Ladysmith: The Diary of a SiegeNevinson, Henry Woodd
History
Ladysmith: The Diary of a Siege
Nevinson, Henry Woodd
Ladysmith (South Africa) -- History -- Siege, 1899-1900
One big man in black I watched for what seemed a very long time. He was
standing right against the sky line, sometimes waving his arm,
apparently to give directions. Shells burst over his head, and bullets
must have been thick round him. Once or twice he fell, as though
slipping on the rocks, for the rain had begun again. But he always
reappeared, till at last shrapnel exploded right in his face, and he
sank together like a dropped rag. Just after that the Manchesters and
Gordons began to force their way along the top of the ridge on the
Boers' left. They had the dismounted Imperial Light Horse with them, and
it was there that the loss was most terrible. Sometimes the advance
hardly seemed to move, sometimes it rushed forward, and then appeared to
swing back again. It was six o'clock, rain was falling in torrents, and
it was getting dark. Perhaps the Gordons suffered most. Fourteen
officers were killed and wounded there, and next day the killed men lay
thick among the rocks. The Boer prisoners say the Gordon kilts made them
easy marks. But the Light Horse lost, too--lost their Colonel, Scott
Chisholme, who had been so eager for their success. Still the Boers kept
up their terrible fire, and the attack crept forward, rock by rock. At
the same time the Devons were called on to advance, and, getting up from
the ant-hills without a moment's pause, they strode forward to the foot
of the hill, keeping up an incessant fire as they went. Then we heard
the bugler sounding the charge high up on our right, and we could just
see the flank attack rushing forward and cheering. The Boers were
galloping away or running from the top. The Devons also sounded the
charge and rushed up the front of the position, but from that isolated
hill on our left they met so obstinate a fire that the order for
magazine firing was given, and for a few minutes the rifles rattled
without a second's pause, in a long roar of fire. Then, with a wild
cheer, the Devons cleared the position. It is due to them to say that
they were first at the guns. Meantime, the "Cease Fire!" had sounded
several times on the summit, but the firing did not cease. I don't know
why it was. Perhaps the Boers were still resisting in parts. Certainly
many of our men were drunk with excitement. "Wipe out Majuba!" was a
constant cry. But the Boers had gone.
The remnants of them were struggling to get away in the twilight over a
bit of rocky plain on our left. There the Dragoon Guards got them, and
three times went through. A Dragoon Guards corporal who was there tells
me the Boers fell off their horses and rolled among the rocks, hiding
their heads in their arms and calling for mercy--calling to be shot,
anything to escape the stab of those terrible lances. But not many
escaped. "We just gave them a good dig as they lay," were the corporal's
words. Next day most of the lances were bloody.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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