The Memoirs of Admiral Lord Beresford

by Baron Charles William De la Poer Beresford Beresford

All we could do was to work our guns. As the square went on, the enemy, moving in large masses, shifted their position, and as they moved, we dropped shells among them. We judged their numbers to be greater than at Abu Klea. Would the square of only 900 men ever get through? If ever a little British army looked like walking to certain death, it was that thin square of infantry.

Presently it disappeared from view. Soon afterwards we heard the steady roll of volley firing, and we knew that the enemy were charging the square. Then, silence. Whether the enemy had been driven back, or the square annihilated, we did not know. What we did know was that if the square had been defeated, the zeriba would very soon be attacked in overwhelming force. But as the moments passed the strain of suspense slackened; for, as the fire of the enemy directed upon the zeriba diminished and soon ceased altogether, the presumption was that the square had been victorious and had got through to the river.

What had happened was that the Arabs, charging downhill at the left front angle of the square, had been met by concentrated rifle fire, our men aiming low at a range of 400 yards, steady as on parade. Once more the British soldier proved that no troops in the world can face his musketry. The front ranks of the charging thousands were lying dead in heaps; the rear ranks fled over the hills; and the square went on, unmolested, very slowly, because the men were tired out, and so came to the river.

Count Gleichen, who marched with the square, recounting his experiences (in his With the Camel Corps up the Nile), writes: "Soon in the growing dusk a silver streak was visible here and there in amongst the green belt, but it was still a couple of miles off.... Our pace could not exceed a slow march. The sun went down, and the twilight became almost darkness; ... a two-days-old crescent was shining in the sky, and its feeble light guided us through the gravel hills right to the brink of the Nile. The men were as wild with joy as their exhausted condition would allow. The wounded were held up for one look at the gleaming river, and then hurried to the banks. Still, perfect discipline was observed. Not a man left his place in the ranks until his company was marched up to take its fill.... A chain of sentries was established on the slopes overlooking the square, and in two minutes the force was fast asleep." Sir Charles Wilson (From Korti to Khartoum) adds: "The men were so exhausted that when they came up from their drink at the river they fell down like logs...."

They had been marching and fighting for four days and three nights without sleep, and with very little food and water, and had lost a tenth of their number. That night we in the zeriba also slept. I remember very little about it, except that Lieutenant Charles Crutchley, Adjutant of the Guards' Camel Regiment, woke me twice and asked me for water. He made no complaint of any kind, and I did not know that he had been hit early in the day and that he had a bullet in his leg. General Crutchley, who was so kind as to write to me in reply to my request that he would tell me what he remembers of the affair, says: "I remember lying on a stretcher that night, and people knocking against my leg, and that my revolver was stolen, I believe by one of the camel boys." Crutchley was carried down to the river by my bluejackets next day, and was taken into hospital. As I remember the occasion, he left the decision as to whether or not his leg should be amputated, to me. At any rate, the surgeon had no doubt as to the necessity of the operation, at which I was present. With his finger he flicked out of the wound pieces of bone like splinters of bamboo. The leg was buried, and was afterwards exhumed in order to extract the bullet from it. I think I remember that Crutchley, seeing it being carried across to the hospital, asked whose leg it was. He was carried upon a litter back to Korti, and the shaking of that terrible march made necessary a second operation, which was successful.

Sir Charles Wilson's force, having bivouacked that night beside the Nile, were up at daybreak; took possession of the empty village of mud huts, called Abu Kru, but always known as Gubat, which stood on the gravel ridge sloping to the Nile, 780 yards from the river; and placed the wounded in Gubat under a guard. The force then returned to our zeriba.

When we saw that gallant little array come marching over the distant hill-top, and through the scrub towards us, we cheered again and again. Hearty were our greetings. Our comrades, who had marched without breakfast, were speedily provided with a plentiful meal of bully-beef and tea.

Then we all set to work to dismantle the zeriba, to collect the stores of which it was constructed and to sort them out, to mend the broken saddles, and load up the wretched camels, who had been knee-lashed and unable to move for twenty-four hours. About a hundred camels were dead, having been shot as they lay. As there were not enough camels to carry all the stores, a part of these were left under an increased garrison inside the redoubt upon the knoll in rear of the zeriba, Major T. Davison in command.

At midday we buried the dead, over whom I read the service, Sir Charles Wilson being present as chief mourner.

The last of the wounded to be moved was Sir Herbert Stewart, so that he should be spared as much discomfort as possible. He was doing fairly well, and we then hoped that he would recover.