The War of the Axe; Or, Adventures in South Africa

by J. Percy Groves

Up this valley G—n led his column, fighting over every yard of the broken ground, until—just as night was falling—he reached the open country in the vicinity of Chumie Hoek. The Caffres here made one more desperate attempt to take the guns, but the gunners opening upon them with shot and shell, repulsed the attack, and it was not renewed; the column then marched on, and eventually arrived in camp with the loss of an artillery waggon, which had to be abandoned owing to the collapse of its team of bullocks...

We must now return to the rear-guard, and see how it had fared with our friends in “Jamieson’s Horse” during that eventful day.

When the officer commanding the rear-guard heard that the escort of the centre division of the convoy was being driven back, and that the waggons were in imminent danger of falling into the enemy’s hands, he consulted with Captain Jamieson as to whether he should not take it upon himself to send a troop to their assistance; but before he had time to come to a decision a mounted orderly arrived from the front with the alarming intelligence that the waggons had already been captured, and that the road was entirely blocked; he also brought an order that “Jamieson’s Horse” should be sent forward at once, to retake the waggons and hold the enemy in check until the road had been cleared.

Anxious to reach the scene of the disaster without a moment’s delay, and being well aware that if he advanced along the road he must necessarily meet with more or less hindrance, Captain Jamieson wheeled the corps to the left, and started off at a hand-gallop across country until he lost sight of the convoy; when he changed direction to the right and led his men over some broken ground, which ran almost parallel to, and was within easy rifle-shot of the road. They had advanced about three parts of a mile over this ground, and were within half that distance of the captured waggons—which were now completely surrounded by hundreds of the enemy—when Frank Jamieson, who was riding at the head of the leading troop, espied—away to the left front—a small party of Caffres driving off the bullock teams into the mountains. He at once pointed them out to his father, who ordered him to follow in pursuit with fifteen men, and do his best to recover the teams and bring them back as quickly as possible.

“Without them,” said the captain, “I do not see how we can take the waggons on; for I heard Thompson say that he had no spare draught cattle.”

As soon as Frank had ridden off, Captain Jamieson and the remainder of the corps galloped onwards, and—the nature of the ground and the “din of battle” favouring them—they approached within a couple of hundred yards of the baggage-train without attracting attention; for those of the enemy who were not actually engaged with either the advance-guard or escorts, were busily employed plundering the waggons. Jamieson’s volunteers were thus enabled to deliver a telling volley, and then charge down on the Caffres before the latter were thoroughly alive to the fact that they were being attacked from that quarter; and so impetuous was this charge, that the little band rode right through the dense masses of the enemy up to the waggons without losing a single man or horse. The next minute the Caffres, recovering from their surprise, closed in upon the gallant horsemen, and for a little while there was some desperate hand-to-hand fighting, in which, however, Jamieson and his men at first held their own. But the Caffres outnumbered them twenty to one, and, moreover, were excited to such a pitch of fury that they were utterly reckless of their lives; and as fast as one was cut down or shot, half a dozen others would press forward to take his place; many, too, actually crawled on all-fours amongst the plunging horses, and thrust their assegais again and again into the poor brutes’ bellies, and so in a short time nearly one-third of the volunteers were dismounted, and assegaied before they could disengage themselves from their dead chargers. And now the corps got broken up into groups, and the end soon came.

Amongst the first who had their horses killed, were Captain Jamieson, young Flinders, and Sergeant-major Keown; they, however, at the time, escaped personal injury, and so continued to fight on foot until they found themselves separated from their comrades, and standing at bay with their backs against a waggon.

Three worthier representatives of our glorious triune kingdom never faced their sovereign’s foes!

On the left of the “dauntless three” stood the fine old Scotchman, cool and calm as if at sword-play; his grey head bare, his tall commanding figure reared to the full height, his long cavalry sabre red with the blood of his enemies. Next to him was our young hero, a trifle less collected than his veteran chief, but not a whit less fearless; could any of his former school-fellows have beheld Tom Flinders at that moment, they would have rested content that the honour of Rugby was safe in his hands! Tom had lost his sword when his horse was killed, and he was now defending himself with an assegai snatched from an enemy’s hand.

Then on the right—close beside his master’s son—stood that brave and honest son of “Ould Erin,” Patrick Keown, armed with an old-pattern dragoon sabre, which he had picked up cheap in some Cape Town store, and had had sharpened until its edge was as keen as that of a scythe. Patrick Keown was a splendid swordsman (he had been sergeant-instructor of fencing to the C.M.E.), and not a few Caffres had fallen beneath his stalwart arm during the fray; but, alas! that good right arm now hung powerless—for an assegai had pierced it through and through, and poor Patrick’s coat-sleeve was literally saturated with the crimson stream that gushed from the wound—and it was his left hand that was clenched within the basket hilt. Round these devoted men was gathered a mob of yelling savages, who thirsted for their blood, yet hesitated to come within reach of their formidable weapons.