There is a sort of fascination about a Maxim in full swing. Water is placed round the barrel in a metal casing, in order to keep the steel from becoming red hot. As it is, in three minutes after the water is poured in it boils furiously, and steam rushes out of the valves. Still, as long as the barrel is in contact with water of any kind, all goes well. In the midst of the Dervish attack the water suddenly gave out in Captain Smeaton's battery, and the machinery would speedily have ceased work from overheating but for the ready help of the men who stood by, and immediately emptied their water-bottles into the empty tubing. The Maxims, thus refreshed, continued their work, and up to 8.30 a.m. no less than ninety thousand rounds of ammunition had been fired from these weapons alone.
About seven o'clock a marvellous attempt to break our lines was made by the enemy. The Dervish leader in the centre—perhaps Yakub, the Khalifa's brother—actually dispatched a body of about one hundred and fifty cavalry against the British position. That any sane man could be guilty of such criminal folly is almost incredible. The devoted band galloped towards the zeriba over the open desert in the very teeth of Maxims and Lee-Metford volleys! Needless to say, not one of these brave fellows got within five hundred yards of our lines. The Maxims and rifles rained bullets upon them, the murderous sheet of lead mowed them down, and they simply vanished from sight. One heroic leader struggled on in front of his comrades, until he too, with his beautiful Arab charger, went down like the rest, and lay there, a silent witness to the magnificent valour of the Khalifa's followers. Not one man in twenty returned from this wild charge, which, for the utter recklessness of its bravery, must be almost unexampled in military history.
The interchange of shots continued until about 8.30, by which time the Dervish forces had been practically annihilated, with the exception of two or three large masses, which had retreated in excellent order behind the hills on the south-west and north-west. In fact, during the last half-hour of this portion of the engagement, the actual rifle fire of the Dervishes had been confined almost exclusively to a small body of sharpshooters, who had ensconced themselves in a sandy hollow some nine hundred yards away on our left centre. These riflemen, being sheltered from the hail of bullets which whizzed over their heads, continued to make very fair practice on our ranks for some time. At last a shell from Major Williams' battery pitched right into the middle of their retreat. What exactly happened I do not know, but, at anyrate, we were troubled by no more bullets from that quarter. Throughout the fighting up to this point I never saw a Dervish run; whenever he retreated he simply walked off the field. I noticed many of the wounded struggle to their feet, attempt to walk away, and then fall to rise no more as merciless volleys again struck them to the ground.
As the Sirdar appeared to think that all danger from Dervish attack was now past and over, the entire army received orders to leave the zeriba and march in échelon straight on Omdurman. Meanwhile, however, the Lancers had advanced over the ridge towards the river, with orders to harass the enemy and head them off from Omdurman as far as possible. The troopers trotted off in excellent spirits, glad to get a chance of some fighting after their forced inaction under cover during the assault upon the zeriba.
And now occurred the most graphic and sensational bit of fighting in the whole battle. A continuous stream of Dervishes was traversing the plain between Gebel Surgham and the suburbs of Omdurman. But before the Lancers had advanced far upon the flank of these fugitives they noticed what appeared to be a body of some two hundred spearmen, who were partly under cover of a low ridge of sand. These Dervishes soon showed that they had rifles as well as spears, for a hot fire was opened upon the cavalry. A charge was at once ordered, and the line of Lancers galloped down upon the enemy. Before they had reached the hollow, however, they saw beyond the riflemen a considerable body of Dervishes, whose presence, thanks to a further inequality in the ground, had not been revealed till that moment. I have heard it said that, previous to falling foul of these partly concealed Dervishes, the Lancers had advanced without any scouts being thrown forward who might have easily discovered how the land lay. Again, even when the white mass of men, some fifteen deep, suddenly rose up before the eyes of the cavalry, there would have been absolutely no shadow of discredit in retiring; for cavalry are not ordinarily required to charge unbroken infantry, nor was this course rendered necessary by the Sirdar's orders. There can be little doubt that if our men, immediately on sighting the large compact body in the rear of the riflemen, had withdrawn, dismounted, and poured volleys from their carbines into the massed ranks of the enemy, they would have inflicted far greater damage upon the Dervishes, with scarcely any appreciable loss to themselves. This course was not taken. So far from halting and retreating, our gallant Lancers quickened their chargers' pace, and hurled themselves boldly against the double rampart of fighting men. Colonel Martin led the way, riding well ahead of his regiment, and, without attempting to use his weapons, forced a passage through the dense masses in front of him. He did not, I believe, receive a scratch during this perilous exploit, though it was almost a miracle that he escaped with his life. A friend of mine who took part in this famous charge told me that as the cavalry galloped forward they were met by a perfect hail of bullets from the riflemen in front, which ought to have emptied many a saddle, but for the most part flew harmlessly overhead. As is usually the case in desperate fighting, none of the men who came safely through the charge appeared to know much about its details. My informant told me that he noticed an officer—probably Lieutenant Grenfell—standing a little on one side and fighting with a ring of Dervishes, three of whom suddenly turned upon himself. As they advanced he realised that he had better make some use of his weapons, so whipped out his revolver and shot the foremost Dervish. After this his horse struggled onward past the rest of the assailants. Until he had shot this man, he had quite forgotten to draw either sword or revolver!
The outer line of the enemy was soon broken up by the impact of the cavalry, and the riflemen tumbled head over heels amongst the horses' feet. But much greater resistance came from the two thousand Dervishes at the back. The confusion was terrible. Lances are not of much use in a crowd, and if our troopers had used their sabres they would have suffered less from the heavy sword blades which were hacking their bodies and hamstringing their horses. If any man was unhorsed he was as good as dead. The furious Arabs leapt upon him and slashed at his face till his features disappeared and his flesh hung in strips. Lieutenant Clerk's charger stumbled and fell forward as it breasted the edge of the nullah, but most fortunately its master kept his seat, and managed to get through the mêlée unhurt. This officer was on September 2nd far too ill and weak for any sort of military duty, but he pluckily kept to his regiment till the day's arduous work was over, and was then obliged to go into hospital worse than before. The fighting through the brief period of this charge—a few minutes all told from beginning to end—was wild and fierce. The Lancers never flinched in the face of an enemy six times as numerous as themselves, and, doing what they could with the clumsy lances, forced a path for their squadrons through the crowd in front. On the other hand, the Dervishes rejoiced, no doubt, to get to close quarters with the hated infidels after all the futile attempts and cruel losses of the morning. Their eyes gleamed with fury as they crowded round the hated Englishmen, and showered spear thrusts and sword cuts upon man and beast alike. The cross-handled Dervish sword is terribly heavy, and the long straight blades of several which I picked up had been freshly ground for subsequent employment upon the person of Tommy Atkins. The large Dervish spear, too, when properly handled, is a most formidable weapon, and if a thrust is driven well home into the body, the wound from the broad iron head is so wide and deep that a man has little chance of recovery.
My readers have all read in the newspapers of some of the many acts of heroism and narrow escapes which were crowded into the space of a few minutes. They have heard how gallantly men like Lieutenant Montmorency and Private Peddar, who had fought their way unhurt through the Dervishes' line, turned back to save their wounded and dismounted comrades—how Major Wyndham, when his horse fell dead beneath him, managed with the help of his friends to push his way through the press and escape the death which overtook almost every other Lancer who was unhorsed.
The enemy's line was completely broken up by the cavalry, and about seventy of the Dervishes were killed or wounded. But when the Lancers formed up some three hundred yards on the other side of the hollow, it was evident from even a cursory glance that the gallant charge had cost them dear. Lieutenant Grenfell with twenty troopers were missing, and of the fifty wounded men many were streaming with blood and scarcely able to keep their saddles. No less than one hundred and nineteen horses out of three hundred and twenty were killed or hopelessly wounded, and in some cases the faithful creatures, who had carried their masters safely through the fight, just managed to rejoin the ranks and then fell dead.
After the charge Colonel Martin ordered his men to dismount and fire volleys at the enemy, who still held their ground. The magazine fire of the carbines speedily dispersed the Dervishes, and the victorious Lancers returned to the scene of their charge and recovered the dead. All the bodies had been horribly mutilated; the faces were quite unrecognisable, and the flesh of the neck and shoulders was scored and lacerated in every direction with sword cuts and spear thrusts.
Indignation against the Dervishes for such mutilations may easily be exaggerated. Sickening as it is to gaze upon a comrade's features hacked out of all human semblance, one cannot forget that the men who did the deed had seen thousands of their brethren slain by our awful fire without a possibility of retaliation. It is worth remembering, too, that the mutilation of the human body is not the exclusive monopoly of barbaric peoples; anyone who has seen the effects of shell fire—bodies ripped open, jaws torn off, and kindred horrors—may find it difficult to differentiate very markedly between the accursed usages inseparable from every system of warfare—civilised and barbarous alike.