Immediately upon entering the town my company was sent on to the hill behind it to guard against any attack, and the men of the Loyal North Lancashire regiment presently worked round along the ridge of the higher hills beyond, and posted pickets on all points of vantage. I therefore did not actually witness the destruction of the wireless installation. Neither I nor my men had had anything to eat since the previous evening and very little since the evening before we left the ship, but we got some bananas in the plantations on the hillsides below us, though only a few of them were ripe. My men, however, brought me two fine large ones quite ripe and of a most delicious flavour.
There was a sort of arsenal on the hill we were guarding, and this was blown up about 5 o'clock, an immense amount of ammunition being destroyed. The houses of the German residents, probably Government officials for the most part, were very well and comfortably built and furnished. The arsenal in the town was set alight and great quantities of ammunition and some dynamite destroyed. A good deal of beer and wine and provisions of various kinds was discovered in Bukoba, but I saw no drunkenness amongst our men.
Just at sundown the order came from General Stewart that our battalion was to parade and march to the jetty and re-embark at once. But at first we had to bury our dead. A great grave was dug in the sandy soil, between the burning arsenal and the Governor's house, and in it were laid three deep the bodies of six Britons, still swathed in their blood-stained clothes, who had given their lives for King and Country, far, far away from their native land and all who held them dear. These men had all been killed outright, but two more who had died of their wounds after being taken to the hospital-ship were brought ashore and buried within sound of the murmuring waters of the great inland lake. Altogether our casualties amounted to twenty; 8 killed and 12 wounded. The re-embarkation of our battalion took a very long time, and it was not till 2 a.m. on the morning of June 24th that my company, A, at last got on board. Until then we had been sitting and lying about on the jetty in our wet clothes, without food, fire, or warm tea or coffee.
Before midday on the 24th our flotilla started back across the lake for Kisumu, which we reached on the evening of the 25th. The authorities had made our men intensely uncomfortable on board the steamer by putting a lot of mules on the crowded decks with them. They were able to rest and get food at Kisumu, and about six o'clock on the evening of the 26th we started by train for Nairobi. Again the authorities packed our men like sardines into miserable third-class carriages made for natives. They could surely have given us two trains and so allowed our tired men a little space to stretch themselves. We arrived at Nairobi at 6.30 on the evening of the 27th, and were packed off again at 7 o'clock for Kajiado. One would have thought that as our men had come out from England to fight for East Africa, and that as we had just returned from a successful attack on an enemy's stronghold, and as our time of arrival in Nairobi had been telegraphed on ahead, that something might have been done by the townspeople on behalf of our tired and hungry men; or that even some kind of official welcome might have been accorded them. But not a bite of food for man or officer was to be had on our arrival at Nairobi, and not even hot water could be obtained to make tea with.
Leaving Nairobi on the evening of June 27th, we reached our camp at Kajiado early the following morning, and our first expedition against the Germans was at an end.
F. C. Selous,
Lieutenant 25th Battalion
Royal Fusiliers.
In a letter to his friend Heatley Noble (July 26th, 1915), Selous, who was then with his battalion guarding the Uganda railway near Voi, speaks of the difficulties lying ahead of our people and the efforts, only partially successful, to hold our territory against the splendidly organized German forces.
"Since our fight at Bukoba we have made an attack on a German post in British territory on the road from Voi to Taveta. Our attack in this case failed, as our information seems to have been all wrong, and the Germans were found to be more strongly posted than had been supposed. An Indian Punjabi regiment was badly cut up, the Colonel killed and the Adjutant wounded and taken prisoner. The native porters, carrying ammunition and equipment of all kinds, threw down everything and cleared as soon as the first shots were fired, and the Germans took possession of everything, including the dead and wounded. They buried the Colonel with full military honours, and allowed the Adjutant to send word that he was being well looked after. There were several other units engaged in this affair, 500 Rhodesians, some of the Loyal North Lancs, and three companies of the K.A.R.; but the casualties in all these contingents were very small, only the Indian regiment apparently having got up against the machine-guns. Things are now at a standstill out here, and when there will be another move it is impossible to say. Botha had 50,000 men, and equipment of all kinds to conquer the Germans in South-West Africa, and he did his job splendidly. Here we have under 2000 white troops, some 2000 African blacks and a considerable number of Indians, most of them very much demoralized as they caught it badly at Tanga and Jasin. The Germans are said to have 4000 or 5000 white men in G.E.A. and nearly 20,000 very well trained black troops under German officers.[73] They are, too, splendidly equipped in every way, and have no end of machine-guns and ammunition. Even if we had a large army here, we could not move it across country to the vital points in G.E.A., as the difficulties of transport would be insurmountable. The only way would be to take Dar-es-Salaam and Tanga, and then advance methodically up their railways, as Botha did in S.W. Africa. For this we should require at least 20,000 or 30,000 men, and as we are not likely to get them, in my opinion we shall be stuck out here until peace is made in Europe. I hope to God that will be before many months are over, or all our young men will be killed. I hope and trust your sons are still alive. I often think of them and of your and Mrs. Noble's terrible anxiety. There has been a lot of sickness—fever and dysentery—both amongst the officers and men of this battalion, but only two deaths—two privates died of dysentery. I think that I am the only one of our officers who has not suffered at all from either bad diarrhœa, dysentery or fever. I have been quite well all the time, and have never been an hour off duty. Bukoba was rather hard, scarcely any food for two days and nights, up to our chests in the swamps, and then lying out in our wet clothes without fire or blanket. I did not suffer any after-effects at all, I am glad to say, and have now got into very good condition. The long marches do not tire me at all, and the men now say that when I fall out no one will be left standing in the battalion. This is, of course, nonsense, but as far as standing fatigue, sun, thirst, etc., I think that I am really better than most of them. Three of our officers have been found unfit for further service, and there are some others who are weak constitutionally, and will never be able to stand any really hard work. So we are very short of officers, and whether Colonel Driscoll's recommendation in my favour for good conduct in the field is attended to or not, I shall very likely get to be a captain before long, as I am the senior subaltern in the battalion. I don't know my drill very well, but my men, I hear, say they have great confidence in me, and will go anywhere with me; but once I am through with this job, no more military duty for me. I hate all the drill and routine-work, and I shall be far too old to take part in any other war after this one."
In a letter to me, written from Voi (December 8th, 1915), Selous gives a short general survey of the operations since he landed.