Conquest

by Julian Stockwin

It was the Sea Battalion, hundreds of sailors standing loosely in lines ahead of the field pieces, looking about them gleefully. He walked over to talk with their lieutenant-in-charge but was quickly spotted and, to his embarrassment, a spontaneous cheer went up. He doffed his hat – all ships must have been stripped of gun crews and there they were, in all their individuality, so different from the uniformity of identical files of soldiers – and his heart warmed to them.

  Many wore a leather harness, which hooked on to the drag-rope shackled to the guns, six-pounders but with narrow iron-shod wheels that would dig into the sandy topsoil, turning them into a ferocious dead lump to pull. Two howitzers were also there, needing to be dragged into battle; squat army pieces that threw explosive shells and therefore had to be heavily constructed, brutes to move.

  The hundreds not at the traces would either be hauling the howitzers, or carrying iron shot and powder. In addition each man was fully armed: a brace of pistols, cutlass and even a boarding pike. If the tide of battle went against them and the guns needed defending, they would do the job. Kydd tried not to think of how they could stand and fight against a sabre-wielding charge by heavy cavalry.

  Baird and his staff were at the head of the army. Distinctive on a white charger, the general was in the centre of a group of splendidly attired officers, all mounted and in animated conversation.

  As Kydd approached, a breathless young ensign found him. ‘S-Sir! Your horse!’ Despite a critical shortage of mounts on the battlefield it would be unthinkable that Kydd, a senior officer, should be seen on foot like a common soldier.

  He climbed aboard awkwardly, the odd-looking brown creature clearly one of those lately gathered locally. It jibbed and snorted at Kydd’s alien scent, and he strove to subdue it while setting off cautiously to join the group around Baird.

  ‘Captain Kydd, sir,’ a colonel said urbanely, gesturing impatiently for him to approach nearer.

  ‘Sir. I’ve given my orders—’

  ‘Then I’ll wish you well of the day, sir,’ Baird said, briefly looking up from a paper. ‘For Brigadier General Ferguson this minute,’ he snapped, passing the document to a waiting subaltern, who cantered off through the assembling columns.

  Kydd held well back while the forming up took place; it seemed to take hours but he knew that any weakness or overlooked detail might cost lives, even the action. It must be worse for the waiting soldiers: Baird had a good reputation in India but would that translate here to reckless abandon, given the stakes?

  Finally, it was time, and the order to advance in general was given. Taking the lead Baird walked his horse slowly forward, closely followed by his staff. As they passed, the head of the column’s screamed commands started the tramp of feet and the monotonous ker-thump of a drum. Apparently the pipers were reserving their wind for the future.

  It was unnerving. The scrubby landscape was flat and sandy, absorbing sound, and stretched away in a gentle rise ahead. There was no sign of the enemy, no hostile threat, but while Kydd was conscious of the army behind, he felt very exposed in the little group at the front. On the other hand he was witness to the grand spectacle of an army on the march into battle, which he knew he would never forget.

  They stepped slowly on, the thousands of men marching in patient unison, standards aloft, squadron colours with their bearers.

  After an hour or so the sun was making itself felt. The pale soil reflected the brightness and was quickly absorbing heat, radiating it up uncomfortably. There was no keen horizontal sea breeze here, only a hot, breathy, vertical shimmering.

  A horse and rider appeared above the skyline at the ridge ahead and stopped. Another rose some distance to the left. Baird reined in and signalled a halt. Screamed commands echoed back and the drums abruptly stopped. An eerie silence slowly spread. Then the general urged his horse forward. Was this some sort of grave martial rite that must be performed before the two armies grappled in mortal combat?

  Kydd followed with the others. Baird seemed hardly to notice the two riders, acknowledging their smart salutes with a distracted wave and peering intently ahead. Then Kydd understood: these were their own scouts and consequently the general must be in sight of the enemy.

  They drew up level and he found himself along the top of a gentle ridge. There, spread out over the plain below, the Dutch host waited for them. With a tightening of his stomach Kydd saw what seemed to be an uncountable number of tiny figures in their battalions, which stretched squarely across their route.

  He tried to take in the wider scene. To the right was the dull-blue monolithic bulk of Blaauwberg, a smaller mountain a little further on. To his left was the same flat, sandy scrub that stretched for some miles inland before another blue mountain range, a larger formation beyond. But straight before them was the gentle slope that led across the baking plain to the Dutch Batavian lines, and in the far distance, the grand sight of Table Mountain.

  Baird had a telescope up and was quartering the ground in front of him with the utmost concentration. Around him his officers waited with patience: this was nothing less than decisions for the final commitment – if anything were overlooked, it would be too late to remedy in the heat of battle.

  ‘Um, a stern sight, sir,’ Kydd said hesitantly to the officer nearest him, who had holstered his telescope after his own survey and now sat calmly.

  ‘Possibly,’ the man said, with a curious glance at Kydd.

  ‘Sir, I’d be most obliged should you give me an account of what faces us.’

  ‘Very well.’ He deliberated for a moment, then said, ‘Before you are the Batavian lines in extended order as they are not expecting our cavalry to outflank them. On each wing is an artillery detachment with more in the centre, which I’m diverted to observe seem to be served by a species of Malay.

  ‘To the left you’ll see a Waldeck Jäger battalion whose rifled barrels are much to be respected. The Dutch infantry are next towards the middle, where you’ll note more Waldecker mercenaries in support behind that forward troop of guns in the centre.

  ‘On the right is a strong showing of Hottentot infantry supported by additional Jägers and on the far right is where much of their cavalry are assembled.’

  Kydd could now make out the differing uniforms and standards distinguishing parts of the array facing them but how all these could come together as a whole was beyond him. Then he saw in the exact centre a disciplined mass of blue – and the tricolour proudly aloft.

  ‘And the French,’ he said.

  ‘Ah, yes,’ the officer came back drolly.

  Baird lowered his glass. ‘Well, they seem to be awaiting us, so I shan’t disappoint them.’

  He let his glance rest on the scene for one last moment. ‘I shall attack in two columns as planned,’ he rapped. ‘The Second Brigade will follow the base of the Blaauwberg massif to storm the lesser mount – Kleinberg. The First Brigade will march to the front. I will have the howitzers in play from the start.’

  A two-pronged attack at a prepared army – but occupying the high ground to the right, above the Dutch, was a strong move.

  Baird leaned over and took a wooden contraption from an aide, which turned out to be an ingenious desk that fitted over his horse’s neck. He began scratching orders at great speed, handing them down impatiently. Each in turn was snatched by a dispatch rider, who put them in his sabretache and sped off in a wild thud of hoofs.

  Their own cannon – such as they were – must now be brought forward. The howitzers with their explosive shells were small but could create dismay among the enemy ranks beyond their size. Kydd gave a grim smile at the irony that the first shots of the battle would be fired by sailors. The Sea Battalion had hauled their bronze beasts under the hot glare of the sun to the front of the British lines and were now deployed to either side of the centre. Knowing they were under the eye of the entire army, they were serving their guns with energy and skill.

  The first shell landed not far from the front rank of the enemy, its orange flash and
instant gout of white smoke followed by a distinct crump. The other howitzer followed suit, its shell causing a swirl in the opposing ranks.

  To the right the pipers opened with a squeal and a drone, and the brigade stepped off in a compact column, as regular a march as ever to be seen on their home parade-ground. The howitzers fired again – but this time there was a reply from a troop of unseen guns located on the very high ground of Kleinberg they had intended as their own.

  ‘First Brigade, advance!’ Baird snapped. The sooner they closed with the enemy the better – if they could survive the guns. Behind, the pipers skirled into life and the column began to move up to crest the ridge. Passing on both sides of the general they marched towards the enemy.

  The battle had begun.

  MacDonald’s brigade, to the right, had increased their pace, knowing the vital necessity of silencing the guns on Kleinberg, and Kydd needed no telling that throwing infantry against guns would be a deathly affair.

  More enemy guns opened up – from the centre, the focus of the attack by the First Brigade. These Highlanders must in consequence advance through the hell of cannon fire before ever getting within range of their own muskets.

  It was a trial for Kydd to act the spectator while others went into danger, but it was his duty.

  Now at the base of Blaauwberg the Second Brigade, still in close order against cavalry attack, would be an easy target for enemy guns but they marched on under the blazing sun.

  Kydd tore his gaze away and watched the other column stolidly moving forward. Now the guns were telling: a ball reached the Highlanders, its passage marked by wheeling bodies and gaps in the ranks. Another – it couldn’t last!

  A series of puffs showed on the flanks of Kleinberg. ‘Jägers,’ the officer watching with him said, with concern. A rifled weapon wielded with skill could always out-range a standard musket, even if the rate of fire was slower. These sharpshooters must have been set to defend the guns and were doing so: some lonely figures on the line of march lay sprawled and still.

  ‘Damn it – where’s those cannon?’ Baird demanded irascibly, twisting in his saddle.

  At that moment the Sea Battalion came over the rise, the sailors near prostrate in the savage heat from the muscle-burning effort of heaving the iron brutes through the soft sand. Yet they hauled on valiantly, trying to keep with the fast-marching troops. One gun, two – four six-pounders were now in the field.

  Matters were now critical. The guns on Kleinberg were easily reaching the advancing brigade and gaps were being torn in the close mass of men; at some point the column must halt and form line to face the main enemy – and then the cavalry massing on Kleinberg’s slopes could charge down on them.

  Heroically, the exhausted seamen pressed on, and when the order was given for the column to halt and form line they man-hauled through to the front and, exposed as they were, manoeuvred their pieces around and set up to return fire.

  Now the enemy would be suffering cannon fire and must make some response – but would the Dutch cavalry dare a charge across open ground?

  The line was formed. Baird was going to make a frontal assault on the mass of the enemy, guns, cavalry and all, trusting in the spirit of the Highlanders to see it through to the end.

  The pipers wailed into life and the line stepped forward at a measured pace, directly for the waiting Dutch. It was bravery of the highest order to keep discipline and formation while at any moment from the massed ranks opposite there would be a sudden crash of musketry, and death would sleet in to meet them.

  The officers’ decisions made now would have consequences over so many: to fire when in range, then helplessly endure the enemy’s response while reloading, or accept the punishment of a first volley and vengefully take the time for a pitiless rejoinder?

  Men were going down in numbers, the guns at the enemy centre firing grapeshot, and there on the flank, high up on Kleinberg, the cannon were taking victims. Everything now depended on the bravery of the Scots regiments up there in closing with the foe.

  ‘I say, that’s as damn well done as ever I’ve seen!’ The officer handed Kydd his glass and gestured at Kleinberg. At first it didn’t register – puffs of gunsmoke from invisible positions between the marching column and the guns. Was it yet another threat? Then he saw that the sharpshooter fire from Kleinberg was slackening, and well ahead of the advance he could just make out nearly invisible green-clad figures scrambling from one vantage-point to another.

  ‘The “light bobs”. Amazing fellows – specially trained at Shorncliffe with rifles to act as light infantry in any regiment. Work in pairs always, and can be relied on, out on their own. See now? I do believe they’ve got the Dutch rattled!’

  The Kleinberg cannons were silent now: an attempt to slew them round to meet the marching 24th Regiment was stopped by the light bobs, who were systematically picking off the gun crews.

  Trumpets sounded faintly from the 24th and the glitter of steel showed as bayonets were fixed. After a crashing volley, the redcoats broke into a mad charge directly at the cannons. It was too much for the Dutch who hitched up their guns and fled downhill, leaving their now exposed position to join the main army.

  Baird’s tense expression cleared. ‘Ah! Those brave fellows have done fine work this day. Now it’s the turn of our other Highlanders.’

  The line of kilted warriors tramped implacably straight ahead. Suddenly the entire front of the enemy erupted into musket-fire. Some of the Highlanders went down but the others marched on, the gaps filled immediately. At 250 yards a halt was called to bring their weapons to the present and open fire for the first time.

  Smoke swirled over them as they reloaded, then the relentless advance continued. Kydd had seen nothing like it – the march into the very mouths of the enemy guns, the silken colours proudly floating above, the pipers in the forefront, their cold courage striking the fear of the devil into their opponents.

  An officer was shot from his horse. He tumbled to the ground but gamely dragged himself to his feet and hoisted himself back into the saddle.

  The lines were closing. It was now more than possible that the armies would meet in the shock of close combat.

  A hundred yards – then fifty. Even to Kydd’s eyes there seemed to be an edgy turbulence in the opposing ranks at the approach of the ferocious Scots. The line stopped: a final crashing volley erupted and out of the smoke with a triumphant yell came the Highlanders in a wild charge. It was a fearsome and glorious sight: in the dust and smoke the gleam of steel as bayonets and broadswords clashed, man stood against man, strove and died – and in the chaos and noise the day was decided.

  The Dutch centre gave way. The vaunted Waldeckers had fallen back, then turned and fled, and kilted troops punched into the very heart of the enemy. The cannon were overrun, the Javanese artillerymen slaughtered to a man. The French heroically attempting to close the line gave ground under the terrible onslaught and more Scots demons flooded through.

  Their army now broken and isolated, there was little the Dutch could do except call a general retreat. Trumpets bayed, and while gallant bands still held their ground and fought, most took flight. It turned to a rout, fleeing Batavians throwing aside their equipment in their terror as they made off south.

  Baird punched the air in elation. ‘That I had the cavalry to harry them now!’ He swore, then recollected himself and raised his telescope to scan the scene. Abruptly he lowered it and looked about him. ‘Ah, Captain Kydd,’ he called pleasantly. ‘If you would oblige me, sir?’

  Kydd rode up to the beaming general.

  ‘The Dutch are in headlong retreat and my brave Highlanders are too fatigued to pursue them. I fancy they are heading for their camp at Riet Vlei to regroup and I wish to dissuade them by means of your excellent frigate. Shall you . . . ?’

  ‘Aye aye, sir,’ Kydd said promptly, raising his arm expectantly. ‘To be signalled,’ he told the waiting galloper, and handed him an order. The officer saluted, wheeled his horse
around in the direction of Bowden at the shore signal pole and thudded off.

  The arrangement was simple: on their joint diagrams the length of the shore was divided into lettered units of one hundred yards. The point specified, together with a number indicating the required distance inland, would be signalled to L’Aurore. It would be a matter of minutes only before the position would be under a cannonade far more intense than any seen on the battlefield that day. Riet Vlei, some miles to the south, would not be the refuge the Dutch expected it to be.

  Baird walked his horse forwards, down the slight gradient over which the First Brigade had marched to glory. The smoke and dust had nearly dissipated and the pitiless glare picked out the trampled field, scattered pieces of kit, and hundreds of bodies lying at random over the arid land. Some still moved, giving out their life in the torture of thirst under the scorching sun; others were still and lifeless, fat black African flies gorging on their congealing blood. Scattered groups of men roamed over the battlefield – whether in plunder or mercy was not clear.

  It turned Kydd’s stomach: at sea there was none of the dust, stink or flies; no casual acceptance of heroism and lonely suffering. It was another, cleaner existence where men fought and died but with their shipmates. They were not left to choke out their lives under a cruel sun without a soul to know of it.

  They picked their way over the desolation, the general’s face now a mask. A dispatch rider cantered up with a message, which he read with evident satisfaction. ‘They’re on the run, gentlemen. I have it here – they’re attempting to regroup at Riet Vlei.’ He thought for a moment and grunted, ‘I’m told there’s a farm ahead. We’ll set up there until things become clearer.’

  It turned out to be one of the pretty whitewashed farmhouses, a little larger than the others and with the infinite blessing of a small pond and spring. Dozens of soldiers drank there thirstily while hundreds more weary infantrymen just sat on the ground, hunched and dazed.

  Inside, Baird welcomed his commanders. Dust-streaked, their breeches torn by thorny scrub and hard fighting, their features were lined and marked by their experience. ‘We’ll press on, shall we, sir?’ a grizzled colonel muttered. ‘My lads need a spell only, then they’ll—’