The Relief of Chitral

by G. J. Younghusband; Sir Francis Edward Younghusband

Leaving fifty men in the serai a quarter of a mile from the fort, and detaching a section under Captain Baird, which Lieutenant Gurdon accompanied, to ascend the hill-sides on the right, Captains Campbell and Townshend advanced for a mile and a half down the valley, towards a house in which it was stated that Sher Afzul had established himself. On arrival at the house it was found that Sher Afzul was not in it, and Captain Townshend then advanced still further down the valley, while Captain Baird's flanking party was strengthened by an additional twenty-five men. Captain Townshend could see a number of men moving about among the trees and houses of a hamlet 500 yards beyond the house which it had been supposed Sher Afzul was occupying; and on the hill-sides which Baird's party were ascending there were some hundreds of the Chitralis. On these hill-slopes firing now commenced, and Captain Townshend concluding that the men he could see in the front moving about in the hamlet were the enemy, opened fire with a section volley. The fire was immediately returned by the enemy, who, being armed with Martini-Henry and Snider rifles, made, says Captain Townshend, most excellent shooting. Among the enemy were several hundred of Umra Khan's men, drilled and trained by pensioners from our own Indian Army; and there were, indeed, many of these pensioners themselves in the force which was now advancing upon Chitral.

Captain Townshend kept his men under cover as much as possible, and, taking advantage, for the purpose, of the boulders and low walls which surrounded the fields, advanced to within 200 yards or so of the hamlet. There was now no more cover in his front, many of his men were hit, and he could see the hamlet towards which he was advancing now crowded with men who were keeping up a well-sustained fire from the walls and loopholes. To advance with the hundred men he had with him, and these not veteran troops of our own army, but untried Kashmir troops armed with worn-out Snider rifles, against superior numbers of a better-armed and more experienced force posted behind walls was an impossibility, and Captain Townshend decided therefore to hold his ground until Captain Baird should move along the hill-slopes to the westward, and so turn the hamlet, and when Baird had done this Townshend would then advance to attack it in front.

But time went on, and Townshend could see no signs of Baird advancing on his flank. On the other hand small parties of the enemy began to overlap him on both flanks and to enfilade him with their fire. His position was now becoming untenable; it was half-past six and would soon be dark, so decisive action of some sort—either an advance or a retirement—had to be carried out at once. At this juncture Captain Campbell arrived and directed that the hamlet should be stormed. The order to reinforce was given but the support of men in rear did not come up, though the order was continually repeated. Captain Campbell then went back to himself bring up the support, while Captain Townshend fixed bayonets preparatory to a charge and kept up a heavy independent fire. The support all this time was lying behind some low walls 150 yards to the rear. Captain Campbell succeeded in bringing on about a dozen men from among them, and then fell shot through the knee just as he was rejoining the advance party. Colonel Jagat Singh, of the Kashmir troops, then went back to try and get more men on, but he could only bring on one or two. So Captain Townshend, finding that to await for further support was useless, went round his men telling them they must rush straight in and take the houses, and he then sounded the charge.

The little party of a hundred men scrambled over the bank behind which they had been lying and advanced to the attack of the strongly-held village to their front. It was a desperate venture, for the enemy were not only in superior numbers and better armed, but they were firing from behind cover, while the troops which the British had now to lead to the attack had to advance across 200 yards of open ground, exposed to fire for the whole distance, and they were men who had never been in action before. Captain Townshend had served in the expedition sent to relieve Khartoum, and had been present in the battles of Gubat and Abu Klea, where Sir Herbert Stewart and Burnaby lost their lives, and he had taken part in the sharp little Hunza campaign in 1891, but he told me that he had never before been under so hot a fire as that which now met his party as they scrambled over the bank. The Kashmir General Baj Singh, a fine old soldier and gentleman, who was always keen to be in the thickest of a fight, and whose keenness had now led him to the front when by rights he should have been more in rear, was shot down on one side of Captain Townshend, while Major Bhikam Singh, another brave old Kashmir officer, was mortally wounded on the other side. Their leaders fallen, the finest troops in the world would have found it hard to face so terrible a fire, and the raw Kashmir infantry could no longer stand before it. Insensibly they shrank under the fire, then crouched down behind stones, till Captain Townshend finding it impossible to carry the charge home in spite of all his endeavours to get the men on abandoned the attempt, and ordered his men back behind the wall from which they had started.

Events had now taken a very serious turn. The British officers were nearly two miles distant from the fort with a handful of disheartened troops in the face of vastly superior numbers of an elated enemy, who were now commencing to overlap them on all sides. The retirement to the fort commenced, and Captain Campbell, even though he was very severely wounded in the knee, mounted a pony and helped to keep the troops in order and steady. This trying manœuvre was effected by alternate parties, the men dribbling off to the rear by word of command while the remainder kept up a heavy fire to keep off the enemy. Captain Townshend always remained with the last party in order to prevent any panic or disorder arising, and in this way the party reached a house about a mile from the fort, where Mr. Robertson was found rallying men who had retired before, and here a short stand was made, while Mr. Robertson, at great risk and exposed to a heavy fire from the enemy now lining the garden walls and houses on every side, rode back to the fort to bring out fifty of Lieutenant Harley's Sikhs to cover the retirement.

It was now quite dark, and the enemy were firing into Captain Townshend's troops from front, flank, and rear, from every hamlet and wall. The Chitralis and Pathans were wild with excitement at the unexpected success of their first encounter with the British, and, carried away in the whirl of enthusiasm, even women hurled down stones upon the retiring troops. Groping their way, and unable at a short distance to distinguish friend from foe, Captain Townshend brought his men along between walls flashing out fire in the darkness till he reached the serai near the fort, where he found fifty Sikhs under Lieutenant Harley come out to cover his retreat. Steady as on parade, and calm and unmoved amidst all the excitement around them, Harley and his veterans headed back the storm while the Kashmir troops retired to the fort. Then he and his men slowly retired within the walls also while the enemy closed thickly around, and the investment commenced which was to last forty-seven long days and weary nights.

But when the officers arrived within the walls it was found that two of their number were missing. Neither Dr. Whitchurch nor Captain Baird had yet arrived. It was known that Baird had been desperately wounded, and deep anxiety regarding the fate of him and Whitchurch was felt, when, at about eight o'clock, Whitchurch was seen from the walls staggering along towards the gateway, supporting and half carrying Baird along. At the beginning of the action Baird, with about fifty men, had been sent away on the right to work round the enemy's flank. With his handful of men, and with Lieutenant Gurdon by his side, he ascended the steep rocky mountain slopes which overlook the valley. It is a generally accepted principle of warfare that an attacking party should be divided into an advance party and a support, and this principle was now acted upon; but Captain Baird, with his characteristic zeal, would not remain with the support, and determined on leading the advance himself. And Lieutenant Gurdon, who, being Political Officer was not present in the reconnaissance in a strictly military capacity, was as anxious as Baird to be in front. So the two British officers agreed to go on together with the advance.