PRECAUTIONS TAKEN AND ARRANGEMENTS MADE
Hospital and Ambulance Work.—A field hospital was established at Wright’s farm and all the available ambulance and stretcher bearers were assembled at the foot of Spion Kop ready for action. Mr. Winston Spencer Churchill says that in ascending Spion Kop on the afternoon of 24th January he passed through the ambulance village. Every available stretcher belonging to every brigade was in use on Spion Kop.
It may be here observed that the casualties of Spion Kop itself were not so great as at Colenso, although, if the whole week’s fighting is considered, they were greater.
Food.—The troops went up Spion Kop with one day’s rations in hand, and during the day the regimental wagons were collected at the foot, within 600 feet of the summit. So that the troops on Spion Kop were quite as near their food as they had been at Three Tree Hill.
Ammunition.—Mr. Winston S. Churchill relates how he found a man dragging down a box of ammunition all by himself. There was plenty of ammunition on the summit at sunset, and it was unfortunate that Lieut.-Colonel Thorneycroft did not ascertain this.
Sir Charles Warren, in his despatch of 1st February 1900 (Blue Book, p. 76), states that the Dorset Regiment carried down a large quantity of ammunition in the dark, which otherwise would have fallen into the hands of the enemy.
Water Supply.—Majors H. N. Sargent and E. J. Williams were in charge of the water supply, and their reports of 28th January have been published. The former says:
‘All the available pack mules which could be procured, viz. 25, were utilised in carrying biscuit tins filled with water up the hill, the tins being refilled from water carts placed at the foot of Spion Kop. Each tin contained 8½ to 9 gallons of water. An officer was placed in charge of the water carts, and had a plentiful supply of spare tins, in addition to those carried by the mules. The mules were divided into two sections, each under an officer. These two sections of mules conveyed to the troops up the hill at each trip 425 gallons of water.
‘The water supply was kept going continuously during the day and late at night, with the exception of one break, caused by an order being given for one section of mules to bring up ammunition. In addition to the water conveyed on mules, there was a spring at the top of the hill under Royal Engineers’ charge, which yielded a fair supply. I superintended generally the water supply myself, and made frequent inquiries as to whether the troops were getting sufficient quantity on top of the hill, and was told they were.’
Major Williams states that he took twelve mules with water to the trees near the top of the hill, arriving there about noon, and established a water depôt there; that the mules made a second trip, and were then taken for ammunition; that the Royal Engineers successfully dug for water at a place three quarters of the way up the hill, that it was thick but fairly plentiful; that from 3 P.M. to 8 P.M. he impressed more mules and continued to hurry up water to the water depôt, while men were also sent up with filled water bottles for distribution to the fighting line. At 8 P.M. it was too dark for the mules to work, and although several fell over the cliff in getting up, there were at that time several full boxes of water at different spots on the hill. He also says that supplies of all kinds were plentiful at the foot of the hill.
Colonel A. W. Morris, Assistant Adjutant-General, who accompanied Major-General Coke up Spion Kop, saw the water depôt supply by the trees—some twenty tins of water. He says in his report of 28th January:
‘Personally, I do not think the men were suffering very badly from want of water. I consider that under the circumstances nothing could have been better than the very difficult arrangements made for water supply: it was not plentiful, but sufficient for the purpose required.’
It seems clear from the above that there was a larger supply of water on Spion Kop than there was at any other hill action in Natal.
Guns.—Major-General Coke attempted to take up a machine gun, but unfortunately it overturned. The mountain guns, the only guns that Sir Redvers Buller could spare for the summit of Spion Kop, were, it is believed, at Frere; at any rate, they were not in any way in Sir Charles Warren’s command and did not arrive at the foot of Spion Kop until 7.30 P.M. and then the men required rest. Shortly before noon on the 24th Sir Redvers Buller offered to send over two naval guns from Potgieter’s Drift, an offer which Sir Charles Warren accepted. They arrived at Spion Kop long after dark.
At 4 P.M. Sir Charles Warren sent Captain Hanwell, R.A., up Spion Kop to arrange about placing these naval guns, and had Lieut.-Colonel Thorneycroft been properly exercising command he should have learnt all about the guns from this officer. Slides were made in the morning in the hillside in case the naval guns should arrive, and 3-inch cable was got ready for hauling them up. These guns could have been got up, but even if they had been placed on the slopes they would have knocked out the pom-poms.
An Artillery officer, Lieutenant Dooner, was also on Spion Kop all day telegraphing information to the Officer Commanding Royal Artillery as to the effect of his fire.
Two guns of the 19th Battery Royal Field Artillery were ordered up the hill to the lower slopes, and had just started when they were met by the retiring force and turned back. Lord Dundonald also had orders to take his machine gun up.
Engineer Operations.—These seem to have been very complete. Lieut.-Colonel Wood and his Staff Officer, Lieut.-Colonel Sim and his Staff Officer, and the 17th Company of Royal Engineers were engaged about Spion Kop all the time, and the 37th Company, sent from Potgieter’s, arrived at midnight of 24th January.
During the 24th the whole of the picks, shovels, and sandbags in possession of the force were carried up to the summit of Spion Kop, and were there ready to be made use of at sundown. Colonel Hill knew where they were deposited; Lieut.-Colonel Thorneycroft apparently did not.
The 17th Company R.E. made the mule path and the gun slides, which were ready the one at noon, the others in the afternoon. This company and others were employed in developing the springs on the sides of Spion Kop, and also made a dam. In the afternoon a message was sent to the half of the 17th Company R.E. on the top of Spion Kop directing the officer in command to be ready to make entrenchments there at nightfall, and Colonel Sim was ordered to go up with a working party of the Somersetshire Regiment.
It is not too much, then, to say that so far as Sir Charles Warren was concerned everything was ready, and action would have been taken during the night in regard to all the points mentioned by Sir Redvers Buller had not the retirement prevented it.
Sir Redvers Buller was therefore mistaken when he wrote, ‘No arrangements were made.’ Arrangements were made, as stated in Sir Charles Warren’s despatch and corroborated from so many sources. It was known on the top of Spion Kop that the guns were to go up, but quite possibly Lieut.-Colonel Thorneycroft did not know it, as he did not place himself in a position to know anything but what was going on in the firing line, and at sundown, when everything should have been done and could have been done, he ordered the withdrawal.
And yet this is the one act which Sir Redvers Buller singles out for special commendation. Colonel Thorneycroft, he says, ‘saved the situation’ and ‘exercised a wise discretion.’
Now, no one will withhold from this officer the praise due to his gallantry, but his determination to retire from Spion Kop, in spite of the ‘No surrender’ order sent to Colonel Crofton, in spite of the protests of Colonel Hill, in spite of the remonstrances of other officers, and in spite of the explicit orders of Sir Charles Warren conveyed to him on the way down by Colonel Sim, was not so much an error of judgment as an assumption of responsibility which, had it been a determination to advance in spite of orders, might perhaps have been justified by success, but as a determination to retire was perfectly unjustifiable and led to the abrupt termination of an enterprise which had been boldly commenced by the seizure of the key of the position, and which, in the opinion of Lord Roberts, ought to have succeeded.
If, then, the chief blame for this failure must lie upon the officer who ordered and carried out the retirement from Spion Kop, the officer in chief command, who assumed so detached a position in his orders and despatches, and yet so constantly interfered when he should have given his second-in-command a free hand, seems to be rightly dealt with in the observations of Lord Roberts.
Had he furnished Sir Charles Warren with naval guns, with mountain guns, and with a balloon in time to be of use, and not on urgent request at the last moment; had he allowed Sir Charles Warren time to continue his bombardment and supplied him with longer-ranging guns, instead of urging him to attack on the threat of withdrawing the force; had he even, after the decision to attack Spion Kop, at once sent over the naval 12-prs. and another company of Royal Engineers to help to get them up at sundown, the story might have been different. But he did none of these things. He only appointed an inexperienced young officer to take command at the top of Spion Kop over all his seniors, and thinks that officer saved the situation by the wise discretion he exercised in abandoning the position he was chosen to defend.
If the memorandum ‘not necessarily for publication’ recently published does not, to our mind, add much to the blame Sir Redvers Buller had already thrown upon Sir Charles Warren, it certainly puts more definitely the opinion the senior had formed of his junior, and, in this light, should not have been concealed from the latter for two years; but, on the other hand, the memorandum tends to lessen our already waning confidence in Sir Redvers Buller.
The same sort of inconsistencies run through it that we have noticed in the despatches. Thus he says: ‘On the 19th he (Sir Charles Warren) attacked and gained a considerable advantage. On the 20th, instead of pursuing it, he divided his force and gave Clery a separate command.’ But there is no sort of agreement between this statement and the telegram he sent at 9.15 P.M. on the 20th, wherein he relates how Clery by judicious use of his artillery had fought his way up, capturing ridge after ridge for about three miles, and the troops were bivouacking on the ground he had gained.
So in the next sentence of the memorandum: ‘On the 21st I find that his (Warren’s) right was in advance of his left, and that the whole of his batteries, six, were crowded on one small position on his right, while his left was unprotected by artillery, and I had come out to tell him that the enemy on that flank had received a reinforcement of at least 2,500. I suggested a better distribution of his batteries, which he agreed to to some extent, but he would not advance his left.’ How is it possible to reconcile this statement with his telegram of 21st January, in which he said: ‘Warren has been engaged all day, chiefly on his left, which he has swung round about a couple of miles. The ground is very difficult, and, as the fighting is all the time up-hill, it is difficult exactly to say how much we gain, but I think we are making substantial progress’?
Finally his memorandum says: ‘On the 19th I ought to have assumed command myself; I saw that things were not going well—indeed, every one saw that. I blame myself now for not having done so.’ It was on the 19th that Warren made his flank march to Venter’s Laager, that he occupied the lower slopes of the Rangeworthy Hills, and that he reported the result of his reconnaissances. What was not going well? He had not been attacked, happily, in his flank march, he had decided that the road by Fair View to Groote Hoek must be the route—and, as we understand, Sir Redvers Buller says there can be no question that was the only route—and he had captured positions on the hills. Only a few paragraphs before in this same memorandum Sir Redvers Buller says that on the 19th Sir Charles Warren attacked and gained a considerable advantage. Is a considerable advantage indicative of things not going well? Instances of these apparent contradictions and inconsistencies in the actions, telegrams, and despatches of Sir Redvers Buller could be multiplied. What does it all mean? Why this sudden change of bearing towards his principal General? We cannot say; but there is the painful fact that after the abandonment of Spion Kop by the commander nominated by Sir Redvers Buller this change of attitude is evident on comparing the telegrams with the despatches.
In conclusion, whatever faults Sir Charles Warren may have exhibited, we can only say that the accusations made against him, and of which for months he was kept in ignorance, do not stand the investigation we have given them.
It has been stated in Parliament that in August 1900 Sir Charles Warren, on his return home, wrote his own answer to the accusations, of which he was then aware from the published despatches. Since then the Government has been worried by Sir Redvers Buller into publishing further accusations against Sir Charles Warren, who tells us, in his recent letter to the newspapers, that he has asked the Government in common justice to give his refutation the same publicity. At present the Government has decided not to publish it, in order that the personal controversy involved between two distinguished Generals may not be prolonged. But is this quite fair to Sir Charles Warren? Having made public all that is to be said against him, might he not be allowed to show that he can justify himself?