The Gold Coast Regiment in the East African Campaign

by Sir Hugh Charles Clifford

It looked at the moment as though von Lettow-Vorbeck’s forces were at last in a fair way to be surrounded, and it was anticipated that his main body would try to escape viâ Chiwata, leaving strong rear-guards to keep both “Linforce” and “Hanforce” in play, and to delay their advance.

On the 11th November No. 1 Column remained encamped at Ndanda Mission Station, two strong patrols being sent out; the one toward Nangus and the other toward Chiwata. The latter was undertaken by B Company of the Gold Coast Regiment, which went some miles down the track without seeing any traces of the enemy.

On the 12th November No. 1 Column marched back to Chigugu, its objective being Mwiti, which is situated on the right bank of the river of that name—a tributary of the Rovuma—and lies fourteen miles due east of Massassi and about half that distance almost due south of Chiwata.

Moving from Chigugu to Chikukwe on the 13th November, No. 1 Column attacked and occupied Mwiti on the 14th November. The Gold Coast Regiment, however, was in reserve upon this day and took no part in the action beyond sending a patrol, furnished by I Company, to occupy a ridge on the right of the advance of the 2nd Battalion of the 2nd Regiment of the King’s African Rifles. This was achieved without opposition from the enemy.

The country in which “Hanforce” was now operating consisted of a succession of hills which rise from the plain to the height of anything from 1000 to 2000 feet, and are grouped about the western and southern flanks of the great Makonde plateau. The latter, which towers above the highest of its foothills by a good 1000 feet or more, is an elevated piece of flat land, roughly circular in shape, situated between the Lukuledi and Rovuma rivers to the north-east of Newala, and measuring approximately forty miles from north to south and again from east to west. The slopes of all these hills and those which lead up to the plateau are covered by grass and trees; and though the latter are sparsely scattered over the hillsides, they grow more thickly in the valleys, which seen from above seem to be choked with vegetation. The foothills are intersected by deep ravines and gorges, and it was through these that von Lettow-Vorbeck’s forces were now making their way in the direction of Newala, the last German base in this part of the country.

Word had been received from the War Office on the 9th November that a German airship was en route for East Africa, and later it was reported that it had started, that it intended to effect a landing on the summit of the Makonde Plateau, and that it might be expected to arrive on the 14th November. This was precisely the sort of spectacular performance, dear to the German heart, in which the enemy so frequently indulged during the war, and which usually involved him in expense and risk altogether disproportionate to the military value that could thereby conceivably be secured. It was doubtless thought by simple folk in Berlin that the dramatic arrival of a Zeppelin on the battlefields of East Africa would fill the native troops fighting against von Lettow-Vorbeck with awe, terror and despair, and would produce upon them the demoralizing effect which a belief that the Germans stood possessed of supernatural powers might be expected to inspire. But the Oriental and African native of to-day is a thoroughly blasé person who has long ago outgrown such childish weaknesses. To put the matter colloquially, he is “fed up” with European inventions, which have almost ceased to amuse or interest him, and have long ago ceased to excite his wonder, much less his fear. The arrival of a German Zeppelin at this juncture would have been welcomed by the men of the Gold Coast Regiment, for instance, as a bright spot breaking the drab monotony of their days; while the British airmen, who by now were heartily sick of the practical inutility of most of the work that they were doing in East Africa, would have hailed its coming with even greater joy. The Zeppelin is believed to have actually made a start from Aleppo, or from some other place in Asia Minor, but if so it was recalled before it had proceeded far upon its journey. Perhaps von Lettow-Vorbeck, who throughout received frequent messages from his Government by wireless, and who may occasionally have been able to communicate with it in his turn, warned the Great General Staff that an airship could produce no effect, military or moral, that it was pretty certain to be wrecked, and that, in a word, the game was not worth the candle.

The mission station at Mwiti, unlike most of its counterparts in East Africa, has been built upon flat land, shut in toward the north and east by a semicircular range of hills; and from this place the Pioneer Company of the Gold Coast Regiment was sent on the 15th November to patrol to Manyambas, six and a half miles to the south-east, which is connected with Mwiti by a track skirting the base of the hills. The Pioneers left half a company at Maruchiras, a place on this track beyond the Miwale River, a left affluent of the Mwiti, which in its turn is a left tributary of the Rovuma; for the enemy had now been driven south of the Mambir, the last river of note in erstwhile German East Africa, and had been definitely pushed into the valley of the Rovuma, which is the northern boundary of the Portuguese possessions.

Meanwhile, at 2 p.m., the rest of the Gold Coast Regiment marched out of camp at Mwiti, and breasting a long slope in an easterly direction, ascended to the summit of a hill lying immediately under the lee of the escarpment which, across a deep valley, leads up to the Makonde Plateau. The latter rising directly to the north of Miwale Hill, the eminence occupied by the Gold Coast Regiment, soared above it to a height of perhaps 2000 feet.

The object of this movement was, if possible, to locate a German camp which was believed to exist at Luchemi, in the ravine between Miwale Hill and the slope leading up to the plateau; but looking down from this height, the valley was revealed as a sea of tree-tops and vegetation to the depths of which the eye could not penetrate. At 6.15 p.m. a camp was selected on a spur jutting out into the valley. To the east, however, there rose yet another and a higher spur, connected with that upon which the camp was pitched by a saddle, the whole covered by grass and trees. This spur was reported by a patrol from a picket of the 55th Rifles, which had taken up a position on the northern flank of Miwale Hill prior to the arrival of the Gold Coast Regiment on its eastern summit, to be held by the enemy. This rendered the position of the camp somewhat precarious, and that night no lights or fires were permitted.

Word was received that evening that the Nigerians had occupied Chiwata, five miles to the north, at one o’clock that afternoon, and that on the morrow they would operate from that place against the enemy camp at Luchemi.