So soon as the enemy saw me under arms and observed my retrograde movement, they disposed of themselves in the most dexterous manner, so as to attack me wherever able, and made frequent feints in one direction so as to attack in another. But so well were my orders obeyed, and so alert was every officer and soldier, fully aware that one error would occasion dire disaster, all these bold attempts were defeated: and I succeeded in crossing the river to the full extent of my most sanguine hopes. When I reached the open country about four miles from the river, the enemy had no cover or ground favourable for molesting me, and I pursued my march uninterrupted, but with great caution and in as compact a body as possible. Three thousand cattle cover a deal of ground, and but for the ability of the Hottentots as drovers I should never have succeeded in bringing them off.
In all my previous service I was never placed in a position requiring more cool determination and skill, and as one viewed the handful of my people compared with the thousands of brawny savages all round us, screeching their war-cry, calling to their cattle, and indicating by gesticulations the pleasure they would have in cutting our throats, the scene was animating to a degree. I continued my march and recrossed the Kei on the 17th May, and rejoined the main body under his Excellency Sir B. D’Urban, having completed a march of 218 miles in seven days and a half, over a rugged and mountainous country, intersected by deep rivers at the bottom of precipitous ravines and rivulets difficult to cross, having had to march for hours without any road at all, bringing with me 3000 captured cattle and 1000 Fingoes, who had flocked to me with their families for protection, and added considerably to my difficulties; and all this effected without the loss of an individual except those whose fatuity, or rather indiscretion, had placed them—so contrary to my caution and my anticipation of danger—within the grasp and power of the undaunted and stealthy savage.
On my reaching Sir Benjamin D’Urban, he gave out—
“21 May, 1835.
“The Commander-in-Chief has again the gratification of recording the military skill and indefatigable activity of Colonel Smith, and the admirable discipline, zeal, and determined spirit of the troops under his orders in the recent expedition beyond the mouth of the Bashee. Upon no former occasion—and there have been many during this campaign where they have well earned praise for their high qualities—have they displayed them in a more eminent degree. They marched in seven days 218 miles; overcame all opposition, notwithstanding that this was obstinately attempted by several thousands of armed and determined savages; crossed and recrossed a large river of very difficult banks, and brought off from the further side three thousand head of cattle which had been plundered from the Colony. They have also achieved a still more important service in the course of this bold and rapid inroad: they have rescued from destruction and safely brought in one thousand of the Fingo race, who from their remote situation had been before unable to join their countrymen now under British protection, and who would inevitably have been sacrificed to the fury of the savages so soon as they should have had leisure to think of them.
“For these services, effected too without loss from the ranks, the Commander-in-Chief returns his thanks to all the troops employed, officers and soldiers, and he especially offers them to Colonel Smith.”
The Governor was much depressed at the unfortunate loss of the chief Hintza by his own treachery, not only from the natural feeling of humanity towards the individual, but because he fully anticipated the hold the canting party would take of it in England. Such men, stripping facts of all collateral circumstances, so changed the features of that incident as to twist it into the tortuous shape of their own cunning duplicity. For my own part, I was firmly based in my conscientious rectitude, of which Almighty God alone was Witness and Judge, and anything which man could say I disregarded. I admit, however, that at the moment I did not expect to be called a bloodthirsty murderer in every print in every quarter of our dominions, or to be shamefully abandoned by the Minister of the Colonies,[108] whose duty it was in such assaults honestly to have supported and sustained me against the misled voice of the public, and not to have sacrificed me at the shrine of cringing party spirit when I had so faithfully, so zealously, and so energetically saved for him the Colony of the Cape. He remained in office long enough to repent and acknowledge his error. My own rectitude of conscience prevented me ever caring an iota for these miscreants’ assaults, and I was ultimately thanked by the minister; although not till I had undergone the ordeal of inquiry by a court of investigation, levelled at me, but assembled on Mr. Southey, by whose hand the chief lost his life (August and Sept., 1836).
The Governor prepared to move into the colony, as soon as he had taken possession of the country on the right bank of the Kei, some years previously wrested from the Hottentots by the Kafirs, and as soon as he had founded the city of King William’s Town [24 May] immediately on the left bank of the Buffalo, and established corresponding posts throughout the newly added “Province of Queen Adelaide.”
The army marched from its position on the Kei, establishing posts on the line of road towards Grahamstown, and headquarters were established on the 22nd May, on the site of the new city, King William’s Town, and remained there till the 11th June, when the Commander-in-Chief returned to Grahamstown.
During this period, with a small force of cavalry and infantry, I made some most rapid and extensive marches throughout the whole of the new province, the object being, in virtue of the proclamation, to compel the Kafirs to return behind the Kei in the spirit of that conquest by which they had some years previously crossed it. A more harassing duty for myself and troops cannot be imagined, although the troops had the best of the fatigue, for after each excursion I took fresh parties.