1852.

Party attached to the Commissioners for the Great Exhibition—Mount Alexander—Corporal John McLaren—Spike Island—Brown Down—Hurst Castle—Holmfirth Reservoir—Alderney—Cambridge Asylum—Tidal observations, river Dee—Van Diemen’s Land—Channel Islands—Kaffir war—Passage of the Kei—Patrols—Party benighted in the bush—Action at the Konap pass—Patrol—Fort White—Patrols—Expedition against Moshesh—Orange River—Passage of the Caledon—The Lieuw—Battle of Berea—Return of the expedition; crossing the drift at the Lieuw—Repassage of the Caledon—Perils of the “sick-waggon” in crossing—Thanks of General Cathcart—Conduct of the sappers during the campaign.

The detachment in London under Captain Owen was throughout the year, attached to the Commissioners for the Exhibition of 1851. Four of the party were generally in the office performing the duty of clerks and draughtsmen. Among the services executed by them was the organization and classification, for historic and scientific purposes, of the voluminous correspondence, documents, and tabulated forms and returns of the department, previous to their deposit in the royal archives. To this was added the duty of preparing the various certificates with the signature of Prince Albert, and forwarding them, with the exhibitors’ and jurors’ medals, and juries’ reports, to the different local and foreign committees throughout the world. To corporal Gardner was intrusted the office of stamping the Prince’s signature. Before he commenced the task he made some experiments to ascertain the best mode of transferring the royal name from the block to the paper. His object was to make the impression a perfect resemblance of the original, to accomplish which the use of common ink was a desideratum. Observation and ingenuity soon led him to adopt an expedient that proved to be very successful. About 20,000 of these certificates he prepared, and many of the transfers were such faithful fac-similes of the original, that the minutest examination of their details failed to discover the slightest deviation from the character of the royal autograph. For two or three months when the men were not employed on more pressing services, they were advantageously occupied in collecting and arranging specimens received from the exhibitors, now composing the trade collection at Kensington palace. They also examined and took charge of the Exhibition photographs, executed in Paris, 18,000 in number, after their return by Messrs. De la Rue and Co. who mounted them. In the evening after the day’s labour had ended, five of the party attended for four months the Government school of design at Somerset House, and received instruction in free-hand drawing. The privilege thus conceded was not only unprecedented but greatly enhanced by an instant departure from the rule of the institution, which required candidates to avail themselves of its benefits in their turn. By the end of the year the sappers with Captain Owen were reduced to four non-commissioned officers.

In January and February two non-commissioned officers with six civilians as labourers, under Mr. John McLaren,[[101]] the deputy surveyor-general of South Australia, were employed in establishing an overland route from Adelaide to Mount Alexander. They laid out a line of road between these points through the wilderness, removed all striking obstructions, and formed at every practicable locality convenient wells of water for the use of travellers. The object of laying down this line of communication was principally to assist the transit of the “gold diggers” of the Mount and the contiguous country into Adelaide.

Twelve rank and file were sent from Woolwich in April to Spike Island, to superintend the convict mechanical skill and labour placed at the disposal of the Ordnance, in carrying on the defences of the island and other posts in Cork harbour. This measure was strongly urged by Colonel Oldfield, the commanding royal engineer in Ireland, on the score both of utility and economy; and the services of the party in directing the convicts in the quarries, the excavations, and at their trades, were followed by results, indisputably advantageous to the public.

The seventh company, employed first at Portsmouth and then at Gosport, in conjunction with the second company, in constructing the batteries at Brown Down, was removed in June from Fort Monckton to Hurst Castle, to repair its defences and construct new batteries. The men, not quartered in the castle, were provided with accommodation in a detached shed, which was converted into a barrack for the purpose.

Early in the year, under orders from the Home Government, four men of the corps under lance-corporal James S. Taylor, made surveys and plans of the Holmfirth reservoir and the country in its neighbourhood, to assist Captain R. C. Moody, R.E., in his inquiries to ascertain the cause of the bursting of its embankment and the consequent destruction of life and property. On the completion of the work the men were commended for the active and able manner in which it had been executed, and received a liberal allowance for their services.

A new station was opened for the corps this year at Alderney, one of the Channel Islands, whither the eleventh company, under the command of Captain W. F. D. Jervois, R.E., repaired from Woolwich, and arrived at the island on the 30th June. Some four weeks after the men commenced the construction of the permanent works considered necessary in those precarious days, to enable the garrison to resist any attempt at invasion by the enemy. There being but little accommodation in the island for troops, unused as it had been to have soldiers quartered on it, the company was necessarily divided into two portions, and domiciled more than a mile apart, at Longy and Corblets. The “Nunnery” was constituted an hospital for the sick.

An appeal was made to the corps in June to subscribe towards the erection of an asylum for soldiers’ widows in memory of the late Duke of Cambridge. From most of the companies it was met by contributions, which in the aggregate amounted to 101l. 17s., and thus insured to the corps a permanent interest in the institution to the extent of nine votes at every election of a widow. The gift from the non-commissioned officers and men of the sappers was the most liberal that had been received from any regiment in the service.

Sergeant John Berry and one private, both surveyors, were employed under Captain Vetch, late R.E., from June to August, in conducting a series of tidal observations in the River Dee at Chester, for the harbour department of the Admiralty, and to carry out also the provisions of the “Dee Standard Restoration Act.” The observations were to extend over a period of twelve months, but the service was concluded in a fourth of the time. The duty was very carefully attended to, and the registrations were always accurately made by the sergeant and his assistant.

One sergeant and fourteen rank and file embarked for Van Diemen’s Land on the 19th July on board the ‘Lady Montagu,’ as a guard over convicts, in conjunction with a detachment of the line under the command of Captain J. S. Hawkins, R.E., and landed at Hobart Town on the 11th December. The Lieutenant-Governor of the colony applied for the assistance of the sappers to constitute, in the first instance, the nucleus of an efficient survey body, and to carry on, both in the city and the distant bush, the trigonometrical and detail survey of the settlement. The men, eleven of whom were married and had families, were selected from the survey companies, and were all competent for the duty both as surveyors and draughtsmen. A change in the designation of the settlement caused the party to be denominated the “Tasmanian Detachment.” Very early after its arrival, the legislative council of the colony showed much hostility to the employment of the sappers, and at last gained the point for which it had pertinaciously worked. After a service of nearly four years in the triangulation and survey of Tasmania, the detachment quitted Hobart Town on the 9th February, 1856, and landed at Sydney, for similar duty, on the 13th following.

A party of six men from Chatham was employed under Captain G. Bent, R.E., from 24th September to 13th December, in surveying and levelling the ground in the neighbourhood of St. Helier’s, Jersey, to the extent of about ten square miles; and afterwards the same party was removed to Alderney, where, under Lieutenant Martin and Captain Jervois, it completed for military purposes a special survey of the island, in May, 1853.

Hostilities at the Cape were this year continued in the same desultory and unsatisfactory manner as in the previous year. The attempts for a fair open fight were quite unsuccessful, and the patrols undertaken to drive the enemy into action were equally as harassing and arduous as in any former war. In these operations the sappers participated to the extent of their numerical means, not without, in one particular instance, suffering greatly both in loss of life and property. The following detail embraces the active services of the corps on the Cape frontier this year.

A party of two sergeants and sixty-five rank and file, under Captain H. C. B. Moody, R.E., returned to King William’s Town on the 1st January, 1852, after three days’ march in escorting supplies to Forts White and Cox.

One sergeant and thirty rank and file accompanied a patrol of nearly 500 troops from King William’s Town, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Skipwith, 43rd regiment, on the 3rd January. Captain Moody with Lieutenant Fowler, R.E., commanded the sappers. The American pontoon was carried with the party. The division crossed the Kei on foot, at a drift, on the 7th and 8th. On the 14th Colonel Eyre’s division appeared in sight, but as the Kei had then risen considerably, the pontoon was used with effect to cross the stream. About one mile and a half above the drift, at a point where the water was smooth though the current was strong, the raft was employed. The river was about 100 yards wide, with a muddy bottom; the bank was easily accessible by infantry, but not by cavalry or artillery. To form the communication a strong hawser was passed over to the opposite bank, and the pontoon, attached to it by two short lines with running loops, was passed from shore to shore, carrying forty men at each trip. On the first day, seven companies of the 73rd and 60th regiments were in this manner ferried across, as also about 100 Fingoe women and children. During the day the tide again rapidly fell, and the waggons, &c., crossed the stream at the main drift. Captain Moody, in reporting upon the conduct of his detachment, said, “Nothing could exceed the energy and willingness with which they all worked.”

From the 31st January to 2nd February one sergeant and forty rank and file, under Lieutenant Fowler, R.E., accompanied the patrol under the command of Captain Campbell, Cape mounted rifles, and, supplied with sickles, assisted in devastating the crops of the enemy in the neighbourhood of Perie and cutting off their supplies. On the Mangoka river a like razzia was effected, and after a night’s bivouac on the Gwokkobi, several huts were burnt and fifty acres of corn cut down. Further destruction was carried on up the Gwokkobi and Umnaza rivers to the Perie station, to the extent of eighty acres. After a slight skirmish with about 200 Kaffirs in the Perie bush, the patrol returned to King William’s Town, laying waste in its route the gardens in the vicinity of Fort Beresford and down the Umtabini to the point of its junction with the Buffalo river, comprising another area of about eighty acres of thriving corn.

Captain Fenwick, R.E., with twenty rank and file, formed the European part of an escort of 100 strong, which conveyed supplies in five bullock waggons, in addition to seventy head of cattle, to Major Kyle’s column in the Tomacha—a distance of seventeen miles from King William’s Town, to which place the detachment returned on the 5th February after two days’ patrolling.

From 27th January to 28th February ten rank and file, under second-corporal William Roberts, were attached to Lieutenant-Colonel Eyre’s column, and during the operations on the march to the Keiskama, and beyond it, were employed in making drifts practicable for waggons, throwing temporary bridges for the passage of the troops, and assisting in the destruction of the enemy’s crops.

A similar party during the same period, under corporal George Grubb, accompanied Major Kyle’s division to Seyolo’s country; and, in addition to the ordinary duties of the camp, assisted in devastating the crops of the Kaffirs, and improved the drifts for the passage of the waggons and the fording of the troops. This detachment also formed part of the waggon escort which conveyed provisions to the column from Fort White.

On the 22nd and 23rd February one sergeant and sixty rank and file were on patrol to Fort White, with supplies for the columns of Colonel Mitchell and Major Kyle. Ten waggons were in charge of the party, five of which were delivered to an escort from Major Kyle’s patrol, and the remainder were unloaded at the Fort. The party then returned to King William’s Town, capturing on the road two Kaffirs and six horses.

From 5th to 27th March nine rank and file under Captain Robertson, were present in the operations of the force under his Excellency the Commander-in-Chief, in driving the enemy from the Waterkloof and adjacent fastnesses, and finally from the Amatola mountains. The sappers, commanded by Captain Fenwick, R.E., were most useful in rendering the drifts injured by heavy rains practicable for the passage of waggons. On this service four men of each regiment accompanied the head-quarters as the Commander-in-Chiefs escort. The party of sappers also shared in the honour, by being permitted to add five men to his Excellency’s body guard. One corporal was also attached to the division under Colonel Eyre, and was present in all its operations from 5th March to 27th April. To this patrol were added seven rank and file on the 20th April, who assisted in the concluding services of the division.

Sixty sappers formed part of a patrol of 150 men, under the command of Captain Moody, R.E., sent out on the 27th March to co-operate with Colonel Eyre’s division, and also to intercept fugitives, cattle, &c., flying from him in the direction of the Isili range. That day Captain Moody formed a junction with Colonel Eyre’s force under Murray’s Kraantz, and in working up by Kaffir tracks to the high ground burnt several of the enemy’s huts. The service required that the party should descend again: this was done in a different direction over shelving rocks and through dense underwood. It then crossed one of the sources of the Buffalo, scoured the country in its vicinage, and returned again through the bush under the Buffalo range towards Colonel Eyre’s camp. The paths were most intricate and rocky, and the detachment consequently marched in Indian file. While in the heart of the bush night came on. The darkness was so intense that the men were obliged to trail on by feeling and calling to each other. It was with the greatest difficulty that the path was kept, but at last it was lost altogether, and halting near a stream the men lay down on the wet ground, without fires, and passed the night in a comfortless bivouac. At grey light next morning the patrol was in motion, and the sappers emerged from the bush after about four hours’ exertion. One man missed his way in the jungle, and spent eighteen hours in endeavouring to gain the detachment. He had nearly exhausted his energies in extricating himself from the steep and broken rocks that lay in his track, when luckily he was rescued by some of his comrades who were sent in quest of him. After renewed efforts to clear the bush of prowling Kaffirs, and driving them and their cattle in the direction of Colonel Eyre’s division, the detachment on the 29th March returned to King William’s Town, laying waste on the route three Kaffir gardens. “As usual,” wrote Captain Moody, “the sappers behaved in an excellent manner.” Their conduct also met with the approval of Colonel Eyre.

With a patrol of about 240 troops, commanded by Captain Robertson, R.E., was sent a party of one sergeant and forty rank and file, under Lieutenant Siborne, R.E. The patrol left King William’s Town on the 30th March. The sappers, broken up into small sections, aided in scouring the Isili Berg. On the 1st April the patrol quitted the bivouac at the source of the Yellow Wood river, destroyed a few huts and several fields of corn, and reached head-quarters on the 2nd April.

A patrol of 300 men, under Captain Moody, R.E., conveyed supplies of cattle and provisions to Fort Cox for the divisions working in the Amatolas, and returned with the empty waggons without opposition from the enemy. The escort was out three days, from 5th to 7th April, and 100 sergeants and rank and file of the corps, under Lieutenant Siborne, R.E., formed a part of the force.

Sergeant John Mealey and ten rank and file accompanied, on the 7th April, a small escort under Lieutenant Broke, 60th rifles, with provisions in waggons to the Green river for Colonel Percival’s division, and returned the next day to King William’s Town.

Soon after this, a detachment of thirty-one men, under Lieutenant Siborne, R.E., built a defensible tower in the Keiskama Hoek, for the purpose of making a demonstration of a fixed purpose permanently to eject the Gaika tribe from that territory and to occupy the Amatolas.

The head-quarters of the ninth company was removed from King William’s Town on the 28th May by Graham’s Town and Fort Brown to Beaufort, at which fort it arrived on the 19th June. Previously to its arrival it was overtaken in the Konap pass on the 13th June by a body of 200 rebel Hottentots, under Ian Cornelis and Damon Kuhn, and at noon was suddenly brought into action. The small force under Captain H. C. B. Moody, R.E., consisted of two sergeants, thirty-one rank and file, and one bugler, in charge of five waggons containing baggage, arms, engineer stores, and 30,000 rounds of musket-ball ammunition, with four women and ten children. The Pass—a long and dangerous one—has a serpentine direction, accommodating itself to the tortuous ravine through which it ascends. On the left, the whole way is a rocky precipice some forty feet high, scarped either by manual labour to form a road or by descending torrents in bygone ages, the summit of which is covered with bush. On the right rises a steep hill, inaccessible, and thickly wooded to the brim; a better position adapted to a lurking foe could not well be imagined, affording the means of enfilade fire at every turn of the road.[[102]] Acquainted by spies with the movements of the convoy, the rebel Hottentots had before its approach concealed themselves in an impenetrable ambuscade, and as the sappers ascended the hill, the advanced guard was met with a volley which killed three of the mules in the leading waggon and stopped the progress of the train, the road being too narrow to turn it. So sudden and fierce a beginning did not appal the detachment, for instantly, without disorder, they joined issue with the enemy though far superior in force and almost unassailable in position. Some of the party soon tried to push into the bush above them, but the rebels already occupied it close to the edge of the road; and as the thicket was too dense to work in, the men were compelled to retire. At this moment one of the leading drivers showed unmistakeable symptoms of treachery and fraternization with the rebels, and he was instantly shot down by a sapper.[[103]] In a few seconds the firing was general for more than 150 yards on both sides of the Pass, but the detachment, careful of its ammunition, only fired when the enemy could be seen and picked off. At length the advance men fell back and took cover under the bank, and between it and the leading waggon, where they received a reinforcement of a few men from the rear. Each waggon was now defended with great determination and intrepidity, and each man fought his way through fearful straits. The firing was chiefly within five yards and less of their antagonists. Sometimes in venturing from their shelter to fire upon the rebels in the kloof, they were opposed by a deadly fire from behind, which always lessened the number that returned. At the head of the road a force of the enemy occupied a position which enfiladed the detachment, but the rebels there were held in check by the steady firing of a few men who kept a vigilant look out for them. Without diminishing his fire in the parts he already occupied, the enemy rapidly increased the extent of his flanks and was trying to surround the little band, but to prevent this, and as the men had been driven to the last stand and were fast falling, Captain Moody gave the reluctant order for the women and children to leave the waggons, and all to commence a retreat. Not a move was made to the rear until the order was given; and, with as many of the wounded as could assist themselves, and the women and children—the retreat towards the old Konap post was conducted with steadiness and without precipitation under a spirited fire from the rebels. On clearing the gorge, a section of the men was extended into the bush to keep the advancing enemy in check, and under its cover the detachment gained an abandoned inn, which was soon converted into a post of defence by barricades and loopholes. Here a final stand was to be made, but the Hottentots, although they were aware of the weakness of the party, dared not renew the attack. The action lasted an hour; three-fourths of the time being spent in defending the waggons, which were riddled with balls. The casualties were——

Killed7—Lance-corporal John Hitchings; bugler David Brotherston; privates John Crilly, John Gillies, James Marr, Edward Phillips, and William Sanderson.
Also the wife of private Thomas Hayward, and three or four of the drivers, including young Webb, a lad of eighteen years of age, who was shot dead while receiving some caps from a sapper.[[104]]
Died of wounds2—Privates William Forgie and John Arthur.
Wounded severely6—Corporal Edward Wilmore; second-corporal William Marshall, and privates Henry Scott, John Cloggie, Philip Gould, and James Reynolds.
Wounded slightly1—Private Thomas Seaman.
Total16

The enemy, though ensconced in the thicket, had many killed.[[105]] All the spare arms, Minié rifles, ammunition, oxen, baggage, and equipments were captured by the rebels, but the waggons, engineer stores, and some minor articles were recovered.[[106]] The Minié rifles luckily had been “rendered useless by the precaution of removing the nipples.”[[107]]

Captain Moody’s conduct throughout commanded the confidence of his men. Of their coolness and courage he reported in the highest terms. Colour-sergeant Alexander Spalding who commanded the rear-guard, and sergeant William King, who had charge of the advance, were favourably noticed in the Captain’s despatch. Sergeant John Davis of the 12th regiment, was also highly spoken of, as well for his coolness and courage, as for his offer to proceed with four volunteer sappers to Fort Brown for assistance. While Captain Moody was assisting the men in their charges, one of the rebels took a steady aim at him by resting his gun on the branch of a tree, but his piece snapped, and before he could re-cap he was shot down by private John Murphy.[[108]] Three times sergeant King collected his men, and bravely headed them in their fruitless charges on the rebels.[[109]] Private Thomas Hayward volunteered to go to Fort Brown alone, in disguise, after dusk for assistance, but the firing having been heard at that fort, a detachment of the 12th regiment soon appeared, and rendered the hazardous enterprise of the private unnecessary. The arrival of the reinforcement, however, put the men again on their mettle, and Captain Moody and his sappers returned with the party to the scene of the disaster. On both sides of the road they scoured the jungle, but the rebels had decamped with as much booty as they could carry off.[[110]] “The little band of sappers,” wrote a London journal, “were noble fellows, who often before, under another of their officers, had fought bravely in a fairer field.”[[111]] In the Government notice of the Commander-in-Chief, dated June 16th, 1852, the conduct of the men “in defending the waggons to the last,” and their “steady and good order in retreat after inflicting a severe loss on the enemy,” were much lauded. The notice then added, that “the greatest credit is due to Captain Moody and his small party of sappers for their soldier-like and gallant bearing on the occasion.” Even the rebel Hottentots themselves in speaking of the massacre said, that “the sappers fought like men.”[[112]]

The remnant of the party, taking with it the killed and wounded, and the women and children, reached Fort Brown at dusk on the 14th June. There the brave men who lost their lives were interred. A subscription was forthwith made among the officers, non-commissioned officers, and men of the royal artillery and 12th regiment to meet the urgent wants of the party, and the necessities of the motherless children of private Hayward. A further sum of 100l. was collected among the benevolent citizens of Graham’s Town for the same purpose, and the amount was distributed to the sufferers in proportion to their losses and wants.

A visit to the fatal spot a day or two after afforded unmistakeable evidence of the obstinate nature of the conflict. Dead horses, oxen and mules, shot in the fray, blocked up the road. Two of the Hottentots lay stanched in their blood, and wells of gore were scattered about the path in sickening frequency. Two waggons, speckled with shot-holes, had been overturned; and further on, in the line of retreat, were strewn quantities of torn uniform, broken muskets, blood-stained linen, and commissariat supplies.[[113]]

Captain Moody, having under him thirteen rank and file, was out on patrol with the force under General the Honourable George Cathcart, from the 6th to 15th July. The sappers kept with the guns. They carried with them a proportion of tools to improve the roads, and assisted in some of the operations for driving the enemy from the Kroome range and the Waterkloof.

On the 25th July sergeant John Mealey and nine men of the corps at Fort White were present with about 100 men of the 12th Lancers, 2nd Queens, and Cape Corps in repulsing an attack on the cattle guard. The Hottentots, about 200 in number, under Uithaalder were on the plain in front of the fort in good skirmishing order. After crossing a drift they stood for a time, and kept up a smart fire on the garrison. They then retreated with the loss of six men to Slambie Kop, to the foot of which they were pursued. The British casualties only counted two slightly wounded. The sappers turned out with great promptitude, not waiting to cover themselves with their jackets, and conducted themselves as good soldiers. Captain Robertson, R.E., was also present, and two of the sappers were near to him in the hottest of the fire. The rebels had a bugler among them who was proficient in his duty. The bugle on which he sounded had been captured by the Hottentots in the Konap Pass a month before from bugler Brotherston, who was killed in the action.

Again Captain Moody, in command of twenty-eight rank and file of the corps, was attached to the troops under his Excellency, which operated from the 29th July to the 29th August across the Kei, by Aland’s Post and Whittlesea. On the 6th August the party was increased by the arrival of nine men at Brome Neck, with the patrol from King William’s Town under Lieutenant-Colonel Mitchell. This party brought up the India-rubber pontoons, but the low state of the tides rendered their use unnecessary. The detachment more immediately with Captain Moody was employed on the journey in repairing the defective drifts, and establishing a defensible kraal on the Kei at the standing camp. The conduct of the sappers was well spoken of by the Captain, and his Excellency expressed his satisfaction with all that had been done by them.

A detachment of twenty-seven non-commissioned officers and men landed at the Cape from England on the 11th September, which increased the corps in the colony from 268 to 285 of all ranks.

Eight rank and file left Fort Beaufort, under Captain Moody, on the 11th September, and were attached to the division under his Excellency, to make a demonstration in the Waterkloof. At Nelle’s Farm, under the direction of Captain Jesse, R.E., they constructed an intrenched camp, assisted by the rifle brigade, and formed a similar one in the valley of the Waterkloof near Brown’s Farm. These services were rapidly and creditably executed.

Four rank and file were present in the field services of the column under Colonel Eyre, from 30th September to 30th October. Four also served in the various operations with Major-General York’s division from the 12th to 28th October.

To the expedition against Moshesh commanded by his Excellency Lieutenant-General the Honourable George Cathcart, were attached, on the 7th November, serjeant Joseph Ireland and 13 privates of the corps under Lieutenant Siborne of the engineers. In the column of route, the sappers marched in front of the leading waggon, which carried the intrenching tools; and on several occasions preceded the force, clearing away impediments in the drifts to prevent delay in the progress of the troops. Lieutenant Siborne, aided by Lieutenant Smith of the Kat river levy, directed the sappers in these hurried interstitial labours.

Streams and rivers abounding in the country, the India-rubber floats were necessarily resorted to, to push on the army. The first water of any magnitude on the line of march, was the Orange River, which, having sunk to an accessible depth, the troops breasted it; but to free them from hazard in crossing, their arms, appointments, knapsacks, and personal war equipment were ferried over on the raft by the party of sappers.

Traversing an open country for about 34 miles the army reached the Caledon, which offered the first serious obstruction to the march. The troops luckily had passed on foot, but by the time the waggons arrived the river had risen fifteen feet. Now the current was fierce, surging, and full of eddies; and the trunks of old trees, which, for years, perhaps, had floated with the changing tide, up and down the stream, materially interfered with the operations of the pontoon; but it nevertheless was made to do its work, and the waggons with the supplies were rapidly passed to the opposite bank.[[114]] Captain Tylden and Lieutenants Stanton and Siborne—the last in charge of the raft—were thanked for their “aid and exertions” in effecting the passage.

A journey of more than seventy miles brought the expedition to the Lieuw—a narrow fordable water, with a dashing tide confined within steep banks. Before however the waggons could cross, both shores had to be cut away to a convenient level by the whole force of sappers assisted by a fatigue party. Still, so difficult was the passage, that five hours were spent in taking over about one-half the train; and then only by the sturdy exertions of a double team of oxen whipped into extra activity by rows of persevering men occupying positions in the river up to their waists in water.[[115]]

Continuing the march, the Caledon River—which swept round from the level in which it was first encountered—was a second time approached, but as the stream was fordable, the operation of crossing was unattended by the exercise of more than ordinary energy. The troops then moved on to the Berea mountain and fought a battle with the well-equipped horsemen of Moshesh, in which the British casualties were severe. Corporal Edward A. Henderson was the only sapper present in the action, he being at the time with the rocket section of artillery, attached to Dr. Fasson, the Ordnance surgeon, in the capacity of medical orderly. The pontoneers were left in camp at the Caledon with the raft.

Having made the chief aware of the political consequences of his defeat, and obtained his subscription to a treaty, the victorious troops retraced their steps to the colony. The Caledon was easily passed, and after a march of about fifty miles, the Lieuw was gained. Recollecting the difficulty of the previous operation, Colonel Eyre ordered that some efforts should be employed to discover a really practicable drift. A few of the waggons crossed at the old ford, but in the mean time sergeant Ireland—a man who had received praise for his boat services and usefulness in the demolition of the wreck of the ‘Royal George’—discovered a diagonal drift so convenient, as to render the passage one of maximum facility. The bottom was rocky the whole distance, with a shallow flow trippling over the stones; while the general stream escaped through fissures and cavities in the rock, and merged into the river at the other side of the bar. The trickling, however, at the drift, caused it to be very slippery, but to make the footing sure, the defect was remedied by scattering along its surface a quantity of sand, which brought the new ford into favour, and the old one was abandoned.

Crossing the Caledon, a second time, without difficulty, the march was sustained to the Orange River. Its passage, however, was a tedious and protracted operation. The rains had increased the height of the stream, and expanded it to 225 yards. The current was resistless and the weather squally. A heavy flat-bottomed punt and the India-rubber cylinders were the only means within reach to achieve the movement. Such an organization, to throw over an army of some strength with guns and troops of horses, attended by a cumbersome train of waggons of unusual magnitude for number was ridiculously small. Five sappers with Lieutenant Siborne manned the raft, and a like number of the troops oared the punt, each working its course, from bank to bank, on a separate hawser stretched across the stream. Thirty-five men, armed and fully accoutred, were taken over at each trip and landed every ten minutes. Indeed the passage across only occupied a third of the time, owing to a skilful use of sheaves—instead of thimbles and eyes—running on the warps, to which short lines were attached issuing from the raft. The latter again was placed obliquely to the warp, by which one of the angles or shoulders of the float was pressed forward to the hawser. All this is probably too technical to be generally understood. The current just suited the arrangement, and lashing against the cylinders—which were broadside to it—drove the raft onward at a rapid rate. Not needing to help in its propulsion, the men, looking to their equilibrium, simply balanced themselves on the deck. Until sergeant Ireland hit upon this expedient, the iron thimbles worked but idly on the rough hawsers, and the raft was necessarily hauled across by the manual dexterity of the pontoneers. Horses, mules, oxen, howitzers, guns, and all sorts of military equipment were passed over on the pontoons; whilst the punt, which could only bear one waggon at a time, and one or two struggling horses, was in constant requisition to take over the baggage and material of the army. Fortunately the evenings were moonlight, which graced the operation with a charm that influenced the ardour and exertions of the men. Under this sombre aspect, the rush of the stream, the splash of the wave, the dip of the paddles, and the gliding of the raft, gave the exploit a feature as romantic as martial. On two or three occasions the hawsers stretched to their utmost tension, by the increasing height of the river, snapt at their weakest points. To renew them was a labour of some eight hours’ toil; and then, such was the strength of the flow, they could not be safely used. The pontoons too, being light and inflated, danced like corks on the troubled water, and were nearly torn at times from under their superstructure. Still, the men accustomed to such perils were only the more daring and energetic, and the passage was prosecuted without accident. Under the altered circumstances of wind and current, the punt would have lain idle for the want of a tow-line by which to work its way from side to side, but Lieutenant Siborne, enlarging his sphere of action, had the boat pulled down on either bank to a good offing and made to do its share of hard duty. It was however a wearying and exhausting process, for each trip was not performed under three-quarters of an hour.

The conveyance of the “sick waggon” claimed especial care, but untoward mishaps made its short career eventful. When about half way across, one of its sweeps or long oars broke, and the boat with its living freight was at the mercy of the impetuous torrent. Drifting with the current it at length plunged among some willow trees below the landing-place, where a rope, passed from tree to tree, being quickly fastened to the punt, a party on shore hauled it to an opening in the bank. The hawser, however, unable to bear the strain, gave way, and the boat whirled off furiously towards a rapid in the middle of the stream. Recovered again, it was pulled up to the trees with so much force, that the overhanging branches became entangled with the waggon and nearly capsized it into the river. In this dilemma, some four or five sappers, under the direction of Lieutenant Stanton, nimbly vaulted into the willows, and with axes, promptly cut down the impeding branches, whilst others of the pontoneers, “swimming about in the boiling flood,” assisted to clear them away. All the obstacles being thus removed, the punt was successfully pulled to the sand-drift, and biding a prudent opportunity, was safely passed to the other bank.[[116]]

No less than eight days were consumed in this exciting operation, and the detachment, which had been left behind its division, to complete some necessary details, were now in full route for head-quarters. By forced marches, in forty-eight hours it overtook the column under Colonel Eyre, which had taken five days to travel the same distance. The subsequent rivers in the journey, being as shallow as rivulets, were easily forded, and no necessity occurred for employing the resources which the sappers had at command. The detachment arrived at King William’s Town on the 29th January. Four other sappers despatched from Bloom fontein and attached to the division under Colonel Napier, were also engaged as pontoneers, and completed the concluding operations for crossing the column. On arriving at Graham’s Town they joined a detachment of the corps there.[[117]] On the following muster parade, a letter was read, in which his Excellency commended the zeal and activity of the sappers as displayed in the passage of the Orange river by the divisions under Colonels Eyre and Napier, and justly attributed the success of the manœuvre to the able manner in which it had been conducted by Lieutenant Siborne.

Lieutenant-Colonel Cole, the commanding royal engineer, in his final report, dated 1st March, 1853, to Brigade-Major Walpole, communicating the termination of the war, thus wrote of the services and conduct of the corps:—“I cannot conclude what is probably my last report to you, without conveying the gratification I have experienced throughout by the value which has been attached to the services of the non-commissioned officers and men of the royal sappers and miners, not only in public dispatches, but from the opinion expressed to me by the late commander of the forces especially, and the officers under whose command they have served, and who have in many instances shown their confidence practically.

“I am enabled to add that from the reports I have received and my own observation, the non-commissioned officers and men have in all instances throughout this arduous struggle shown a zeal and determination to further the service in which they were engaged, and have displayed their usual gallantry and discipline whenever they have been in the presence of the enemy.”