difficult question, but the Boers
instantly left their cover, and the men in the sangars behind, some
of whom had not been so seriously engaged, were ordered by their
officers to desist from firing. In an instant the victorious Boers
were among them.
It was not, as I have been told by those who were there, a sight
which one would wish to have seen or care now to dwell upon.
Haggard officers cracked their sword-blades and cursed the day that
they had been born. Privates sobbed with their stained faces buried
in their hands. Of all tests of discipline that ever they had
stood, the hardest to many was to conform to all that the cursed
flapping handkerchief meant to them. 'Father, father, we had rather
have died,' cried the Fusiliers to their priest. Gallant hearts,
ill paid, ill thanked, how poorly do the successful of the world
compare with their unselfish loyalty and devotion!
But the sting of contumely or insult was not added to their
misfortunes. There is a fellowship of brave men which rises above
the feuds of nations, and may at last go far, we hope, to heal
them. From every rock there rose a Boer--strange, grotesque figures
many of them--walnut-brown and shaggy-bearded, and swarmed on to
the hill. No term of triumph or reproach came from their lips. 'You
will not say now that the young Boer cannot shoot,' was the
harshest word which the least restrained of them made use of.
Between one and two hundred dead and wounded were scattered over
the hill. Those who were within reach of human help received all
that could be given. Captain Rice, of the Fusiliers, was carried
wounded down the hill on the back of one giant, and he has narrated
how the man refused the gold piece which was offered him. Some
asked the soldiers for their embroidered waist-belts as souvenirs
of the day. They will for generations remain as the most precious
ornaments of some colonial farmhouse. Then the victors gathered
together and sang psalms, not jubilant but sad and quavering. The
prisoners, in a downcast column, weary, spent, and unkempt, filed
off to the Boer laager at Waschbank, there to take train for
Pretoria. And at Ladysmith a bugler of Fusiliers, his arm bound,
the marks of battle on his dress and person, burst in upon the camp
with the news that two veteran regiments had covered the flank of
White's retreating army, but at the cost of their own annihilation.
