Forced to Retire My first thought was how to secure the best and shortest line of retreat; it lay by Deh-i-Mazang, but in order to use it, the gorge close by that village had to be held; for if the enemy reached it first they would have no difficulty in gaining the heights above Kabul, which would practically place the city at their mercy.
I was very anxious also to prevent any panic or disturbance taking place in Kabul. I therefore told General Hills, who just then opportunely joined me, to gallop to Sherpur, explain to Brigadier-General Hugh Gough, who had been placed in temporary command of that place, how matters stood, and order 200 of the 72nd Highlanders to come to Deh-i-Mazang with the least possible delay. I directed Hills, after having delivered this message, to make for the city, shut the gates, and do all in his power to keep the people quiet, while warning the [Kizilbashes][10] to be prepared to defend their quarter. I then despatched my nephew and A.D.C., Lieutenant John Sherston, to Macpherson to inform him of what had happened, and desire him to push on with the utmost speed.
Having taken these precautionary measures, I sent another A.D.C., Captain Pole Carew, to Brigadier-General Massy to direct him to try and find a way by which the guns could retire in case of a necessity, which appeared to me to be only too probable.
The engagement had now become a question of time. If Mahomed Jan could close with and overwhelm our small force, Kabul would be his; but if, by any possibility, his advance could be retarded until Macpherson should come up, we might hope to retain possession of the city. It was, therefore, to the Afghan leader's interest to press on, while it was to ours to delay him as long as we possibly could.
Pole Carew presently returned with a message from Massy that the enemy were close upon him, and that he could not keep them in check. I desired Pole Carew to go back, order Massy to retire the guns, and cover the movement by a charge of Cavalry.
The charge was led by Lieutenant-Colonel Cleland and Captain Neville, the former of whom fell dangerously wounded; but the ground, terraced for irrigation purposes and intersected by nullas, so impeded our Cavalry that the charge, heroic as it was, made little or no impression upon the overwhelming numbers of the enemy, now flushed with the triumph of having forced our guns to retire. The effort, however, was worthy of the best traditions of our British and Indian Cavalry, and that it failed in its object was no fault of our gallant soldiers. To assist them in their extremity, I ordered two of Smyth-Windham's four guns to halt and come into action while the other two continued to retire, but these had not gone far before they got into such difficult ground that one had to be spiked and abandoned in a water-cut, where Smyth-Windham found it when he came up after having fired a few rounds at the fast advancing foe. I now ordered Smyth-Windham to make for the village of Bhagwana with his three remaining guns, as the only chance left of saving them. This he did, and having reached the village, he again opened fire from behind a low wall which enclosed the houses; but the ammunition being nearly expended, and the enemy close at hand, there was nothing for it but to limber up again and continue the retirement through the village. At the further side, however, and forming part of its defences, was a formidable obstacle in the shape of a ditch fully twelve feet deep, narrowing towards the bottom; across this Smyth-Windham tried to take his guns, and the leading horses had just begun to scramble up the further bank, when one of the wheelers stumbled and fell, with the result that the shafts broke and the gun stuck fast, blocking the only point at which there was any possibility of getting the others across.
With a faint hope of saving the guns, I directed Captain Stewart-Mackenzie, who had assumed command of the 9th Lancers on Cleland being disabled, to make a second charge, which he executed with the utmost [gallantry],[11] but to no purpose; and in the meanwhile Smyth-Windham had given the order to unhook and spike the guns.
Padre Adams earns the V.C. By this time the enemy were within a few hundred yards of Bhagwana, and the inhabitants had begun to fire at us from the roofs of their houses. I was endeavouring to help some men out of the ditch, when the headman of the village rushed at me with his knife, seeing which, a [Mahomedan][12] of the 1st Bengal Cavalry, who was following me on foot, having just had his horse shot under him, sprang at my assailant, and, seizing him round the waist, threw him to the bottom of the ditch, thereby saving my [life].[13]
Suddenly the Afghans stayed their advance for a few minutes, thinking, as I afterwards learnt, that our Infantry were in the village—a pause which allowed many of our Cavalry who had lost their horses to [escape].[14]
Directly we had got clear of the village the Cavalry reformed, and retired slowly by alternate squadrons, in a manner which excited my highest admiration, and reflected the greatest credit on the soldierly qualities of Stewart-Mackenzie and Neville. From Bhagwana, Deh-i-Mazang was three miles distant, and it was of vital importance to keep the enemy back in order to give the Highlanders from Sherpur time to reach the gorge.