I no longer required an escort, but told the ten men who had been with me for fifteen months, had incurred more danger than any other soldiers in the Column, and had worked longer hours, that if they liked to follow me to Maritzburg they could have a week’s holiday, and I would give them as good a dinner as the city could produce; and they came with me.
Colonel Buller and I rode down together through Ekowe, where we learned that we had received a step in the Order of the Bath, Buller having been made a Companion of the Bath after the operations in the Amatola Mountains. My reward was induced by a letter written by Sir Bartle Frere on the 27th of March, two days before the battle of Kambula, in which he urged on the Secretary of State for the Colonies the great value of the service performed by Colonel Pearson and myself, dilating on the political effect of our maintaining positions so far advanced in Zululand as to render invasion of Natal by the Zulu army in force an operation of extreme peril. My friend Pearson received the Companionship of the Bath. Lord Chelmsford, who had preceded me to Maritzburg, wrote me the following letter:—
“My hearty congratulations on your promotion to K.C.B.; it ought to have been given to you months ago. The Authorities have apparently woke up and realised the fact that you had not in any way been rewarded for your good work in the old Colony, and at the beginning of this war I hope they will also understand that a good deal is still due to you for Ulundi.” This kind wish was not, however, fulfilled.
The inhabitants of Maritzburg entertained Lord Chelmsford at dinner, and in speaking after it he took the opportunity of again thanking me in the following words: “I never would have believed it possible for any General to receive such assistance and devotion as I have experienced from my men.... It would be invidious to particularise individuals and services, but when I look back eighteen months two names stand out in broad relief, the names of Wood and Buller. I can say that these two have been my Right and Left supporters during the whole of my time in the country.”
I took some interest in the dinner I gave to my escort at the principal hotel. It was costly, and the variety of the liquids which my guests ordered was astonishing, for they drank beer and every sort of wine to be found in a hotel cellar. Sir Redvers Buller and I were occupying the same bedroom, the city being crowded, and when Walkinshaw, my Orderly Bugler, brought us our baths at 4 a.m. next day, Sir Redvers asked Walkinshaw, “How is your head?” “Not very well, sir.” I, being interested in discipline, asked as he left the room, “I hope they all got home?” “Yes, sir.” He is an accurate and truthful man, for he put in his head and added,—“they had carts and wheelbarrows.”
The Cape Town people also entertained us, and the ladies of the Colony gave me in 1880 a very handsome embossed silver shield for my services in the suppression of the Gaika outbreak, and later I received an address with a beautiful service of plate from the inhabitants of Natal.
Steaming by St. Helena and Ascension, we reached Plymouth on the 26th August, where my wife, brother, and sisters met me, and I went as soon as possible on a visit to my brother-in-law at Belhus, where my mother was staying, Sir Thomas Lennard’s tenantry giving me a great reception. The village of Aveley was decorated, and the inhabitants taking out the horses pulled the carriage up to the house.
The Fishmongers’ Company, of which I had become a liveryman in 1874, entertained me at dinner on the 30th September. I took the opportunity, on being asked to speak on South Africa, to try to do justice to Sir Bartle Frere, whom I termed, and after twenty-five years’ experience still regard, as the greatest High Commissioner South Africa has seen; the greatest not only in his treatment of barbaric peoples, but in unflinching courage and rectitude of purpose. The trust he placed in me was the means not only of winning over some valuable allies, but of neutralising the position of many colonists of Dutch extraction, who otherwise would have swelled the number of discontented Boers who assembled at Pretoria to protest against our Government.
I spoke also of my comrades, mostly deceased, who had done so much for England, purposely making no difference between officers, non-commissioned officers, and privates who had distinguished themselves. While some newspapers unduly praised me, I was taken to task for naming anyone by a few anonymous correspondents of the daily Press. After paying this tribute of respect to the memory of those who had given up their lives while under my command in defending the interests of the country, I spoke of the Prince Imperial as follows: “In remembering those brave spirits and that gallant youth—the son of England’s Ally—whose mother is our honoured guest, I am reminded of the question and answer in Shakespeare, for humanity is the same in all ages. When Rosse said to Siward—
‘Your son, My Lord, has paid a soldier’s debt:
He only lived but till he was a man,
The which, no sooner had his prowess confirm’d
In the unshrinking station where he fought,
But like a man he died,’