Endeavours to clear the obstruction.
Unfortunately the derailed armoured car and truck blocked the line and had to be removed. The Boer guns had changed their position, and opened a pitiless fire at a range of 1,300 yards. None the less, the men of the Durban Light Infantry and the Dublin Fusiliers, led by Captain Haldane and Mr. Winston Churchill—sometime a lieutenant in the Army and now acting as a newspaper correspondent—bravely set to work. Shells and bullets rained upon them, yet, in spite of this, one truck was dragged backwards and then toppled over so as almost to clear the line; it still overlapped slightly, and the engine was set to work to butt it aside. There was great danger of derailing or injuring the locomotive in this operation. Attempt after attempt was made carefully, with unsuccess. Each time the engine moved it a little, but only a little, and the successive pushes failed to clear the line. At last, however, a well-aimed shell struck the locomotive, setting the wood with which it was protected on fire, and the driver in despair turned on full steam. With a grating, tearing sound the engine tore its way past, but, unhappily, the armoured car and truck behind it parted their couplings, and could not be got past the obstruction. They had to be abandoned.
THE DISASTER TO THE ARMOURED TRAIN NEAR CHIEVELEY.
In which Mr. Winston Spencer Churchill, the special correspondent of The Morning Post, son of the late Lord Randolph Churchill, distinguished himself by his gallant conduct.
As many of the wounded as possible were placed on the engine, and keeping on the further side of it the survivors retreated. The Boers, however, poured in such a hot fire that order soon vanished from the British force. The engine had to put on steam to escape; the infantry were left behind, and dropped here and there crying for help. A few were doubling to some houses for shelter, when a wounded private raised the white flag.
[Photo by Gregory.
Born, 1839; entered 60th Rifles, 1858; served in China, 1860; Red River Expedition, 1870; Ashanti War, 1874; Kaffir War, 1878; Zulu War, 1878-9; Deputy Adjutant-General, 1885; Under Secretary for Ireland, 1887; Adjutant-General, 1890; Lieut.-General, 1891; in command at Aldershot, 1898; appointed to command of Army Corps, South Africa, 1899. Sir Redvers Buller arrived in Capetown October 31; having matured his plans he went on to Natal, arriving on November 25.