One of the great mysteries of Stigand’s hunting adventures is his near-fatal brush with an elephant, somewhere in southern Sudan in 1912. General Wingate merely says that “Stigand had had a contest at very close quarters with an elephant, which had trampled on him and nearly killed him; he was brought to Khartoum seriously ill and spent his convalescence under the Sirdar’s [Wingate’s title] roof.”
In Theodore Roosevelt’s foreword to Stigand’s classic Hunting the Elephant in Africa (see bibliography), even Teddy brings up the fact that it was generally unknown what had happened in the elephant incident except that Stigand was badly injured, although we have no details. To quote Roosevelt in his exasperation: “But it is as difficult to get Captain Stigand to tell what he has himself done as it was to get General Grant to talk about his battles. After this manuscript was in my hands [late 1911 or early 1912], Captain Stigand was nearly killed by an elephant. It was in the Lado and he was taken down to Khartoum; but his letters to his friends at home touched so lightly on the subject that they had to obtain all real information from outside sources.” This “outside” information has not, to my knowledge, survived. What a shame.
While languishing in Wingate’s garden one day, recovering from the mysterious elephant incident, Stigand confided to the governor-general that he was smitten with a lady and wished to marry. The usual consequence of such a decision was to offer the resignation of one’s commission, which Stigand did. Although Wingate tried to talk Chauncey out of bringing a wife to the severe living conditions of Sudan, neither was he unaware of Stigand’s value. He relented and granted an exception to regulations. The captain (at that time) took the hand of Miss Nancy Yulee Neff of Washington, D.C., on January 4, 1913, in England. He brought her back to his duties at Kajo Kaji, and they began to build a home there. Then Stigand went down with blood poisoning, and, by the time he had recovered, she was half-dead of blackwater fever and had to return to a healthier climate.
As the years went on, despite problems of health and primitive conditions, they managed quite a lot of time together, even if sporadically. During his ten years in Sudan proper, he was constantly on the go, mostly putting down native risings and rebellions, in the course of which he was twice again mentioned in dispatches in the London Gazette, in time earning his Order of the British Empire, as well as the other decorations already mentioned. In 1917, his daughter, Florida, was born. Late May of 1919 saw Stigand on leave in America with his wife, daughter and parents-in-law, until ordered to return to Mongalla on July 20, reaching his post on September 12. Neither he nor Nancy had the faintest notion that they had had their last sight of each other … .
It took a few weeks for Stigand Bey to sort out what was really going on, not so simple in a place where communications are difficult even today. The problem came down to the fact that the Aliab Dinkas were having a wonderful time raising general hell and had gone so far as to attack and burn Minkammon Station on the White Nile, scaring the native authorities thoroughly and, based upon their successes, encouraging their own kind to rise.
The company of troops Stigand sent to reconnoiter reported 3,000 Dinkas and Minkammon in ashes. Worse, this force had effected no retribution (somewhat understandable, considering a mere company against 3,000 wild men!), and Stigand knew very well that unless somebody slapped the Aliab fingers, there could be a general revolt savage beyond belief. Aliab Dinkas were not the sort of chaps one fooled around with.
On the sixth of November, he sent another company from Tombe, a few miles upriver from Minkammon, under Victoria Cross winner Major F. C. Roberts and a Major White, White actually commanding the movement. When White and Roberts learned that the first force had, indeed, done nothing, they advised Stigand, as governor, that, even though their own force was but 200 men, it was imperative they attack the Dinkas immediately before the rest of the tribe joined them.
Stigand agreed. All of the Dinkas were not Aliabs, and he was anxious that those “sitting on the fence” be shown a display of force so they would not go over to the enemy. Therefore, he took sixty men and a Captain Wynne-Finch from his position at Tombe down to the village of Jongley and from there on a two-day forced march inland, east to Kongor where the uncommitted Dinkas were. He noted that things “look rather nasty and the whole countryside long grass.”
Twelve days later, Chauncey wrote his wife that the Dinka chiefs claimed to be loyal and seemed sufficiently cowed that he recrossed the White Nile and marched back to near Minkammon, running into the column of White and Roberts. This force had been attacked in heavy numbers at three o’clock in the morning by the Aliab Dinkas and only beat off the enemy in fierce hand-to-hand fighting in a very hairy engagement. They had sustained seven killed and nine wounded, plus some porters lost. The enemy had managed to sneak up to the edge of the zareba, or protective thorn stockade, and broken through. It must have been a terrifying experience for the British; the Dinkas poured through the gap in the hundreds, each warrior making a weird whistling sound by which they could recognize each other in the dark. At dawn, the British were astounded that they had gotten off so lightly; two officers reported that spearmen even ran between their beds and woke them! At length, the Dinkas retired, and more than one hundred spears were picked up next morning, indicating a good number of enemy dead, as the Dinkas always tried to carry away their casualties and were determined not to leave behind fine, valuable spears.
A week later, Stigand again wrote Nancy that, despite his dislike of patrols and punitive expeditions, this one had been forced on him. To paraphrase: “Any failure … to give them a good hammering … will only lead to future trouble or encourage other tribes to do the same … .”
In his final letter, December 3, five days before his death, he said that he planned a two-week sortie against the Dinkas, having received intelligence that enemy losses at Minkammon and in the night attack against White and Roberts were more costly in dead and wounded than expected. He complained of a sore throat, from the smoke of grass fires, and a touch of fever. He expressed his hopes to be home early in the new year and closed with all his love. It was signed “C.”
Stigand never realized it, but in his writings, somewhere between 1908 and 1911, he described his own death almost perfectly. He detailed the typical expedition getting started after some white was murdered or a tribe under British jurisdiction got mauled by one that wasn’t. What then happened was the arrival of the punishing force, before which the natives scattered, trying to hide their stock; some huts were burned and a few men shot down until the miniwar was over. Messengers of peace were sent out, and the natives promised to be good boys. If they were, they might even have gotten some of their cattle back after a year or two. Perhaps a soldier or two became separated and skewered, but losses on both sides were usually very light. This was the case, said Stigand, ninety-nine times out of a hundred.
There is, however, that hundredth time. It all starts as the other ninety-nine, but either the enemy is unfamiliar with the effectiveness of firearms or enjoys a particular superiority of men, position or both. Then, as Stigand related with eerily accurate foresight, “Nothing is seen of the assailants except a few flying men. Suddenly, there is a rush in thick grass or bush and the little column gets massacred.” How right he was.
For Stigand, the hundredth time was here, this morning, in the long grass of Kor Raby where a thousand stark-naked, six-and-a-half-foot-tall Aliab Dinkas lay silent in the thick cover, watching the British column advance. Sharp eyes noted the lone officer on the far right front, and a dozen dusky tribesmen wriggled through the grass to cut him off. Waiting until the troops closed to within a few yards, where their rifles would not be so effective, there was a sudden shout, and with a wild screaming the spearmen washed like a wave onto the staggering soldiers, startling the advance guard and the carriers into a backward rush that threatened to break the all-important defensive square.
The air was thick with gleaming spears which fluttered and hummed with a sharp, whickerin
g sound, some ending their flight with a solid thug! as they sliced into flesh. A mist grew from the dust of running feet and the smoke of return rifle fire, crackling like popcorn. From the right, Stigand was seen firing as fast as he could into the charging mass of whooping warriors, his empty cartridges catching the early sun in flashing arches of brass as they were ejected from the repeater. Across the formation, a tough campaigner, Sergeant Macalister, dropped under a sleet of steel, and Commanding Officer White also fell, three spears through him, a strange, khaki butterfly pinned for mounting. He was dead in a few minutes of hemorrhage.
Stigand had to break for the main column at once if he was not to be overwhelmed. But a glance at the situation showed that only pressure from his position could stem the retreat of the advance guard back into the bearers, collapsing the box. He knew exactly what he was about to do. Without a thought to his own safety, the Governor of Mongalla Province set his jaw and rammed home another ten-round clip into his .303 rifle.
Nobody saw Stigand killed, the last sight of him recorded as pouring fire into the enemy as fast as he could load. It is almost certain that he was rushed by a group of the enemy from point-blank range and speared to death before he could cut them down. About a dozen of his empty cartridge cases were picked up from about his body, although he must have fired quite a few more shots than this, the empty cases of which were missed in the long grass. Also, even though he is thought to have been killed in the first two minutes of fighting, his position was surely not static; he would have been moving about to avoid thrown spears as well as to present himself with better angles on targets of opportunity. As a master rifleman, firing as rapidly as possible at a more or less massed enemy, it would seem on the low side to presume that he did not take at least twenty of the enemy with him. Most important, he did save the square by spending his life, knowingly and willingly, to throw back the impetus of the Dinkas’ first rush, quite possibly saving the entire column before the formation and firepower based upon it was crushed.
Stigand, White and Macalister were temporarily buried at Kor Raby, where the detachment had spent the night before. Later, the bodies were recovered and permanently interred at Tombe, under a solidly built cairn of stones brought from the Stigand home at Kajo Kaji, at the special request of Mrs. Stigand.
One of the most fascinating and touching documents I have ever read is the letter of condolence from Major Roberts, V.C., to Mrs. Stigand, describing the action that day and the death of her husband. It’s worth reading:
Dear Mrs. Stigand,
It is with great sorrow that I am writing to give you the details of Stigand Bey’s death. I am sure that you will wish me to tell you everything. In the beginning of November the Aliab Dinkas on the western bank of the Nile round Tombe rose. Stigand Bey did his utmost to settle matters peaceably, but to no purpose. The Equatorial Battalion was ordered out, and up to the 5th December had a certain amount of fighting. On this latter date the column again commenced operations with Stigand Bey as Political Officer. I own that it was not right for the “Governor” to come with us, but unfortunately no one else was available owing to sickness. Stigand Bey had also by this time made up his mind that half measures were of no use, and that the Dinkas required severe handling. He himself showed the greatest keenness in all the arrangements; and I am afraid from the start took unnecessary risks, always being well in front or on the flanks of the column reconnoitering, and taking bearings for a future sketch of the country marched through. At 7.15 a.m. on the 8th December the head and flanks of the column were rushed in very thick grass, by what I estimated to be a thousand of the enemy (in order to explain things better I am enclosing a rough plan of our formation, and where Stigand Bey was at the moment the rush came). Personally I was at the head of the left flank guard, and did not see Stigand Bey fall, but Bimbashi Kent-Lemon, who was at the head of the right flank guard, saw him with his rifle to his shoulder firing as hard as he could and attempting to stop the backward rush of the advance guard and the carriers, which threatened to break up our square formation. No one I can find in the battalion saw him killed, but it must have happened within the first two minutes. His end I know was an extremely gallant and a happy one, by the smile on his face when we picked him up. From the spear wound through his chest he must have died instantaneously and have suffered no pain. All of us know that he gave his life to save the column from utter destruction, which would have been certain unless he had stopped the first rush before too many of the enemy got inside the square. We afterwards picked up about a dozen of his empty cartridge cases, which I think speaks for itself. At dusk the same day we buried him and Major White, our Commanding Officer, who was also killed, fifty yards to the N.W. of a small clump of trees at a place named Kor Raby, where we had spent the night of the 7th/8th December; this spot will be well remembered by all on the patrol, and you must not worry about the exact position not being found in the future.
It is impossible for me to tell you how all, British and Native officers, non-commissioned and men, feel for you in your great loss; your consolation is that he was one of the most gallant officers and the finest man the Sudan or Africa has ever known, and I feel certain that his death was the one he would have chosen above all things—giving his life for others.
With deepest sympathy,
Yours very sincerely,
F. C. Roberts, Bimbashi, a. O. C. Equat. Bn.
Mongalla, 21st December, 1919
A caveat here: Anybody who knows anything about armies and dead soldiers is aware that there are some common devices employed; i.e., to assure the family of the deceased that he met his end painlessly, no matter what horror of lingering agony he may really have suffered, very frequently “with a smile on his face.” I have seen people bayoneted to death and can assure you none was smiling. All cutting instruments, be they spear, arrowhead or bayonet, kill by ultimate loss of oxygen to the brain by bleeding, unless they happen to pierce the brain itself or the upper spinal cord. To look down and see a couple of feet of spear shaft jutting from your ribs, covered with your blood, would not tend to put a smile on your face. In actuality, the expression is usually one of unbelievable surprise, Hollywood be damned.
On the other hand, if you’ve gotten to know old Chauncey as well as I have, I’ll bet you two hangovers and next month’s mortgage payment that Stigand really did have a smile on his face! He had that much class.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Stigand, C. H., Central African Game and Its Spoor (In collaboration with D. D. Lyell) (The Field, London, 1906).
————. Scouting and Reconnaissance in Savage Countries (Hugh Rees, 1906).
————. The Game of British East Africa (The Field, London, 1909).
————. Hunting the Elephant in Africa (And Other Recollections of Thirteen Years’ Wandering) (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1913).
————. The Land of Zinj (London, Bombay, Sydney: Constable & Co., Ltd., 1913).
————. To Abyssinia Through an Unknown Land (London: Seeley & Co., 1910).
————. Administration in Tropical Africa (London: Constable & Co., Ltd., 1914).
————. Dialect in Swahili (or, A Grammar of Dialectic Changes in the Kiswahili Language) (London: The Cambridge University Press, 1915).
————. Equatoria, The Lado Enclave (including a Memoir by General Sir Reginald Wingate, Br., G.C.B., Etc. and comments by Colonel Thorp) (London, Bombay, Sydney: Constable & Co., 1923) (Posthumous work).
Major P. J. Pretorius
SHE SLIDES THROUGH the southern sea in sinuous silence, her silhouette no more than a black blot on the horizon where the stars are missing. The thrumming of her engines is barely audible, even on her bridge where blue eyes probe the sepia African waters through crisp Zeiss lenses. Her stealth is not out of fear, but caution. There is nothing in these vast hunting grounds but prey—the British enemy. Already she has left a spoor of bloated bodies from the dozens of merchantmen she has slaughtered, and now, m
iles astern, even the burning debris of her latest kill is no longer visible off Zanzibar—the noble (and undergunned) H.M.S. Pegasus, now firmly settling into the bottom mud with her two loyal guard ships. It had been a quick, decisive victory for the Imperial German Navy, but her commander realizes he may have jeopardized his mission by its very success: When Pegasus—who surely got off a wireless message—is discovered to have been sunk, the British will be forced to come after the German raider or lose all ability to supply her East African colonies.
The engines slow in response to bridge signals, the faint bow wake a slender, dully glowing feather as the mass of the German East African shoreline looms off the starboard bow. She knows the way to her lair. In the years before Der Tag, her intelligence had carefully charted the great Rufiji River to a distance of nearly twenty miles inland and found it navigable even for a light cruiser of her class. Cautiously, battle cruiser Königsberg noses her steel snout into the main channel and churns slowly out of sight into the heavy jungled river inland. At this moment, in 1914, she has the distinction of being the biggest and most dangerous game in Africa.
Death in the Silent Places Page 8