“Although it had been deemed prudent to abandon the men’s knapsacks and the officers’ baggage, the reserve battalion of the Ninety-first Regiment went down the side of that shattered wreck, fully armed and accoutred, and, with the exception of their knapsacks, ready for instant service. It would be difficult to praise sufficiently the steady discipline of that young and newly-formed battalion, thus severely tested during nearly seventeen hours of danger; above eight of which were hours of darkness and imminent peril. That discipline failed not, when the apparent hopelessness of our situation might have led to scenes of confusion and crime. The double guards and sentries which had at first been posted over the wine and spirit stores, were found unnecessary, and they were ultimately left to the ordinary protection of single sentries.
“Although the ship was straining in every timber, and the heavy seas were making a fair breach over us, the companies of that young battalion fell in on the weather-side of the wreck, as their lots were drawn, and waited for their turn to muster at the lee-gangway; and so perfect was their confidence, their patience, and their gallantry, that although another vessel was going to pieces within a quarter of a mile of us, and a crowd of soldiers, sailors, and convicts were perishing before their eyes, not a murmur arose from their ranks when Captain Gordon directed that the lot should not be applied to the detachments of the Twenty-seventh Regiment and Cape Mounted Riflemen, but that the Ninety-first should yield to them the precedence in disembarking from the wreck.
“The officers of the Ninety-first Regiment who disembarked with the battalion were Captains Gordon and Ward, Lieutenant Cahill, Ensigns MʻInroy and Lavers, and Assistant-Surgeon Stubbs. If from among the ranks of men who all behaved so well, it were allowable to particularise any, the names of Acting Sergeant-Major Murphy, Colour-Sergeant Philips, Sergeant Murray, and Corporal Thomas Nugent, deserve this distinction. It was through the first that Captain Gordon communicated his orders, and carried them into execution. Every order he (Sergeant-Major Murphy) received was obeyed, during the confusion of a wreck, with the exactness of a parade-ground. He never left the particular part of the ship where he had been stationed, during the darkness and terror of the night, although a wife and child seemed to claim a portion of his solicitude; and when he received permission to accompany them into the surf-boat, he petitioned to be allowed to remain with Captain Gordon to the last.
“The two sergeants were young lads, barely twenty-two years of age. They had married shortly before the battalion embarked at Kingstown, and their wives (quite girls) were clinging to them for support and comfort when the ship parted from her anchors. The guards were ordered to be doubled, and additional sergeants were posted to each. This brought Sergeants Philips and Murray on duty. Without a murmur they left their wives and joined the guards of the lower deck. Their example of perfect obedience and discipline was eminently useful.
“And, if an officer’s name may be mentioned, the conduct of Assistant-Surgeon Stubbs well deserves notice. He was in wretched health; but on the first announcement of danger he repaired to the sick-bay, and never left his charge until they were all safely landed.
“And, though last in this narrative, the beautiful calmness and resignation of the soldiers’ wives ought to be ranked among the first of those ingredients of order which contributed to our safety. Confusion, terror, and despair, joined to the wildest shrieks, were fast spreading their dangerous influence from the women’s quarter when Captain Gordon first descended among the people on the lower decks. A few words sufficed to quiet them, and from that moment their patience and submission never faltered.
“By half-past three P.M. the bilged and broken wreck was abandoned with all the stores and baggage—public and regimental—to the fast-increasing gale, and to the chances of the approaching night.”
The excellent conduct of the Ninety-first throughout the Kaffir Wars of 1846–47, and again in 1850–53, received, with the army, the grateful thanks of the country, conveyed through the Government, in these expressive terms, to Lieutenant-General the Hon. Sir George Cathcart:—“The field of glory opened to them in a Kaffir war and Hottentot rebellion, is possibly not so favourable and exciting as that which regular warfare with an open enemy in the field affords, yet the unremitting exertions called for in hunting well-armed yet skulking savages through the bush, and driving them from their innumerable strongholds, are perhaps more arduous than those required in regular warfare, and call more constantly for individual exertion and intelligence. The British soldier, always cheerfully obedient to the call, well knows that, when he has done his duty, he is sure to obtain the thanks and good opinion of his gracious Queen.”
The subsequent foreign service of the Ninety-first has been in the Mediterranean, and in September, 1858, it proceeded overland to India.