“You will already have heard from your son what happened on our way up from Lang Fang, and of the little fight we had on the 14th of June. Well, the next day the outposts ran in and reported that the Boxers were at hand in great numbers. The enemy arrived close on their heels and made a determined rush at the fore part of the leading train, which was drawn up beside a well, where the men were engaged in watering. They were met by a withering fire, but pushed on with extreme bravery and did not fall back until some of them actually reached the train. Then they could do no more, and retreated, leaving about a hundred dead. This certainly gave us a better idea of their courage, and the difficulties we should be likely to encounter, than anything that had yet happened.
“At half–past five in the afternoon a messenger arrived on a trolley from the rear, to say that Lofa station was attacked by a very strong force of the enemy. Number two train had steam up, and the admiral at once took a strong force down in it. On their arrival at the station they found that the fight was over, and the enemy having fallen back discomfited, the reinforcements started in pursuit, and harried their retreat for some distance, accounting for about a hundred of them and capturing a few small cannon.
“The next day we remained at Lang Fang, a strong body being employed in repairing the line. Under the protection of a guard a train went back to Lofa, and on its return we learned that the repairs we had affected on the line beyond that place had been a good deal broken up. Later, the officer of the guard at Lofa came in, and reported that three large bodies of Boxers were moving about in the distance, and that he expected an attack would be made on the station. However, they moved off quietly. They were probably on their way to destroy the line, for a train that left at four the next morning for Tientsin came back in the afternoon, with the news that the line was so completely broken up round Lofa that it could not be repaired with the materials and men on board.
“The admiral left an hour later to see for himself the state of the line. He pushed on for some distance, his men repairing the line as they went, till he reached Yangstun, but only to find that beyond that point the line was entirely destroyed. It was now evident to the admiral, and to all of us, that if we continued to stop at Lang Fang we should ere long have to stop there permanently, for our provisions were almost entirely exhausted. The admiral had seen this some days before, and had sent off several messengers to Tientsin to ask that junks should be sent up the river, and ammunition and provisions forwarded by train to Yangtsun, his intention being to establish a base there. But we never heard any more of these messengers, and the fact stared us in the face that we were absolutely cut off from Tientsin.”
CHAPTER XIV
SURROUNDED
On the seventeenth messages were sent to Lofa and Lang Fang to recall the three trains there, but it was evident that it would be impossible to utilize them for our retreat, as they might be suddenly cut off by the Boxers. One came in on the afternoon of the next day, and the others arrived in the evening. They had had some very sharp fighting. The German naval officer, who was in charge of the two trains, reported that he had been attacked early that afternoon by a force of fully five thousand men, including cavalry, a great proportion of whom were armed with magazine rifles of the latest pattern. The attack was made both in front and on the flanks. The troops marched out against them, and although exposed to a heavy fire, forced them to retreat. Nevertheless, when our men retired towards the train, the enemy rallied and advanced again with the evident determination to gain their object; but being beaten off with more loss than before, they finally retreated. Their loss was over four hundred killed, while we had six killed and forty–eight wounded. In the course of the fight a banner was captured which belonged to the army of Tung–Fu–Hsiang. This was the first indication we had that the Imperial Chinese troops had taken the field against us.
“A conference of the commanding officers of the various nationalities was held the next day, and it was decided that, as the railway was completely destroyed on both sides of them, and they could not use it either for advance or retreat, it would be better to endeavour to withdraw to Tientsin. Preparations were at once made. The wounded and the few remaining stores were carried down and placed on board some junks that had been captured on the previous day, and at three oʼclock in the afternoon a start was made. Progress, however, was not destined to be rapid, for the junks had not gone far before they grounded in a shallow reach of the river. Three of them were got off pretty easily; but a six–pounder quick–firing gun of the Centurion had to be thrown overboard to lighten the fourth before she would float. In consequence of this delay, we had only made two and a half miles when night fell. We started early the next morning and were fighting all day, but progress was very much retarded by the necessity for keeping abreast of the junks. The management of these lubberly craft was beyond the European sailors, and as no Chinaman could be got to navigate them they were continually running across the river and getting stuck, so that from four oʼclock in the morning till six in the evening the force only advanced eight miles.