At New Moshi Station both telephone and telegraph were working day and night. Where the whole organization had to be improvised friction was not altogether unavoidable. All the members of Headquarters were extraordinarily hard-worked. But we did have bright intervals during the strenuous work. The abundance of creature comforts enjoyed by the Europeans in the North was shared by us at Headquarters. We were literally spoilt by the number of gifts sent us by private individuals. If one of us travelled on the Northern Railway, on which in time of peace it was difficult to obtain a little food for love or money, he was now cared for by someone at almost every station. I remember when Lieut. Freiherr von Schroetter returned to New Moshi, very famished, after carrying out some very exhausting patrols in the country north of Erok Mountain. After having, according to normal ideas, been thoroughly well fed from seven o’clock till eleven, he shyly asked if he might have some supper. The next morning he started on fourteen days’ leave to his plantation in Usambara, in order to recuperate and attend to his business. After breakfast we gave him coffee, bread, butter and meat, to take with him in the train, and had warned the various railway stations to look after this completely famished patroller. So, after half an hour, the station guard at Kahe offered him another breakfast, at Lembeni the charming wife of the Station Commandant had baked him a cake, and at Lame he was looked after by the commander of the local Recruit Depot, Sergt.-Major Reinhardt. At Makanya the guard, Planter Baroy, who belonged to the country, brought him home-made chocolate and bullocks’ hearts—a fruit the size of a melon—at Buiko the hospitable traffic manager of the Northern Railway, Kuehlwein, who had so often entertained us in passing through, had prepared him a delicate meal. At Mombo, where the supplies from the Usambara Mountains were collected, and where we had established most of our workshops, our protégé was met by Warrant Officer Meyer, of the Navy, with a sustaining supper. But then we got a telegram: “Please do not order any more, I can’t eat any more.”
Although this continuous feeding shows a spirit of sympathetic chaff at the expense of the starving subaltern, it also proves, better than any theoretical dissertations, how intimately all classes of the population of the northern districts worked in with the troops, and how they tried to anticipate our every wish. This co-operation continued as long as the troops remained in the North.
Whenever duty gave us a chance we arranged for change and recuperation. On Sundays we often went out together near New Moshi for a cheery day’s shooting. Both carriers and Askari soon picked up their business as beaters, and drove the game towards us in exemplary order, with loud shouts of “Huyu, huyu:” “There he is.” For variety of game the country provided more than one would be likely to find anywhere in Europe: hare, various dwarf antelopes, guinea-fowl, several relatives of the partridge, duck, bush-buck, water-buck, lynx, several kinds of wild boar, small kudu, jackal and many other kinds of game abounded. Once, I remember, to my astonishment, a lion silently appeared fifteen paces in front of me. Unfortunately I had my gun in my hand, and before I could put up my rifle, which was on my knees, he had as silently disappeared. In the teeming Kilima Njaro country, and even more east of Taveta, our shooting expeditions provided a welcome increase to our meat supply. But in the main this depended on the cattle which the Masai brought us from the Kilima Njaro and Meru country, but which also came from far away near Lake Victoria.
CHAPTER VI
FURTHER HEAVY FIGHTING IN THE NORTH-EAST
BY the time we kept Christmas in the Mission Church at New Moshi, and afterwards in our mess in the Railway Station, the military situation north of Tanga had become sufficiently acute to indicate that decisive events in this quarter were probable. During the last days of December, our patrols, who in that district were on British territory, had been gradually pushed back, and had concentrated south of Jassini, on German territory. The combined force amounted to two companies and a corps of some two hundred Arabs. The enemy had obviously been reinforced, and occupied the buildings of the German plantation of Jassini. It looked as though he intended to push gradually forward along the coast to Tanga, securing the occupied country by a system of block-houses. In order to investigate matters on the spot, I travelled early in January with Capt. von Hammerstein to Tanga, and thence by car to Capt. Adler’s camp at Mwurnoni, using the newly-completed coast road to the north, a distance of thirty-eight miles. Lieut. Bleeck, of the Reserve, whose numerous successful patrols in that country rendered him particularly suitable for the purpose, accompanied me on my reconnaissance, from which I learned that the country for miles round Jassini consisted principally of a cocoanut plantation belonging to the German East African Company, which was also planted with sisal, a species of agave with sharp thorns. This sisal, which formed a dense undergrowth among the palms, was in many places so interlaced that one could only force one’s way through by enduring a quantity of very unpleasant pricks. It is, of course, always difficult to make plans for an action in country so totally unknown to one without the aid of a map, and relying only on the reports of patrols. In this case we got over the difficulty as Lieut. Schaefer, of the Reserve, who had been called to the colours, had for years held the post of Assistant on this plantation, and could therefore furnish exact information. A tolerably accurate sketch was prepared, and the battle-names allotted to various localities were entered on it. The general situation appeared to be that Jassini was an advanced post, and that the main body of the enemy was in fortified camps further north. It was to be assumed that an attack on the advanced post of Jassini would entice the main body to leave its camps and fight in the open (sic!). My plan was to take advantage of this possibility. In order to engage the enemy while hurrying from his places of assembly to the assistance of the advanced post, in favourable tactical conditions, I intended to place my troops in readiness on his probable lines of advance, in such a manner that he would have to run up against them.
In this closely-settled country supply presented no difficulty, and the necessary carriers could be provided by the numerous European plantations. So the companies ordered up by telegraph from New Moshi had only to be accompanied by their machine-gun and ammunition carriers, a considerable advantage in arranging for their railway journey. This was accomplished rapidly and without friction, thanks to the proved capacity of the Commandant of the Line, Lieutenant Kroeber, retired, of the Landwehr, and the understanding and consuming zeal with which the whole personnel of the railway bore the unavoidable strain without a murmur.
By the 16th January the companies from New Moshi had detrained a couple of miles west of Tanga, and at once marched off towards Jassini, as well as the troops from Tanga, for the immediate protection of which only one company was left behind. On the evening of the 17th January the force of nine companies, with two guns, was assembled at Totohown plantation, seven miles south of Jassini, and orders for the attack were issued for the following morning. Major Kepler, with two companies, was directed to attack the village of Jassini, working round by the right, and Captain Adler, with two more companies, had a similar task on the left. To the north-west, on the road from Semanya, was posted the Arab corps. Captain Otto, with the 9th Company, advanced frontally by the main road on Jassini, followed immediately by Headquarters and the main body, consisting of the European Company, three Askari Companies, and two guns. The marches were so arranged that the attacks on Jassini should take place simultaneously at daybreak, and that all columns should mutually support each other by pushing on with energy. Even before daybreak the first shots fell in the vicinity of Kepler’s column, a few minutes later firing began in front of us with Otto’s column, and then became general. It was impossible in the endless dense palm forest to obtain an even approximate idea of what was really happening. We were, however, already so close up to the hostile position at Jassini, that the enemy seemed to be surprised, in spite of his excellent intelligence service. This supposition was afterwards, in part at least, confirmed. Of our rapid concentration south of Jassini, and our immediate attack with such strong forces, the enemy had actually had no idea.
Otto’s column quickly drove back an entrenched post in its front, and Headquarters now made a circuit to the left through the forest, where first one, and then two more companies, were put in so as to outflank Jassini. What seemed curious was that in this move we came under a very well-aimed fire at short range, possibly no more than 200 yards; and it was not till much later that we learned that the enemy had not only a weak post in Jassini, but that four companies of Indians were also established there in a strongly constructed and excellently concealed fort. Suddenly Captain von Hammerstein, who was walking behind me, collapsed; he had been shot in the abdomen. Deeply as this affected me, at the moment I had to leave my badly-wounded comrade in the hands of the doctor. A few days later the death of this excellent officer tore a gap in the ranks of our Staff which was hard to fill.