The Last Horseman

by David Gilman

  ‘Let them go!’ Maguire yelled. He had lost two men, one of them a Boer, the other a Frenchman. Their bodies would stay where they lay sprawled across the blood-soaked rocks, the gore already drying to a dark stain in the sun’s heat. ‘Come on, you men! Get them guns hitched. The Irish are comin’ and they’ll put the steel through ya! Hurry now!’ he shouted as he clambered down from their vantage point to the obvious relief of the Boer gunners, who chorused their gratitude. ‘That’s enough blabbering,’ he told them, slapping one of the elders on the shoulder. ‘Ya can buy me a drink later on. Corin, get our horses brought up. We need to be away from this place before them Dublin lads come over that ridge.’

  *

  Sergeant McCory was as good as his word. The Irishmen’s volley followed by rapid gunfire reverberated across the killing ground, its crackling thunder chasing Radcliffe and Pierce like the devil’s hoof beats as they ducked and weaved back towards their horses and the upturned field gun. Neither man could run more than fifty yards without stumbling to his knees and sucking in the dry air. Fear drove them continually back on to their feet, ignoring the pain from strained limbs and rasping lungs. By the time they reached the gun they knew that the Boers would have their field glasses trained on any distant movement.

  Pierce retched and vomited what little was in his stomach; then he and Radcliffe pressed their backs against the upturned gun seeking respite and cover. Both drank thirstily from the canteens. There was no need, and little breath, for either to speak. The wheels were shoulder height; they got their arms on the iron rims and heaved. The gun was lying at an angle, and was unstable: with luck they’d be able to rock it over. However, Pierce had been right; the gun was too heavy. It was also caught in a rut.

  ‘Strip them,’ Pierce cried, pointing to the dead mules as he ran for the horses tied to the wheel of the other damaged gun. Their luck couldn’t hold much longer.

  Radcliffe pulled the yokes and traces from two of the dead animals and then slipped them over the horses’ heads as Pierce tied the traces on to the gun carriage’s wheels. Radcliffe geed the horses up as Pierce steadied the gun. With a crash it settled upright. Shots plucked the air; rocks splintered, startling the horses. They shied and lurched forward, hauling the gun into the shallow cusp of dead ground, enough to offer some meagre shelter.

  ‘Cut the traces!’ Radcliffe yelled, throwing the yokes clear and climbing on to his horse, settling the other as bullets struck the gun’s barrel. Pierce threw himself flat, the horses reared, Pierce’s remount broke free of Radcliffe’s hold and then screamed as Mauser rounds found their mark. ‘I’ll draw them!’ Radcliffe shouted and spurred his horse away, bullets whining above his head.

  Pierce had no time to argue. He got to his feet, yanked the breech open, and reached for one of the blue-tipped shells that lay scattered from the smashed limber. Despite his riding gloves his sweaty hands fumbled the shell’s brass casing, and as he ducked to retrieve it pinging rounds from Boer sharpshooters glanced off the gun’s barrel once more.

  He cursed, yanked free one of the safety pins from the shell and left the other as the dying gunner had told them. He pulled the lever that opened the breech and then rammed in the shell. The gun could fire over three thousand yards and that was too far. He pushed the lever closed. He didn’t aim, hoping that the gun crew had corrected the gun’s elevation before they had been slain. The recoil rocked the gun back on to the axle spade that limited its rearward movement, but the gun still jumped from the force of the shot. As it settled he cleared the breech, pushed in another shell from the caisson, and yanked the lanyard again.

  Bullets sought him out, forcing him down, but as the explosions erupted on the hillside he heard a great cheer from the infantrymen, who broke cover and ran forward. Blood gutters on bayonets caught the sunlight, the sharpened steel glinting as the second shell hurled shrapnel into the Boer positions. Rattling gunfire plucked the dirt, chasing the lone figure who rode crouched low across his horse’s withers. Radcliffe was heading towards the right flank of the hill, aiming for the saddle between the two kopjes. Pierce cursed. His friend would be caught in crossfire if he didn’t get the hell off that horse and find some cover. Instinct was making the Boers shoot at him; there was no other reason. He was no threat, just one man who had dared them. Pierce bent to try and lift the gun’s trail. If only he could move it a few inches the change in angle over the thousand yards could help his friend: Pierce knew the devastating effect the exploding shells would have on the Boer positions. It was a futile effort; the gun’s dead weight defeated him. He saw figures approaching in a crouching run. They were levies carrying stretchers, sent to help the Natal Indian Ambulance Corps. The levies were spread out but two of them fell dead from gunfire; the others hesitated, half ducked, frightened, uncertain what to do. Run or retreat. Pierce yelled at them and waved them on.

  ‘Come on! Run! Here!’

  The men recovered and with shoulders hunched ran towards him. Bullets skipped in the dirt but the levies made it to the gun. He recognized Mhlangana.

  ‘This way!’ Pierce told them, cutting the air with his hand in the direction he wanted the gun shifted. They put their shoulders to the wheel and with brute force shifted the carriage. Another man fell, a bullet tearing through his chest. He writhed and choked in a spasm of sudden pain. The levies’ eyes widened with fear and they froze as they watched him die. ‘Ammunition!’ Pierce shouted, pointing to the scattered shells. ‘Come on! Move it!’

  Pierce loaded the one shell that remained in reach and yanked the lanyard. The powerful explosion made the men wince but it broke the spell. A half-dozen cartridges were quickly gathered and Pierce kept feeding the breech and laying the shrapnel on the distant hill.

  ‘Again!’ he yelled and bent to lift the gun for a wider field of fire. The grunting effort strained every muscle in his legs and back, but the urgency gave him strength. The men heaved; the gun shifted. Pierce pushed two rocks beneath the wheels to stop the recoil then rammed home a shell and tugged the lanyard. The gunfire on Radcliffe was silenced but he cursed when he saw that his friend was still directing the fast-galloping horse between the kopjes and that two Boers had ridden into the gap and raised their rifles to aim at him.

  Pierce tugged his right-hand glove free and quickly calculated the distance. He brought his rifle to his shoulder and set the Sharps’ sight. The air was still; no breeze shifted the artillery smoke. He might miss at this range but the crack of the .50-calibre bullet would tell whoever was trying to shoot Radcliffe that someone had them in their sights. He laid his cheek against the curved stock. He sighted along the octagonal barrel and steadied his breathing, letting thirty years of experience take over. He cocked the rear trigger which primed the front trigger. It needed only the gentlest touch to fire the weapon. He squeezed off a shot. The recoil slammed back into his shoulder. It took three seconds for the bullet to fly the thousand yards, by which time Pierce had levered free the empty case and thumbed another finger-thick round into the breech, his thumb cocking back the hammer. One of the men in the distance danced aside as a puff of dust from the first shot spurted close to him. Pierce fired again before the man could decide what to do. The second shot made him flail his arms and tumble backwards from the force of the bullet. The second Boer swerved his horse for cover.

  Radcliffe was clear.

  *

  Lieutenant Baxter shouted his orders, picked up and carried by NCOs. ‘Advance!’ This was no time to attack in extended line. If he lived through this he’d take the consequences for disobeying the general’s order. ‘Come on the Irish!’ He was the first to rise up and run with Sergeant McCory at his shoulder.

  Pierce watched the magnificent sight of hundreds of men rising from the ground and, like a great flock of birds, swooping forwards towards their enemy, bayonets glinting, a roar suddenly erupting from their chests.

  Mulraney ran with them, muttering the prayer of contrition: ‘Forgive me my sins, O Lord, forgive me my sins...�
� he repeated over and over until his words gave way to blasphemy with the urgency of the gunfire and their desperate attack. Battle instinct had taken over: field drills of moving forward in extended line were ignored; instead the men took lung-tearing short runs, kneeling to shoot, moving on under covering fire from the next man, gaining precious ground. They swarmed across the terraced boulders, edging their way into the kopje’s crevices and gullies. Soldiers still fell to Boer gunfire, but the artillery rounds that Pierce had laid on the hillside bought the Irish regiment a foothold where they could unleash their savage anger. Boers surrendered but were shot down or bayoneted and as the wounded died their cries quickly spread panic. The Irish pushed, shoved, clambered and clawed their way up slabs of rock that rose twenty feet, driven by the desire to kill those who’d had them at their mercy with their longsighted rifles and artillery.

  Radcliffe saw the soldiers advance around the side of the slopes. He was sweeping around the assault’s flank and had not yet reached the place where the cavalry had been slaughtered on the reverse slopes, but it was obvious the enemy’s guns had been hauled away otherwise they would have bombarded the attack. Screams and full-throated curses filled the air as British and Boer locked in hand-to-hand fighting.

  Men gouged and kicked, used their fists, rifle butts and bayonets amid the erratic staccato of gunfire. Entrails spilt from men’s bodies and the sickening, cloying taste of death clung to the back of men’s throats. Few men cried for mercy because they knew none would be given.

  Radcliffe saw Boers beat a soldier to death with their empty rifles, the sound of his skull cracking like dried firewood being splintered, and then they were set upon by soldiers who stabbed and ripped at them repeatedly until the bloodied mass below their blades barely resembled that of a tattered carcass. He could ride no further. He pulled the carbine from its sleeve and ran along the edge of the tide of wild, cursing Irishmen, faces contorted in their own lust for life. He saw Lawrence Baxter in the fray as soldiers swept past him; the lieutenant was running forward, calling for the retreating Boers to surrender, but in their blind panic and determination to escape they fired at him. Radcliffe coolly shot three men and then saw two Boers dragging away a younger man who limped from a wound. His heart pounded. It was Edward. The lad had the same broad shoulders and shock of dark hair.

  ‘Edward!’ he yelled. But the three escaping men were swallowed by others swarming down the reverse slope of the hillside with the soldiers at their backs. The mêlée of men fighting hand-to-hand redoubled, as Irishman and Boer grappled each other to the ground. When weapons slid from bloodied hands men snatched at knives and bayonets, fought with fists and rocks, smashing relentlessly into their enemy until their opponent died. Radcliffe chased the three men, emptying his rifle at others who turned to face their attackers. Caught up in the tide of khaki he had to use the empty weapon as a club to ward off the Boers who begrudged every inch of their retreat.

  He was closing on the men who carried his son.

  One turned, raised a pistol and in that instant Radcliffe realized that Lawrence Baxter had turned his back to yell orders to his men. The Boer could not resist the opportunity to kill a British officer. Radcliffe shouted a warning and without aiming fired three shots from his revolver; he saw the impact of his bullets shatter the man’s head and chest. They had dropped Edward on to the ground. The second man snarled and swore in his own language and lunged, defenceless except for the knife in his hand. There was little to distinguish Radcliffe and the man who faced him; both were blood-splattered and caked with dirt, and each had the desperation to live etched on their faces. Radcliffe killed him at ten paces with two shots and ran forward oblivious to the threat from the random rifle fire that crackled around him. Trembling from exertion he bent over the boy, who lay face down.

  ‘Edward!’ he cried, easing the boy’s shoulder over.

  The fist that held the rock caught Radcliffe a glancing blow. He fell back as the youth pressed his attack. The lad’s size and strength belied the youthfulness of his face. He couldn’t have been more than fourteen years old. The snarling boy could never have been Edward, who could never have been there in the first place. ‘My pa!’ he screamed. ‘My pa!’

  In the seconds before the rock could slam into Radcliffe’s face he knew he had just killed the boy’s father who had been trying to save his son from the battlefield. That moment of realization seared through him as harshly as the sun blinded his eyes. He raised an arm, trying to protect himself. The boy grunted and Radcliffe heard the thwack of a bullet tearing into bone and heart as the youth spewed blood and fell back. Radcliffe kicked himself free of the shuddering body and rolled clear. Lawrence Baxter, as filthy as the men around him, stood several paces behind him, tunic unbuttoned, bareheaded, revolver in his hand. He allowed himself a nod to Radcliffe and then pursued his men downhill as they mopped up the last resistance.

  Radcliffe cradled the boy, waiting for his pulse to finally cease. The young eyes gazed unblinking at the sky that he had known for only a few short years. How long had it been, Radcliffe wondered, since he worked his father’s farm, brought the cattle in from the veld and listened to the old men talking of war and their blood enemies and the planned resistance to British imperial ambitions? Young and old alike were fatally bound together in a common history.

  He opened the boy’s jacket and saw the familiar label. The sight of the bloodied mess clinging to the wool fibres fed the fear that gripped him. There now seemed little doubt that Edward was either a prisoner or had been killed and his body stripped.

  Gently, he closed the boy’s eyes, and turned him face down so the scavengers would not take them.

  With a weariness that was due to more than his years, he walked to where the horse stood. The stallion, ears alert, raised its head and whinnied, stamping on the ground as if trumpeting a call of defiance to the other horses across the kopje.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  The soldiers surrendered to the heat and their exhaustion. The day’s killing was over. They sat or sprawled among boulders and brush, slurping what water they had and wiping bayonets free of blood. Alongside them flies swarmed over the congealed wounds of the dead and wounded. Radcliffe picked his way down the re-entrant where the slain cavalry lay scattered. Most had been struck two or three times; some had gaping wounds, proof that some Boers had cut the tips off their bullets. Cruel hatred for a bitter enemy. Thankfully there was no sign of Edward among the fallen riders.

  Radcliffe worked his way around the hillside, remembering what Sergeant McCory had told him about the initial attack. If Colonel Baxter had led men into that crossfire of hell he’d have skirted between the boulders and worked upwards for a better firing position. And that’s exactly what Colonel Baxter had done, trying to give his men a chance. The colonel had advanced further and higher with half a dozen men at his side even after the main attack had failed. The Irish had scrambled and fought, stabbing and wrestling their opponents into a macabre death embrace. Their colonel had managed to clamber another twenty feet beyond the men who lay dead behind him, and that’s where Radcliffe found him, his back against a blood-smeared boulder, one leg twisted underneath him, the empty revolver still gripped in his hand. His head was slumped on his chest. The single shot that had killed him had left a stain on the front of his khaki tunic. Radcliffe carefully straightened his friend’s body and sat with him for a moment, easing the pistol from his hand, allowing his fingers to linger on Baxter’s.

  He rejoined the men on the hillside and told a bedraggled Lawrence Baxter where his father lay. The young man had aged, and his exhaustion was apparent. He appeared numb to the news of his father’s death, but nodded in gratitude.

  ‘I must attend to my duties,’ he said and turned away, perhaps, Radcliffe thought, to grieve privately or to let the loss of his father take its place amid the sorrow for all those others who had fallen.

  Soldiers stirred themselves to gather their dead as the first of the hospital wagons f
rom the railhead arrived. Someone whistled a familiar call. Radcliffe raised his hat and signalled to Pierce, who saw him and jumped down from the wagon.

  ‘Holy God,’ Pierce muttered when he saw the carnage. ‘Edward?’

  ‘Not here,’ Radcliffe told him as he took the offered canteen and spilled water into his hand for the horse, and then drank himself. He took Pierce to where the boy’s body still lay, flies buzzing in the bloodied mess of the exit wound. Before long the maggots would hatch and desecrate the boy further.

  ‘Boy had Edward’s jacket,’ Radcliffe said.

  ‘Then he’s a prisoner somewhere,’ said Pierce, knowing that there was also an alternative.

  His gaze followed the contours of the hills where he had laid his shots. The shrapnel bursts had flayed the impact area and the torn shreds of men’s bodies smeared the boulders. Raptors were already pecking at the flesh. All the old memories of another war churned in his stomach. Radcliffe noticed the look of disgust on his friend’s face.

  ‘Let’s find Edward and go home,’ said Radcliffe.

  Pierce nodded and the two old soldiers turned their back on the slaughterhouse.

  *

  Two hundred and thirty-six British soldiers lay dead on the ground, covered in ground sheets and laid out in neat rows as the regimental sergeant major had instructed. Even death needed to be handled in an orderly fashion. The rail stop seethed with activity as more troops arrived and the dead were taken away to be buried in one of the many war graves that would come to blight the countryside. Stretcher-bearers from the field hospital continued to carry men in from the battle, laying them down in whatever scrap of shade was available next to the open-air operating tables which often consisted of little more than the stretcher balanced across ammunition boxes. As soldiers staggered in, wretched from the fight, Indian water-carriers, turbaned and dressed in their dark blue serge jackets, their legs bound in puttees, carried puckals, the canvas bags that cooled water, slung across their shoulders. These bheesties were as regimented and disciplined as any soldier, and worked their way diligently through the thirsty men, portioning out a drink for each man desperate for the gut-wrenching cold water.