[CHAPTER XV.]
THE FIRST BATTALION.
1900-1902.
SOUTH AFRICA (continued).
SLABBERT’S NEK: THE BRANDWATER BASIN: BERGENDAL: MONUMENT HILL: LYDENBURG: THE MOUNTED INFANTRY OF THE ROYAL IRISH REGIMENT.
Two days after Bethlehem was taken, General Hunter’s column entered the town, and Clements fell back towards Senekal to obtain the supplies of which his men were much in need. After a week’s halt at Biddulphsberg, the 12th brigade was recalled by General Hunter, now in command of the whole of the troops in the eastern Free State, to take part in a great combined movement against the burghers who had retired into the hilly region drained by the river Brandwater, and locally known as the Brandwater Basin. It is bounded on the south by the river Caledon, the frontier of the native state of Basutoland, whose savage warriors, longing for a pretext to attack their hereditary enemies the Boers, stood ready to resist any violation of their territory, and thus forbade the passage of the stream. To the west, north, and east the basin is enclosed by high, almost continuous ranges, which, springing from the right bank of the Caledon, form a huge horse-shoe, whose northern foot-hills sink into the plain a few miles south of Bethlehem. This mountain wall is about seventy miles in perimeter, and is crossed at five places by roads fit for wheeled traffic: the western face (the Wittebergen) is pierced by Commando Nek, the northern by Slabbert’s and Retief’s Neks, the eastern (the Roodebergen) by Naauwpoort Nek and the Golden Gate. Very soon after Hunter arrived at Bethlehem, he decided to fight his way with part of his force into the Brandwater Basin from the north and west, and to drive the burghers into the arms of detachments posted at the mouths of Naauwpoort Nek and Golden Gate: but before this plan could be carried into effect he had to wait for supplies of food and ammunition, and it was not until a fortnight after the occupation of Bethlehem that his troops were ready to begin work. On July 21st, his army was thus distributed: Rundle with the 8th and Colonial divisions stretched from Ficksburg to Senekal; the brigades of Clements and Paget lay at Wit Kop and Witnek, a few miles north-west of Slabbert’s Nek; the Highland brigade (the 3rd, under Major-General MacDonald), stood at Bethlehem ready to march on Retief’s Nek; and Major-General Bruce-Hamilton with the 12th brigade, to which part of the Royal Irish mounted infantry had been attached, commanded the exit from Naauwpoort Nek. Next day orders were issued for a general attack along the whole of the western and northern line; Rundle was to bombard Commando Nek, while Clements and MacDonald assaulted Slabbert’s Nek and Retief’s Nek respectively. Clements advanced on the 22nd to Bester’s Kop, the enemy’s outposts retiring before him towards Slabbert’s Nek. He had only two of his four battalions at that moment with him, for the Worcestershire had been temporarily detached, and the Bedfordshire had not rejoined from Lindley.
During the night, the draft of ninety-eight non-commissioned officers and men, with whom Major Lysaght had joined the battalion on the 18th, had a rough introduction to the joys of campaigning in South Africa: there was a great storm; rain fell in torrents; many of the horses broke loose and stampeded in every direction, and when the Royal Irish fell in after a hurried meal of sodden biscuit and bully beef, they were wet to the skin, and longed for the excitement of a fight to get their blood once more in circulation. But the General’s plans had been kept secret, and the Royal Irish, who were in advance-guard, had no idea that an action was imminent, and trudged wearily over the rough surface of the rolling down, scarcely glancing at the curious line of isolated kopjes which, at intervals of a mile or more, rose like watch towers across their path. Suddenly distant firing was heard; at the sound of the guns the XVIIIth stepped out vigorously, and soon discovered that Brabant’s Horse, the cavalry screen to the column, were being shelled by the defenders of Slabbert’s Nek. As Clements reconnoitred this formidable position, he found that its difficulties had not been exaggerated by his guides—loyal Britons settled in the Free State, who at the outbreak of the war had placed their local knowledge at the disposal of the Intelligence department. The Nek, or pass, ran through a defile about half a mile in width, overhung by steep, almost precipitous mountains, and its entrance was partially barred by a low rounded knoll, with smooth glacis-like sides, seamed with trenches which swept the ground to the front and flanks. To the left of the defile, as he looked at it, was a long square-topped kopje, with cliff-like walls that only a goat could climb: to the right stretched another kopje, higher, longer, and more irregular in shape, with five great spurs projecting from its rugged flank. Above these spurs rose a series of ledges, like the steps of a gigantic staircase; the hillside was strewn with boulders and honeycombed with caves, and the topmost peak raised its snowy crest nearly two thousand feet above the plain. The greater part of this kopje was held by the left wing of the enemy, and Clements realised that until he had taken it he could not hope to force the pass; therefore, as soon as his flanks were covered by mounted troops, and his artillery had begun to shell the trenches on the Nek, he directed Lieutenant-Colonel Grenfell, with part of his corps (the 1st Brabant’s Horse) and a few Imperial Yeomanry, to seize one of the projecting spurs. This mission the irregulars fulfilled, but when they began to scale the ledges they were brought to a standstill by a furious burst of musketry; the General at once ordered two companies of the Wiltshire to occupy a spur on the right of that ascended by Brabant’s Horse, and directed the Colonel of the Royal Irish, who were then about five thousand yards from Grenfell’s spur, to send two companies to reinforce the dismounted troopers. The choice fell on G (Captain Gloster) and H (Captain Daniell), the former being in command of the whole detachment.
After a stiff climb, H company joined Grenfell on one of the ledges or steps in the kopje, where they found Brabant’s Horse hotly engaged with the burghers, who held two tiers of rocks, the lower four or five hundred yards up the hillside, the higher about two hundred yards farther off; another body of the enemy enfiladed the ledge from a donga. In an hour or two Gloster joined Daniell, prolonging the line to the left, where, to quote from a letter of Lieutenant Kelly, a subaltern in G company, “we fired wildly at where we thought the enemy were, for we could not see a man, but had a good idea, as they were shooting uncommonly straight. Brabant’s were on the same ledge with us, and a real cheery lot they were—quite delighted with everything and full of jokes.” Just after the Royal Irish had snatched a mouthful of food, a message arrived from the General, “as soon as you have occupied the spur, send two companies to the top of the hill.” Gloster and Daniell reconnoitred the ground, and decided to “rush” the next belt of rocks, Gloster working up to them from the right, while Daniell made a dash across the open. After sending for ammunition and filling the men’s pouches, Gloster moved forward with half his company, leaving Kelly with the remainder of G company to support his advance with musketry. Following the plan made by the two captains, Daniell gave Gloster about ten minutes’ start, and then pushed on from both flanks, but though Kelly kept up a vigorous fusilade upon the ridge of rocks, the immediate object of the combined attack, the enemy was unshaken, and the bullets fell like hail among the men of H company as they ran up the slope. Suddenly Gloster’s half company began to appear on the right, moving in such a way as to come under the musketry of Kelly’s party, who from their position could not see Gloster’s men; the danger was so imminent that Daniell himself ran back across the fire-swept zone and ordered Kelly to follow him to the ridge, now held by the leading troops. When they reached the front line they found that Gloster, mortally wounded, was sinking rapidly. Again to quote his subaltern: “he had reached the top quite under cover, and in his usual dashing manner was pushing forward in front. He climbed up and looked over a rock; and seeing some Dutchmen quite close, raised his rifle, and as he did so was shot, as was another man in exactly the same way. The bullet passed through the right fore-arm and chest. He was a really gallant fellow, and died nobly.” When Daniell thus succeeded to the command of the detachment, the situation was very unpleasant. The ledge upon which the men crouched was so commanded by the enemy’s fire that every time a soldier peered over it he drew a storm of bullets: and on the left front the burghers seemed to be in force within twenty or thirty yards of our position. The men were anxious to avenge Gloster’s death with the bayonet, but a charge was impossible, for it could only have been delivered on a very narrow front and under converging fire. There was nothing for it but to lie under the crest of the ridge, to keep the men on the alert by shooting at the rocks behind which the Boers were ensconced, and to report by signal that any farther advance would be attended by very serious risk. Fortunately, cartridges never ran short, as the ammunition carriers were able to reach the firing line under cover from the left rear, where Lieutenant Panter-Downes with a few men showed so determined a front that he kept the burghers at a respectful distance, and prevented them from enfilading Daniell’s party.
While Gloster’s detachment was struggling for foothold on the hill the battalion marched towards the foot of Grenfell’s spur; on the way two companies (D under Captain Milner and F under Captain White) were diverted to the left front to watch the burghers in the trenches on the pass. The plain that these companies had to cross looked perfectly level from a distance, but in reality was a series of undulations over which without a landmark it was difficult to move in the right direction. Such a landmark was found in a cluster of Kaffir huts, but the Boers had taken the range accurately, and when D company passed between the kraals it was greeted by a storm of bullets, by one of which Captain Milner was dangerously wounded. Neither company halted until it was about nine hundred yards from the works on Slabbert’s Nek, with whose defenders for the rest of the day they exchanged a slow but steady fire; and from the right of D’s line the Boers who were facing Gloster’s party could be plainly seen; “but,” writes an eye-witness, “we did not dare to shoot much at them, as they were too much mixed up with our men.”
As two companies were acting as escort to the guns, the main body of the XVIIIth was now reduced to two companies of regular soldiers and one of volunteers. This skeleton battalion was finally halted about eighteen hundred yards to the left rear of Grenfell’s spur, and in widely extended lines, lay for many hours exposed to the shots of marksmen, who were so well concealed that they offered a very poor target in return. The headquarter companies of the Royal Irish had nothing to do except to fire an occasional round in the direction from which the enemy’s bullets came; to listen to the bursts of musketry from the hill, and to wonder how long the shells of a pom-pom playing on them from the Nek would continue to fall among the regiment without doing any harm. Happily only one of these horrible little projectiles found a billet: it shattered the big drum, greatly to the amusement of every one, except the drummer, who was fast asleep beside it. The damage to the drum was soon avenged by a 5-in. shell, which smashed the pom-pom and blew several Boer gunners to pieces.
When darkness put an end to the combat, the result of the day’s operations seemed meagre in the extreme. Brabant’s Horse and Gloster’s detachment of the Royal Irish had doubtless made a lodgment on the hill to the right of the pass; but they could do no more than hold their ground, and could expect no help from the two companies of the Wiltshire, who had failed to establish themselves on the spur which they had been ordered to seize. The works on the Nek had been vigorously bombarded, but their defenders appeared to be unshaken by the shells of the artillery and the threatening presence of Paget’s brigade on the left of the guns. But the General was in no way dispirited, for excellent news had reached him in the afternoon. An officer of Brabant’s Horse, who with a small party of mounted men was watching the outer flank of the big kopje, heard that Grenfell and Gloster were “held-up” on the ledges, and determined to ascertain if there was no other way to the top of the hill. By “a most daring and successful reconnaissance” on foot, he discovered a track leading to the summit, running well to the right of the ledges, through ground apparently unoccupied by the enemy. When Clements received this report he saw that once he had gained possession of the top, he could outflank the burghers facing Brabant’s Horse and the Royal Irish, drive them before him into the Nek, and then rake its defences with rifle-fire. As it was then too late to attempt any important movement, he ordered a squadron of Brabant’s (dismounted) to be at the summit by daybreak next morning, promising them the support of four companies of the Royal Irish and two of the Wiltshire regiment, who were not to follow the path discovered by the officer of Brabant’s, but to ascend by a ridge still farther to the right. While most of the infantry bivouacked on the ground they stood on, four companies of the Royal Irish were assembled, and moved to the farmhouse fixed as the rendezvous of the little column. At 4 A.M. on the 24th Lieutenant-Colonel Guinness, who commanded the combined force, began to ascend the kopje, described by General Clements as “an almost unclimbable hill”; four hours’ desperate scrambling brought the Royal Irish, breathless and exhausted, to its highest crest, where they found the dismounted troopers of Brabant’s Horse, who moving by a shorter and easier route had gained the summit some little time before their comrades of the XVIIIth. Hitherto the march had been unopposed, but now a few shots were fired by burghers who appeared more anxious to retire than to fight. Part of the infantry then joined hands with G and H companies whose adventures during the night will be told later; the remainder drove the enemy before them, turned the works upon the Nek, and swept them with musketry from the left rear. A great burst of cheering greeted the appearance of the Royal Irish on the top of the hill; a general advance was ordered; the Boer resistance suddenly collapsed, and by 11 A.M. Clements was master of Slabbert’s Nek.
An officer has supplied the author with a very spirited account of the proceedings of the headquarter companies, from which the following extracts have been taken:—
“We arrived at the farm about 7 or 8 P.M. on the 23rd, without transport, and consequently without blankets or food, on the coldest night I remember having spent during the war. After seeing the men settled and giving them leave to break open their emergency rations, we went into the farm building. Here the Wiltshire officers who had arrived before us, had already made themselves comfortable before a fire in the kitchen, and had a chicken roasting for their breakfast. There were six of us, and we had had nothing inside us since dawn—hence lowering of the moral sense and theft! We had only two emergency rations among us: we ate them: they were excellent, but not enough, and we eyed that bird hungrily until the Wilts nodded: then some one suggested the eating of that chicken. We needed very little persuasion to tear it limb from limb, and we devoured it hastily, like house-breakers at supper in a burgled house! The anger of the Wilts was great when a couple of hours later they awoke; they did not suspect us at the time, thinking we had been all asleep, and their wrath was directed against the men. So warped had our sense of right and wrong become that it was not until we had dined them next day in camp that we gave ourselves away.... After a few hours’ sleep we—i.e., A, D, F, and the volunteers, and two companies of the Wiltshire, started on our night march, led by Colonel Guinness and a guide, and a more miserable time we never had. It was bitterly cold, with a Scotch mist blowing sharply down from the hill above us. The necessity for secrecy forbade our smoking, and the effort to keep from coughing, kicking down stones, and otherwise making a noise was very trying. The track lay up a ‘razor-edge’ sort of ridge, very slippery and strewn with boulders. The higher we climbed the more difficult it became, until finally we were ‘clawing up’ on hands and knees, and the last bit, just as there was a glimmer of light, was the worst of all: we had to pull each other up by our rifles, yet, with precipitous ground all around us, we lost not a man.”