Great Britain -- Defenses; Imaginary wars and battles
The British officers recognised the new-comers as a squadron of Bengal
Lancers! At last India had sent us help, and our men sent up a loud
cheer. A large force of cavalry and infantry, together with two
regiments of Goorkas, had, it appeared, been landed at Sheerness. They
had contemplated landing in Hampshire, but, more unfortunate than some
of their compatriots who had effected a landing near Southampton, they
were driven through the Straits of Dover by the enemy's cruisers.
Marching north in company with a force from Chatham, they had earlier
that morning attacked and routed the enemy's right flank at Blackheath,
and, after capturing the battery of the foe at Greenwich, greater part
of the escort of which had been sent over to Lewisham an hour before,
they slaughtered a battalion of Zouaves, and had then extended across to
Denmark Hill, where a sanguinary struggle occurred.
The French on Dog Kennel, Red Post, Herne, and Tulse Hills turned their
deadly machine guns upon them, and for a long time all the positions
held out. At length, however, by reason of a splendid charge made by the
Bengal Lancers, the battery at Red Post Hill was taken and the enemy
slaughtered. During the next half-hour a fierce hand-to-hand struggle
took place up Dog Kennel Hill from St. Saviour's Infirmary, and
presently, when the defenders gained the spur of the hill, they fought
the enemy gallantly in Grove Lane, Private Road, Bromar Road, Camberwell
Grove, and adjoining roads. Time after time the Indian cavalry charged,
and the Goorkas, with their keen knives, hacked their way into those of
the enemy who rallied. For nearly an hour the struggle continued
desperately, showers of bullets from magazine rifles sweeping along the
usually quiet suburban thoroughfares, until the roads were heaped with
dead and dying, and the houses on either side bore evidence of the
bloody fray. Then at last the guns placed along the hills all fell into
our hands, and the French were almost completely swept out of existence.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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