by John Wilcox
Simon knew that Colley had briefly considered falling back to Newcastle, some twenty miles to the south. But the general had resolved to deny the enemy the psychological victory of seeing him retreat, and except for sending back the Natal Mounted Police to bolster the garrison at Newcastle, he had maintained his force and his position at Mount Prospect. He was, however, concerned about his lines of communication to the south.
Two days after the battle, Simon was summoned to the general’s tent. He was welcomed with a smile and gestured to sit on a camp stool.
‘These farmers fought a p-p-pretty good defensive battle,’ Colley began, ‘but I wish that they’d be a bit more ambitious and attack me here. What do you think of the chances of that happening, Fonthill?’
Simon had noticed that, since the death of Deane and the loss of virtually all his senior staff officers, the general had taken to using his scout as a kind of sounding board, sometimes murmuring his thoughts aloud as though Simon was not there, at others, as today, asking his advice directly.
‘Bit unlikely I should say, sir.’ Simon’s thoughts returned to President Brand’s delicate balancing act. ‘It’s one thing to defend one’s homeland but quite another to invade Natal. I think Joubert and his colleagues will always have one eye on world opinion and would be reluctant to lose approval by crossing the border aggressively. As you said yourself, the Boers are not really invaders. They will certainly have come to have a look at you here and will have seen how strong this position is. They won’t want to risk losing what they won at the Nek.’
‘Quite so. But they could well try and cut me off here by b-b-breaking my line of communications to Newcastle.’
‘Indeed, sir. But I doubt whether they have either the will or sufficient numbers of men to hole you up here, particularly with reinforcements on the way.’
Colley ran his fingers through his beard. ‘You’ve said that the Boers are pretty mobile, yes?’
Simon nodded. ‘Very. I’d say that they are among the best light cavalry in the world.’
‘Right. I want you and your two scouts to patrol the road back down to Newcastle. Native carriers are taking the mail back and forth, but until I am sure that the Boers have no intention of attacking me here, I d-d-don’t want to detach forces to keep the road open, so you must be my eyes along that w-w-way. Don’t engage, of course, but I want to know the instant the Boers come out in any sort of force. I don’t want them to block the road to Newcastle. Understood?’
‘Understood, sir.’
The twenty miles of well-beaten track that led back to Newcastle was reasonably open country, less mountainous than the terrain north of Mount Prospect, although the kloofs of the Drakensbergs skirted the track to the west. This time of the summer rainy season, however, found the road at its worst. The track itself was only a succession of shallow fords, mud holes and boulders of rock, and at roughly the halfway point between Prospect and Newcastle, it crossed the Ingogo river at a drift which was normally only about two feet deep at low water, but which could become a dangerous crossing after heavy rain.
Simon divided the road between the three of them into three beats of just over six miles, with each man exchanging his beat through the day to ensure that familiarity did not breed complacency. But it was boring work. There was no sign of Boer activity and the intermittent rain and the muddy, broken track made the riding difficult and uncomfortable.
It was with relief, then, that Simon, having ended the day at the end of the line at Newcastle and been last man back at Prospect, saw Jenkins waving an envelope at him as he rode in. A letter from home! Something to relieve the monotony of this tedious picket duty. He took the envelope with alacrity but his pleasure receded immediately when he recognised his mother’s strong, sloping hand. He knew that, inevitably, the letter would contain an account of Alice’s wedding to Covington and he certainly did not want to read about that.
He tucked the envelope under his waterproof and led his mare away to the lines, where rough canvas shelters had been erected, unsaddled her and rubbed her down. Later, as he sipped a mug of tea in his bivouac tent he sighed, frowned, slit open the envelope and began reading. He could not refrain from smiling, however, as he immediately encountered his mother’s familiar direct style.
My dear Simon,
Why on earth don’t you write more often!!?? Really, my boy, you are a great trial to us and you must try and be more, well, filial! You have been away from home now for so long. It really does seem as though you are deliberately chasing trouble - and yet you are no longer even in the army! One letter from you, my dear, in the last two months is simply not enough. I sometimes wonder if this strange manservant of yours is a bad influence on you. It does not do, Simon, to get too close to the working classes. It is healthy and RIGHT to maintain a distance between you and these sort of people, however worthy they may seem.
Now, as soon as you can, please do write and tell us what is happening to you. We informed General Wolseley, of course, that you were in Cairo and we received your scribbled one-page note from wherever it was in South Africa. But it told us very little. I expect to hear from you now by return.
Your father and I are very well, although it is proving a bad winter and the major spends far too much time with Llewellyn out in the cold, ditching and hedging on the edges of the estate. I worry constantly about him coming down with a chill, but he pays no heed to my chiding.
Alice had a simply splendid wedding three weeks ago in the village church at Chilwood. It was a very fine occasion with lots of people from the regiment attending, of course. Quite like old times for your father! Alice looked lovely in a cream confection - strange she did not wear white! - although she seemed perhaps just a little peaky, if you know what I mean. Probably the strain of it all . . .
Simon put down the letter and closed his eyes for a moment. Then, pinching the bridge of his nose with finger and thumb, he continued reading.
Covington looked very dashing in his colonel’s uniform with all his medals. His face is terribly scarred, of course, and he wears a black patch to cover his sightless eye. They have fitted some hook contraption to cover the loss of his hand. It is quite amazing what they can do these days to alleviate the effect of these dreadful wounds. They are going to live on his estate in Norfolk, although I did hear that he is hoping to rejoin the army once Alice is settled in there. It seems most unlikely to me that he could play a full part in the regiment again, but I believe he has influence.
Brigadier Griffith, of course, feels that his daughter has made a good match, although your father and I still believe that Covington is rather too old for Alice. There was a time, you know, when the major and I had hopes that you and she might . . . but that is all water under the bridge now, of course.
My dear, even if you don’t write to us - and you jolly well must - you certainly must write to Alice. She asked after you of course - a trifle wistfully, I felt. Anyway, her address is as follows: Blackdown Hall, Frettenham, near Norwich, Norfolk.
Simon put down the letter again and stared at the canvas above his head. Then he carefully tore out the address and put it into his wallet. The letter concluded with a brief sentence from his father, warm but anodyne in content, and Simon tossed the pages on to the top of his haversack. But the reference to Alice’s wedding brought back the agony of his love for her. It was a feeling which had been sublimated for a while by the potent physical presence of Anna Scheel, so perhaps this meant that he could find someone else one day. Even so, the thought of Alice in her cream wedding dress set his mind racing. Later, Jenkins and Hardy were amazed when he insisted on joining them in a hand of poker. He lost, of course, but he didn’t seem to mind. Jenkins accused him of not concentrating.
The next day’s patrolling was equally uneventful, although for once there was no sign of rain. The sky was clear and the sun seemed unusually large and hung like an incandescent fireball, causing wisps of steam to rise from the puddles and mini-drifts along the track. On his re
turn, however, Simon found a summons from the general awaiting him.
‘You have obviously seen no sign of Boer m-m-movement along the track to Newcastle?’ he was asked as soon as he entered Colley’s tent.
‘No, sir.’
‘Well, I feel in my bones that Johnny Boer will make an attempt now to cut off my lines of c-c-communication back to Natal, now that the weather has lifted for a moment. I therefore intend to make a reconnaissance in force along the road and am writing the orders now. But a mail detachment is leaving before dawn tomorrow and I want to t-t-test the water, so to speak. I want you and your two chaps to go with it. Any sign of interference, bring ’em back straight away. Right?’
‘Right, sir.’
The mail detachment was small, two Zulu carriers mounted on ponies and carrying the post in large canvas bags slung around their necks, with an escort of three mounted infantrymen plus Simon, Jenkins and Hardy. They set off in the pre-dawn darkness, splashing through the puddles, Simon leading the way well ahead of the little party and Jenkins and Hardy - the better horsemen - well spaced out on the flanks. One of the mounted infantrymen hung back behind to give warning of a possible attack from that quarter.
The sun had risen by the time the little party reached the double drift just above the confluence of the Ingogo and Harte rivers, some five miles south of Mount Prospect. The water, ochre-coloured from particles of dolarite stone, had risen since Simon’s last patrol and it reached the haunches of the scouts’ horses as they waded in. The three had joined together to make the crossing, and Al nodded upstream to where a bird had noisily entered the water.
‘That, mah friends, was the long-beaked darter,’ he drawled. ‘Only bird equipped to eat fish under water.’
Jenkins shook his head. ‘Sometimes, Al,’ he said, ‘I think you make this stuff up.’
‘Nossir. Just interested in flora an’ fauna, is all.’
As the three urged their horses up a steepish rise to reach a stony plateau above the crossing, Al pointed to the right. ‘See that water buck, with that white ring on its rump—’
He was interrupted by the ping of a bullet that seemed to whistle between the three of them. Three further shots rang out and Jenkins’s horse reared and then toppled over, bleeding from the shoulder, throwing the Welshman clear. Within seconds, Hardy’s Colt had appeared in his hand and he fired twice at horsemen who now appeared over a low rise to their left. Jenkins scrambled to his feet and Simon bent down from the saddle, grabbed his outstretched hand and somehow hauled him up behind him on to his mount’s rump. Hardy now had both Colts in his hands and was slowly urging Custer forward with his knees towards the advancing horsemen, taking cool aim and firing sequentially. Two of the Boers fell from their saddles and the others paused for a moment, clearly surprised at Hardy’s advance and the accurate fire from the American’s pistols.
‘Quick,’ shouted Simon. ‘Back to the drift. The others won’t have crossed yet. We must save the mail.’
The two horses and their three riders turned and galloped back down the slope, in time to see the mail detachment cantering towards them on the other side of the ford.
‘Enemy ahead,’ shouted Simon, as his horse splashed into the first drift, Jenkins hanging on with both arms locked round his waist. ‘Couriers turn back to the camp. Escort dismount and give us covering fire.’
As the Zulus turned their ponies round and urged them back up the track, the three mounted infantrymen, acting with commendable alacrity, flung themselves from their horses, knelt and opened rapid, if inaccurate, fire from their carbines at the Boers as they crested the rise above the first of the two drifts. It was enough to halt the pursuit, and the Boers dismounted and began returning the fire.
The covering fire was light but sufficient to deter the usually accurate Boer shooting, and Simon, Al and Jenkins were able to cross both drifts, dismount at the far side and add their own fire to that of the infantrymen. The duel that followed was inconsequential, but it was clear that there were insufficient Boers to ford the drifts in the face of the rifles opposing them, and there was no other crossing for miles.
‘Right,’ said Simon. He nodded to the infantrymen. ‘You three take Jenkins here and catch up with the mail. I doubt if the Boers are this side of the Ingogo, so hurry them along back to Mount Prospect. Al and I will stay long enough to deter pursuit.’
Jenkins opened his mouth to argue, but Simon shook his head. ‘Off you go and take charge. We will follow in a few minutes.’
In fact, Simon was not at all sure that there were no Boers between the river and the camp, but the risk had to be taken. In the event, however, he was proved right. After levelling a fusillade of fire at the ridge top, he and the American mounted their horses and spurred them away back up the broken track. It was half an hour before they caught up with Jenkins and the mail detachment, but they were not pursued and soon the little party rode into Mount Prospect.
Simon immediately reported to the general
Colley put down his pen and listened with care. ‘You d-d-did well to save the mail. That settles it. I can’t have them cutting off the road. I shall leave early tomorrow with three hundred men and we shall escort a c-c-convoy of supplies back from Newcastle. I shall want you to scout ahead. We march at eight a.m.’
Chapter 11
The day dawned brightly and a warm sun welcomed Colley’s force as it mustered within the camp’s earthworks. The column consisted of five companies of the 60th Rifles, thirty-eight mounted infantry and four horse-drawn guns, and as Simon and his two comrades rode out ahead - Jenkins was now re-horsed, of course - the men were laughing and joking and calling to each other in the sunlight as they fell into line. They were equipped to travel light, for the general hoped to be back in the camp by early afternoon, but Simon shook his head as he noted that they carried little food or water. It was clear that if a Boer commando lay ahead, Colley expected to brush it aside like a fly. It was as though the battle of Laing’s Nek had not taken place.
The three scouts again spread out, a little more widely this time and riding more slowly. Simon felt sure that the column would be attacked. The question was, where?
Their journey was uneventful, however, until they came to the double drift at the Ingogo and Harte rivers. On the other side the track ran upwards to the stony plateau where they had been attacked the day before. Simon was still unsure how they could have been ambushed on what seemed to be a flat plain. It was obvious, however, that the rolling grassland, made green by the recent rains, must conceal declivities and fissures which could hide horsemen. This was dangerous territory and the obvious place for a second ambush. He decided to wait for the main force before crossing.
He rode to meet Colley and pointed across the river. ‘This is where we were attacked yesterday, sir. That plateau seems able to conceal horsemen.’
‘Hmm.’ The general consulted his map. ‘Seems to be called Schuin’s Hoogte, if I’ve pronounced it r-r-right. Looks innocent enough to me.’
‘Quite so, General. But you might consider it prudent to put some men and, say, a couple of guns up on that point to the right,’ Simon gestured to a spur on the north side of the crossing, ‘to command the drifts in case you need to cross back in a hurry.’
Colley shot him a keen glance. ‘I don’t anticipate c-c-crossing back in a hurry, Fonthill.’ He spoke with a smile that disarmed the sharpness of the retort. ‘But you are probably right.’ A company of the Rifles and two of the guns were marched up the spur while the remainder of the column rested. Simon, Jenkins and Hardy splashed across the drifts and fanned out, and minutes later the main crossing began.
The three scouts had cantered cautiously past the place of the previous day’s ambuscade when a whistle from Al made Simon halt. There, some thousand yards to the right, about one hundred Boer horsemen sat watching them. They made no attempt to ride forward. It was as though they were waiting for the main column to appear. Simon immediately told Hardy to ride back and warn the
general while he and Jenkins waited and watched in turn.
Clearly the news had not daunted or delayed Colley, for the leading files of the column breasted the rise on to the plateau very soon afterwards. The general rode forward to join Simon and examined the Boers through his field glasses. The Boers, still immobile, seemed to be reined in on an open slope beyond a small ravine. It was a tempting sight.
‘Guns forward and unlimber,’ barked the general. The two nine-pounders were wheeled round in the centre of the plateau while the column waited expectantly. So too did the Boers, who made no attempt to move.
‘Cheeky blighters,’ murmured Colley, his glasses to his eyes. ‘Right. Send ’em packing with a few shells in their middle.’
A murmur of expectation rose from the watching infantrymen, for whom nothing was more satisfying than seeing artillery disperse cavalry. The guns were loaded and the first sent its shell screaming high over the horsemen to burst some distance away on the slope beyond. It was, in fact, a poor opening shot, but then the unexpected happened. Instead of wheeling away in consternation, the Boer horsemen calmly rode forward and reached the cover of the ravine. There, they dismounted and ranged along its lip to open fierce and accurate rifle fire on the stationary column exposed in the centre of the plateau. What was more, Simon realised that a contingent of Boers were pushing around the column’s right flank to envelop the plateau. From being in command of the situation, Colley was now under attack, and within seconds the initiative had been stolen from him.