by Max Hennessy
‘Zulu,’ someone said. ‘Bugger’s been looting the brandy.’
The song went on through the darkness, a drunken babble in the silence. The thought that they were surrounded by hundreds of corpses was unnerving and one or two men with brothers in the camp, tried to slip off, only to be brought back at once. Certain they were surrounded by the main impi, they were all convinced they would never see daylight.
The voice that had been intoning the Lord’s Prayer had changed to the Twenty-third Psalm ‘–Though I walk through the Valley of the Shadow of Death I fear no evil–’
The bugger’s lucky, Colby thought. I do.
But the psalm continued and the high-pitched drunken African voice on the slope went on. As fatigue caught up with them, men began to sink down, indifferent.
Halfway through the night, Colby started awake. The stars were glowing above his head as only African stars could. Nearby, an officer was handing out rations to his men and, as he heard European voices, he remembered he was on the site of a disaster of unbelievable proportions. Far from conquering Cetzewayo, Chelmsford appeared, within eleven days of starting, to have lost his whole army.
When he woke at dawn, he was aware of the smell of death, and turning, he saw the body of a white man with his stomach slit open, lying in the pile of his own entrails. Jumping to his feet, terrified, he was thankful to see other men moving about. A party of them had been into the camp but it was deserted except for corpses. Cosgro had been with them and had found his spare horses dead on the picket rope, their groom lying between them, his dog skewered to the ground by an assegai. Pale and shaken, he was wiping vomit from his tunic.
‘Every bloody man,’ he was saying in a shaking voice. ‘There wasn’t one left alive! Not one! There must be hundreds of them, both black and white!’
As the sky paled, they were fallen in again, and, turning towards the west, Colby saw smoke hanging in the sky.
‘There was fighting at Rorke’s Drift,’ Cosgro said. ‘They must have swept straight on after destroying this place. Chelmsford’s expecting to find another disaster there.’
He was clearly beside himself with terror. ‘We ought to be moving back,’ he said. ‘We must be running short of food by now.’
‘We can always eat each other,’ Colby growled. ‘Starting with you.’
As Cosgro turned away, his eyes full of hatred and fear, Colby’s heart went cold. Busy with bitter thoughts about the politicals who had started the war, he decided it would be God help the colonists if the Zulus slipped past. There was little in the way of military strength at Helpmakaar and, if they could wipe out a camp as strong as Isandhlwana there was nothing to stop them heading for Pietermaritzburg as well.
Thank God, he thought, that Gussie and the children were in Durban.
Five
But they weren’t.
The feeling in Augusta’s bones that something dreadful was imminent had set her chafing. The terrifying dream had come again, disturbing and upsetting and, hearing of an officer’s wife in Pietermaritzburg whose husband had been sent to the Cape with a broken leg after his horse had fallen on him, she snatched at the opportunity and obtained the house she was evacuating. After all, she thought, she was almost in Durban. Pietermaritzburg was only fifty-six miles to the north-west.
It was an attractive town with streets wide enough to accept the eighteen-oxen voortrekker spans and, built on a sloping plain at an altitude of over two thousand feet, was noted for its healthy climate. Unlike many South African towns, it had even been in existence for forty years; British troops had been garrisoned there for a long time and, though it had been denuded for the march into Zululand, there were still a few of them around.
Despite the corrugated houses, which were stifling in the midday heat, the place was not unpleasant to live in, with its flowering trees, exotic birds and the splendour of the skies at dawn or sunset. There was plenty of entertaining and the black servants were silent, efficient and affectionate, despite their disconcerting habit of serving meals with their foreheads plastered with round coloured labels which Augusta identified as coming off her cotton reels. There were gardens, and the surrounding countryside was full of superb lakes, streams and waterfalls where picnics could be taken. And, unlike England, it was possible to arrange them well ahead and know the weather would be fine. Already the children had settled down happily, and with Annie Ackroyd an excellent housekeeper, it seemed safe enough, with the Zulus almost a hundred miles to the north, two bad drifts at the Tugela and Mooi Rivers to stop any invading force, and the track dotted with troop detachments all the way back as they moved up to Helmakaar.
Aubrey Cosgro’s wife turned up unexpectedly shortly after they had settled in, a silly little creature who matched her husband for lack of sense. She had almost caused a riot in the ship in which she had come out by insisting that she should have the best cabin because her child, being in line for a title, was more important than the other children. She was a sad woman, too, because she clearly didn’t trust her husband to behave himself when she wasn’t by his side, but, because she was lonely and missed England and because she was another army wife, Augusta cultivated her, feeling it might help to heal the rift between Colby and the Cosgro family.
She had just been on a picnic with her in the carriage to the Karkloof Falls and as she descended and started to unload the children, she saw Annie Ackroyd standing on the step with one of the black servants. Her face was pale and she looked worried. It was obvious at once that something had happened, but Augusta gave no sign until she had sent the carriage on its way and taken the children indoors.
‘What is it, Annie?’ she asked quietly. ‘Has something happened?’
Annie Ackroyd looked worried. ‘I don’t know, ma’am, to be sure. But Tom Asimano here came in an hour ago to say that horsemen arrived from Rorke’s Drift last night. He heard that Colonel Durnford’s native column’s been defeated.’
A cold hand clutched at Augusta’s heart. ‘Where did he hear this?’ she asked, forcing her voice to be steady.
‘He says from one of the native servants at Sir Bartle Frere’s house. He said the column had been cut to ribbons and Colonel Durnford killed.’
Augusta drew a deep breath. ‘If it’s as bad as it sounds, I think we ought to be prepared to make a hurried move back to the coast.’
Annie’s eyes widened. ‘Surely, ma’am, the Zulus won’t come here.’
Augusta was still struggling with her voice, her mind full of her dream. ‘I don’t know, Annie,’ she said. ‘But if they’ve destroyed Colonel Durnford’s column, there must be a large force of them near the Tugela and it might easily get behind the other columns and invade Natal.’
For the rest of that evening, they moved quietly round the house, placing things handy. Augusta had had enough experience of war in her adolescence to know what to do. Above all, she told herself, she mustn’t panic. Panic spread. There must be no reason for anyone else in the house to be frightened.
The rumours persisted and the following morning as they went outside for the first time she was aware of groups of people standing in the street talking under the jacaranda and gum trees and by the spiky leaves of the aloe hedges. There was a strange atmosphere of suspense and even of dread. Nobody was showing it yet but it was there and, as the hours dragged by, the shadow of a disaster brooded over them all.
During the morning, Hetty Cosgro arrived. She was close to tears.
‘No news is good news,’ Augusta told her inadequately. ‘We’ve just got to go on waiting. It’ll probably all turn out to be a mistake. Some native runner who’s got the wrong end of the stick.’
But then Annie, returning in the carriage from shopping, said crowds were waiting at the Raadzaal for information and that quite definitely it had been heard that there had been a battle and something had gone terribly wrong. Nobody was saying anything yet, but snippets of news were leaking out and it seemed there had been a major disaster, though nobody knew yet whe
re it had occurred or what exactly had, happened.
‘I think, Annie,’ Augusta said quietly, ‘that we had better pack a few things. We must be prepared to go quickly.’
‘Won’t the Major expect you to be here, ma’am?’
‘The Major,’ Augusta said firmly, ‘will expect me to make sure his children are safe. Just prepare a suitcase or two, then make sure the horses are in the carriage and that Tom Asimano is handy to drive us.’
Annie gave her a scared look and Augusta knew exactly what she was thinking. With all the best horses taken by the army, what were left weren’t very good. The two they’d hired with the carriage were galled at girth and neck and had a habit of jibbing or rearing like squealing unicorns, and their favourite pastime was to bolt downhill then suddenly sit on their haunches as if they hoped the harness would break and the carriage crash over them and end their lives. They had never once attempted to pull without attempting to commit suicide and there had been occasions when the only way to move them was for Tom Asimano to reeve a rope under their fetlocks and haul on it while Augusta beat them about the ears with the whip.
‘I know, Annie,’ she said. ‘Tom Asimano might bolt. But in that case I’ll do the driving.’
The town was unnaturally quiet all day in the sultry heat. Men were moving on horseback to and from the centre, trying to find out what had happened, and there were carriages waiting in the wide square near the Raadzaal. That evening the first real news was brought in by deserting Kaffirs who had cut across country instead of following the road, and were fleshed out by a trooper of the Natal Mounted Police who had ridden into town to give the alarm. Finally, two British officers, one from the 24th and one from the 3rd, arrived. All the way behind them towards the frontier everybody was busy laagering for their defence, and settlers in the tiny dorps were barricading and provisioning their houses.
The wildest rumours were hurrying about: the whole British and Colonial army had been wiped out and there was nothing between the Zulus and the coast. Dundee, Helpmakaar and Weenen had fallen and the Zulu army was heading for Greytown which was only fifty miles away. Pearson’s column was besieged in Eshowe and Wood’s column had been forced into the Orange Free State. Rorke’s Drift was surrounded and in flames, and Chelmsford had been butchered with all his men. The two officers who had galloped in to alert the authorities to the danger were suddenly seen as deserters.
By evening the reaction had reached talk of lynching, and Hetty Cosgro, quite certain that she was a widow, was arranging to return to Durban, when a newspaperman who had been with the army appeared. The disaster, it seemed, had occurred at a place called Isandhlwana and out of a force of eighteen hundred black and white soldiers only a handful had escaped. Six full companies of the 2nd/24th had died without a single survivor and of the Europeans who had officered native units, most were dead. The appearance of the men who had ridden in with the news suddenly took on a different aspect. In a disaster of this proportion, there must have been a general sauve qui peut and the only intelligent thing for any survivor to do was get away from the scene as fast as he could.
The newspaperman, an ex-officer himself, brought official confirmation in the form of letters from Chelmsford. Rorke’s Drift, it seemed, was safe, but only after a tremendous fight, and so was Helpmakaar, but the casualty list he brought was far from complete and seemed impossibly long.
The town was shocked. Terrified but still calm, Augusta continued with her packing. Several times, people appeared, asking to buy the horses and carriage which stood outside the door and she became so concerned that someone would steal them, she and Annie led them round the house and tethered them, still in the shafts, to the back stoep where they couldn’t be seen.
In every mind was the thought of a vast Zulu impi heading towards them, and the measures for the defence of the town were so energetic everybody came to the conclusion that the Zulus were already on their way. A garrison order was issued that soldiers must always be armed, because an officer had been murdered on the east of the town by a half-witted Kaffir, and the following morning an aide appeared on the step to inform Augusta that the house was to be barricaded.
‘We’re laying out a laager,’ he explained. ‘It will cover several of the town’s streets. Your house, I fear, lies on the perimeter. I advise you to leave for Durban at once.’
Augusta’s temper flared. ‘Don’t be stupid,’ she snapped. ‘My husband’s with Lord Chelmsford. I shan’t move until I know either that he’s safe or that he’ll never be returning.’
By Sunday, everyone was numb with fear. The Maritzburg Rifles, a volunteer infantry unit, had been mustered, but since there were only just over seventy of them, every male capable of carrying a rifle was also being armed, and families were being ordered to set aside bedding and rations for the wounded and to be prepared for an attack if they heard three guns fired from the fort. Normal life had come to a standstill, and the exuberance that had existed on the invasion of Zululand had given way to panic. After violently underestimating the Zulus, it appeared to Augusta – who had heard such stories before about the Sioux and the Cheyennes – that they were now heavily overestimating them.
Colby was still with Chelmsford as a member of his staff as he rode into Pietermaritzburg. The Commander-in-Chief was tired and discouraged. His invasion had come to an end within eleven days of starting, two of his columns were still cut off out in the blue, and the very safety of the colony itself now seemed in doubt. All he could do was regroup his forces to protect Natal until reinforcements came.
‘And they’ll have to come,’ he said. ‘I can’t even begin to plan the next phase until I learn what they are and when they’ll arrive.’
Considering that his command had suffered a disastrous defeat and that he was assailed by intolerable pressures, his mind seemed to be working clearly. A man of colourless personality, he nevertheless impressed Colby with his method, tenacity and moral strength, and he was alarmed by the mood of the town.
‘I think we need to calm the place down,’ he said. ‘There isn’t a Zulu on this side of the Tugela. You’d better let me have a report on what’s being done, Colby, because I see no point in terrifying every woman in Natal.’
It was late when Colby rode out, accompanied by a young officer from the Pietermaritzburg garrison who was so inexperienced he wasn’t at all sure what was expected of him. Here and there a head poked through a loophole cut in the shuttered houses, but the sight of an officer in uniform was too much for most people and they began to crowd into the street. Had they heard of Gregorius Retief? Did they know who was safe from the Natal Mounted Infantry? How about the Edendale contingent? Colby answered the questions carefully, cautious not to give hope yet at the same time not to encourage despair, and was just about to mount again when he heard his name called. As he turned, he saw a figure running through the dusk towards him. To his amazement it was Augusta. She was in a state of near-panic, made worse by her efforts to control it, and the dream she had seen had grown over the last days to monstrous proportions. Normally a realist unafraid to look a fact in the face, a future without Colby had been too terrible to contemplate.
‘Jesus Christ in the Mountains!’ he said angrily as she clung to him. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘I was afraid.’
‘You’d have had less to be afraid of in Durban,’ he snapped. He was tired and his temper was close to the surface. Then he saw the agony in her face, the relief, the strain, and the tears in her eyes, and he put his arms round her.
‘I wanted to be near you,’ she was saying. ‘I was afraid something was going to happen.’
‘Something did,’ he said harshly. ‘By God, it did!’
As her knees gave way, she sat down abruptly on the edge of the step, her handkerchief balled in her fist and damp from the tears of relief. Then she drew a deep breath and got control of herself. ‘I kept dreaming,’ she said in a shaking voice. ‘I had you stone dead and the children orphans. I had you ly
ing stark and white in the moonlight with a spear through you. There’ve been terrible stories of what the Zulus do and I couldn’t even think of it. What happened, Colby?’
‘Some bloody fool must have gone off his head,’ Colby said. ‘Half the force had been taken out of camp to meet the Zulus. There was no reason for a defeat and Chelmsford’s baffled because he overlooked nothing. He ignored none of the warnings that were sent him.’
Her misery was subsiding rapidly. ‘What’ll happen now?’
Colby drew a deep breath. ‘They’ll auction off the effects of the dead and Chelmsford will ask for reinforcements.’
‘Will he get them?’
‘I expect so. He knows the government’s bloody meanness and he’s going to ask only for three infantry battalions, two cavalry regiments and enough artillery and engineers to make possible what he intends. Personally, I think he’s erring on the side of understanding. I’d have made no bloody bones about it. I’d have demanded that the people at home dig into their pockets. If they want an empire, they shouldn’t expect to get it on the cheap.’ He shrugged. ‘Perhaps that’s why Chelmsford’s a general and I’m only a brevet lieutenant-colonel.’
Augusta’s fingers were working in his. ‘What about us?’ she asked. ‘What happens now?’
‘I’m to return to the North Cape Horse,’ Colby said. ‘And you, madame, are going to Durban where you’ll be safe.’
She turned to face him, her face pink, her eyes dangerously bright.
‘No, Coll,’ she said, her vehemence startling him. ‘I’m staying here.’
‘You could be in danger if the Zulus come.’
‘Where I came from, people were constantly in danger from savages. Along the frontier in Arkansas and Oregon they still are. I’m staying here. I’m scared.’
She didn’t look scared. At that moment, with her eyes flashing and her small jaw set, she looked ready to take on Colby, Chelmsford, the Army Council, the authorities in Natal and the government at home.