He left the outer line of our pickets at dusk, and flitted away silently to the nearest native kraal; he handed in the letters to the black chief, and wandered on empty-handed towards General Buller’s camp. Meanwhile a simple Kaffir girl would pass the Boer camp, calabash on head, going to fetch water from the spring in the early morning. The letters were in the empty water-vessel!
She put them under a stone by the spring, and another maiden would come from the other side, and take them on in her calabash or mealie-jar.
At last the native runner would call for them and carry the letters to the English lines.
On the 6th of January a determined attack was made by the pick of the Boers upon Cæsar’s Camp. Our pickets in Buller’s relieving army could hear the sound of the guns, muffled by distance; officers and men gathered in groups on the hill-sides and listened intently to the long low growl of the rifle. Then came a helio message from Sir George White to General Clery: “Attacked on every side.” The nervous strain on these men, condemned to inaction after each new failure to cross the Tugela and fight their way into Ladysmith, became almost insupportable. They sat outside the big camp, gazing on Bulwana with telescopes and field-glasses, hardly daring to utter their thoughts. A second helio was flashed across: “Enemy everywhere repulsed; fighting continues.” Then tongues were once more loosened, and hope arose as the distant firing sank to a sullen minute-gun. But half an hour later the booming of big guns on Bulwana was renewed, and away to the west arose a fierce rifle fire. “Attack renewed; enemy reinforced,” winked the helio from the top of Convent Hill, and again a dumb despair fell on the watchers. “Very hard pressed,” came the third message, firing our soldiers with indignant rage, as they thought of the poor part they had hitherto taken in relieving Ladysmith. But at length the heroism of the Devons, the Imperial Light Horse, and others of the Ladysmith garrison beat back the Boers’ desperate assault.
The Devons had climbed up the hill late in the afternoon to avenge their fallen comrades. They had charged straight up the hill in a line, but a deadly fire at short range brought down dozens of them as they rushed the top. However, there was no wavering in the Devons, but they pressed forward at the double with the steel advanced, and only a few Boers waited for that disagreeable operation in war. There was a terrific hailstorm going on as Colonel Park halted his men just below the crest: it was a moment to try the nerves of the strongest. Once over that lip of hillside and a fiercer storm than hail would meet them in the face, and call many of them to their last account. No wonder many a hand went for the water-bottle, and little nervous tricks of foot and hand betrayed the tension of the moment.
“Now then, Devons, get ready!” The men gripped their rifles in the old way of drill, quick and altogether, brows were knit, teeth set, and away they went into the jaws of death.
“Steady, Devons, steady!” No need to bid them be steady. They bore down upon the Boers with dogged and irresistible force, and the Boers turned and ran. Many an English officer fell that day, and several doctors were wounded while doing their duty.
The Boers who fought most fiercely were the old Dopper Boers, who nursed a bitter hatred for all Englishmen. These men would refuse all kind help even when lying hurt. They were suspected sometimes of cruelty to our wounded; for more than one of our men was found covered with bruises, as though he had been kicked or beaten to death. But these things were exceptional, and such conduct was confined to the most ignorant and uncivilized of the old Boers.
Many of the wounded lay where they fell for twenty-four hours and more. The Kaffir boys as they dug the long shallow graves would hum a low refrain; above wheeled the vultures, looking down upon the slain. The Boers confessed that it was the worst day they had ever had, and five days after the battle they were still searching for their dead. Our dead numbered about 150.
The Imperial Light Horse, containing many young Englishmen in their ranks, greatly distinguished themselves. The Brigadier commanding in the fight wrote to their chief officer: “No one realizes more clearly than I do that your men were the backbone of the defence during that day’s long fighting.” But sickness carried off far more than rifle or cannon. The Imperial Light Horse, who came to Ladysmith 475 strong, were now reduced to 150; the Devons, from 984 had gone down to 480.