He was, indeed, a good Regimental officer; he managed the Mess, the Canteen, and the Sports club, and, indeed, was a pillar of the regiment. He kept a horse, but seldom, or never, rode, putting it generally at the disposal of the subaltern of his company. He played no games, and lived for nothing but the welfare of the men of his Company, and the reputation of the Regiment.
At Aldershot, in 1873, he gave me a lesson which I have never forgotten. I was senior Major, being in temporary command of the Regiment, and spoke to him about three young officers who did not pay their mess bills when due, and when the delay recurred the third time, I said, “Unless these bills are paid to-morrow morning, you will put the three officers under arrest.” The Commanding Officer being away, I was in the Orderly-room when he reported, “The bills you spoke of have been paid, sir.” “You see,” I remarked, “it only required a little firmness on our part to get the Queen’s Regulations obeyed.” He saluted, but said nothing, and when I saw him in the afternoon I said, “Hackett, I do not quite understand your reticence. Why don’t you help me in making these young officers pay their bills by the proper time? Why do they delay?” “Oh, it’s not wilful, sir,” he replied—“only impecuniosity.” “Oh, that can’t be the case,” I argued, “because when they had to pay, they paid.” He only answered “Yes”; but something in his tone made me say, “If you are right, can you explain how they got the money at such short notice?” “That’s quite simple, sir,” he answered; “I paid the bills myself.” After this I thought less of the effect of my firmness!
When I visited him in the Hospital the morning after the action, he was a piteous sight, for a bullet had passed from one temple to another, and, without actually hitting the eyes, had protruded the eyeballs, injuring the brain. He was unconscious of the terrible nature of his wounds, possibly from pressure on the brain, and observed to me, “Your Commissariat officers are very stingy in not lighting up this Hospital tent; the place is in absolute darkness.” We were all so fond of him that nobody ventured to tell him the truth, and it was not until he was in Maritzburg that the doctors begged a lady, who was a constant visitor at the Hospital, to break the news to him.
When we received, on the 4th January 1879, the Gazette of the Promotions and Honours for the suppression of the Gaika outbreak, I addressed the Military Secretary as follows: “Lord Chelmsford writes to me a kind letter about the omission of my name when honours were being served out, but I am not likely to trouble you on my own account, especially as one Commanding Officer rewarded has never been within 500 miles of bloodshed, but I confess Brevet Major Hackett might have attracted your, or His Royal Highness’, favourable eye. A man of long service, old enough to be father of the junior Captains, he has, I believe, been for many years the bed-rock of the 90th Light Infantry. An excellent Regimental officer, ever ready to counsel or aid those of his brothers whose follies, or scanty purses, brought them into trouble. He has successfully neutralised the bad points of two Commanding Officers.”
When in the Hospital at the close of the action, I did not speak to Arthur Bright, who was dozing, but after we had had something to eat I sent Maude over to see how he was going on. Maude came back saying that he was sensible, but very depressed, although the doctors said a bullet which had passed through his thigh had not touched any artery or bone. The two doctors had more than they could do, and may therefore be readily excused for not having noticed that the other thigh bone had been shattered; and Bright died, happily without pain, before morning. Over six feet in height, and very handsome, he exercised, through his high moral tone, great influence amongst the subalterns. He had been captain of a boat at Eton, was our boldest and best Polo player, and was a gifted draughtsman, possessing also a beautiful tenor voice. He had only fifteen months’ service when he took command of the company of which Maude was the Captain. This company had been unfortunate, for Stevens, its Captain, was dangerously wounded on the 30th April 1878, when Saltmarshe was killed; and now, in one day it had lost its only duty officer, Bright, and the gallant Colour-Sergeant Allen.
For two or three days after our victory I had some anxiety on account of our convoy of wounded men, which Buller escorted to the Blood River. My battalion was unfortunate, for, in addition to the two officers of the 90th whom we buried, we sent away three wounded in the convoy. I was obliged to keep Maude to help me, in spite of his company being without an officer.
Lieutenant Smith, whose arm was badly hit, was invalided to England. After seeing his family, he went to stay with Lady Wood, and, while he was giving his account of the fight in the drawing-room, his soldier servant was telling my wife’s servants about it in the kitchen; and, alluding to the time when I walked across the open to the Laager, he said, “We saw three Zulus following him, and we knew he couldn’t hear ’em, so we turned our faces away that we might not see him assegaied!” “Ah,” the cook said, with deep emotion, “that would have been a sad day for his wife and children!” when the soldier observed cheerfully, “Oh, we weren’t thinking of them, or of him either, for the matter of that, but what would have become of us if ’e’d been killed?”
I heard from Lord Chelmsford, who said he observed in my official report of my attack on the Inhlobane that I had made no reference to his having induced it; and, while thanking him for his generosity, I replied that I considered I was bound to help him, and that the operation I undertook was, moreover, feasible, and would have been carried out without any serious loss except for the coincidence of the approach of the Zulu main army.
30th March.—Although nearly all of Wood’s Irregulars had deserted the previous evening, we still had the Zulus attached to the companies, as well as the drivers and foreloupers of the waggons, and, knowing it was hopeless to expect them to bring in, without reward, any Zulus as prisoners, I made it known I would give a “stick” of tobacco for any wounded or unwounded Zulu who was brought into camp. During the fight it was difficult to spare wounded Zulus who could sit up, for, when I took out a company from the Redoubt for a counter attack at 5.30, an officer shouted, “Look out for that wounded Zulu behind you.” He fired immediately, killing a soldier who followed me. When all resistance was over, I was anxious, not only for the sake of humanity, but in order to make an accurate report, to ascertain what regiments had attacked us. So I instructed our men to bring me, if possible, a representative of every Zulu regiment engaged.
Next morning, 15 or 20 grand specimens of savage humanity stood in front of me, while the interpreter took down their names and the names of the officers commanding the regiment to which they belonged, and we learnt that the Zulu army had numbered over 23,000 men. When I had obtained all the information I required, I said, “Before Isandwhlana, we treated all your wounded men in our Hospital, but when you attacked our camp, your brethren, our black patients, rose and helped to kill those who had been attending on them. Can any of you advance any reason why I should not kill you?” One of the younger men, with an intelligent face, asked, “May I speak?” “Yes.” “There is a very good reason why you should not kill us. We kill you because it is the custom of the Black men, but it isn’t the White men’s custom!” So, putting them in charge of an officer and a couple of Colonel Buller’s men, I had them sent safely past our Outposts, as far as the Zunguin mountain.