But even then all was not over. The great, the supreme effort to recapture Wagon Hill came at four o’clock in the afternoon. The lightning flashed, the thunder rolled, the hail clattered and splashed, the guns blazed, vomited, and growled, and the silky whistle of bullets made a flute-like treble to the awful orchestra of sound. In the midst of the uproar the Boers again obstinately advanced up the heights, firing deliberately as they came. On their heads poured the wrath of the British guns, and among their numbers rained the ceaseless bullets of the Infantry; but they steadily moved up, doggedly determined once more to reach the crest of the hill. They came nearer and ever nearer till, on a sudden, they flung themselves upon the Devons, who, cheering wildly, rushed into their midst and dispersed them. One short moment—one wild, valiant rush, and then—then the trusty British bayonets dripped with gore, and the Boers—all that were left of them, a racing, disorganised rabble—surged madly down the hill!
The worst was over; the British conquerors rushed after the retreating foe. The Devons, led by their intrepid commander, charged down the slope, and this time, with a wild exultant yell—which echoed like a tocsin among the caves and the boulders and the honeycombed banks of the river—effectually drove the fleeing herd from the scene of carnage.
The lost ground was recovered, but the lost lives.... Yes; they, too, live in the glorious annals of British history.
Captain Lafone, Lieutenants Field and Walker were among the slain; and Lieutenant Masterton was wounded. The splendid charge cost the Devons all the company officers—fifteen killed and forty wounded!
THE GREAT ASSAULT ON LADYSMITH—THE DEVONS CLEARING WAGON HILL.
Drawing by W. T. Maud.
It was a dreadful seventeen hours’ work. Not a soul but had his duty, and more than his duty, cut out for him. The jolly Jack Tars stood to their guns from morn till night, blazing away with marvellous accuracy and precision, while the gallant Natal Police, Natal Carabineers, and Mounted Rifles were wedged between the Boers from Mount Bulwana and the rest of their attacking party, and signally defeated all their efforts to effect a junction. The Manchester Regiment, the Border Regiment, a detachment of Mounted Rifles, the Gordon Highlanders, and the Rifle Brigade defended the east of Cæsar’s Camp like heroes, while on the west, as we know, the Imperial Light Horse, more Gordon Highlanders, the Devon Regiment, the King’s Royal Rifles, and a Naval detachment did glorious deeds. The Naval Brigade and the Natal Naval Volunteers occupied a central position, while three batteries of the Field Artillery were perched on a hill, and one remained on the ground below. All these were called upon to act with might and main to avert the pending calamity, to meet the stubborn, mulish persistency of the Boers with its match in British bulldog obstinacy, and show the enemy that with all the odds against them the besieged would never surrender. Valiantly—almost miraculously—they held their own. They who for months had been exposed to privation of all kinds, who had fought engagement after engagement, who had eaten, drunk, and slept with the shadow of death hanging over them, knowing that at any moment the caprice of fate might make them victims to the incoming shells or threatened disease, came out with enfeebled frames, but wills of iron, determined to conquer or to die.