Hervey 08 - Company Of Spears

by Allan Mallinson

  ‘It is a little difficult not to when Colonel Somerset appears to consider me but a native scout!’

  ‘Tush!’

  Fairbrother returned his eyes to the parade. ‘ “Who is the happy Warrior? Who is he that every man in arms should wish to be?”‘

  ‘“It is the generous Spirit”. That is what the poet said, is it not? Be generous then!’

  ‘I am at your service.’

  He was. Captain Edward Fairbrother – the rank now properly constituted – was appointed aidant to the Officer Commanding Mounted Detachments, Kaffraria Field Force. It was a fine title, he had observed; and, more sardonically, one that would look fine on a gravestone.

  One of Colonel Somerset’s gallopers came bowling along the line in a growing cloud of dust.

  ‘Why do you suppose he thinks that necessary?’ said Hervey, shaking his head. ‘We have sat a good hour.’

  Fairbrother shrugged. ‘Somerset will be impatient for the off. That, or he confounds celerity and celebrity.’

  Hervey laughed, then returned the galloper’s salute. ‘Colonel Hervey, sir: the column’s to advance at ten o’clock.’

  Hervey took out his watch. It was fifteen minutes before the hour. ‘Very well.’

  He turned to the two gallopers from the Sixth and the Rifles, who had closed with him on seeing Somerset’s man approaching. He nodded to them; he need say nothing.

  They relayed the order at the trot, the drill for muster parades. Hervey was pleased as he watched the lines form column of route with but a very few words of command. He glanced left and right. In the distance were the burghers. He need give them no orders. Their instructions were to guard the flanks during the march; they would conform by their own initiative. Hervey may have had his doubts, but in this sort of ranging the burghers were practised enough.

  At ten o’clock Lieutenant-Colonel the Honourable Henry Somerset gave his bugler the order to sound the advance, and the Kaffraria Field Force began its march to the frontier. The fifes and drums of the 55th (Westmoreland) Regiment of Foot struck up ‘The Lass o’ Gowrie’, and the battalion stepped off at attention as one, arms sloped, heads high. Hervey watched them with admiration: these were the men – the infantry of the Line – who had prised the French out of Spain and stood astride Bonaparte’s arrogant march on Brussels. They could volley like no others, and they could charge with the bayonet. They could prise the French out of Spain again and out of Belgium if it came to it. But were these close-drilled ranks what was needed here? He did not know. Colonel Somerset was sure of it: breasts of red to affright the savage, and cavalry to terrify him! And perhaps it would be so, for who knew how these Zulu fought? Hervey simply inclined his head: in a month or so they would have their answer.

  XXIII

  THE HAPPY WARRIOR

  Gaika’s kraal, ten days later

  Hervey reckoned that Chief Gaika’s kraal covered the same area as what his father called the cursus of the Great Henge on Salisbury Plain. It lay on an east-facing slope in open country ninety miles beyond the Keiskama River, within sight of many smaller ones. This was Gaika’s principal kraal (the one nearer the frontier afforded better grazing for his iinkomo – his cattle – in winter). The outer perimeter was a stockade of thorn about seven feet high, with an inner palisade fifty yards beyond. Grass-made huts like beehives occupied the space between the two, in which lived the tribal chosen. Inside the palisade Gaika’s cattle were herded at night, and in the middle was the chief’s own hut encircled by a smaller thorn thicket. Hervey and Fairbrother had not been invited into the sanctum when they visited the winter kraal three months before, but now they stood in Gaika’s clay-floored courtyard with Colonel Somerset and his staff, welcome-mead in hand and with the unquestionable authority that a regiment of redcoats and several hundred horse conferred.

  Gaika spoke freely and with animation. Colonel Somerset’s interpreters – one Dutch, the other Hottentot – struggled to keep up with him.

  ‘He’s not saying that,’ whispered Fairbrother. ‘That’s not what he means.’

  Hervey leaned closer to him. ‘What is he saying?’

  ‘He speaks the conditional: they are translating as if he spoke an intention.’

  Hervey was resolved not to stand on ceremony. He edged forward from the back of the party to where he might have Somerset’s ear.

  ‘A word, Colonel, if I may?’

  Somerset heard but did not move a muscle. Hervey knew well enough the courtesies in front of a man such as Gaika; he would just have to wait.

  After ten minutes, as Gaika sat down and motioned for more mead to be brought, Somerset turned to him. ‘Colonel Hervey, your intrusion is not apt.’

  Hervey bit his lip. ‘Fairbrother says you are not being served faithfully by the interpreters. They give the impression of Gaika’s concurrence with what you ask of them, whereas he speaks conditionally.’

  Somerset checked his instincts to curse Fairbrother for his impudence: if what ‘the half-caste’ said were so then it changed the conclusions he was coming to. He bowed to Gaika, turned and beckoned Fairbrother to him.

  ‘What is all this?’

  ‘Colonel, Gaika is not saying that he will not cross into the colony, and that he will oppose the Zulu, he is saying that he would if he were able to persuade the elders of the Xhosa to muster their warriors, and if the men in red and the horses fight alongside him.’

  Colonel Somerset looked dismayed. ‘You are sure?’

  ‘I am. And he implies he had already taken an unfortunate decision – I suspect to throw in with Shaka. He said Ngebe silahlekile ukuba ubungasibonisanga indlela: “we would have got lost if you had not shown us the way.” ‘

  Somerset thought for a moment. ‘Come with me.’

  Hervey followed too.

  Gaika smiled, and invited them to sit on hides next to him. They drank more mead, and he revealed that he recognized Hervey, and Fairbrother (whom he called njengomXhosa – ‘like a Xhosa’).

  ‘Ndisafunda, mhlekazi,’ replied Fairbrother, raising his palms.

  Colonel Somerset looked at him.

  ‘I said that I was still learning.’

  But Gaika smiled. He liked mhlekazi – ‘big handsome one’. He turned to Somerset. ‘This man we shall speak through,’ he said decidedly.

  Fairbrother relayed the sentiment to Somerset, who nodded.

  He did not wait to be asked by either party. ‘‘Mhlekazi, if you are able to muster all the warriors, how many will they be?’

  Colonel Somerset looked affronted. But he did not speak.

  Gaika told him twenty thousand, though Fairbrother told Somerset he thought he exaggerated. And Gaika spoke with increasing warmth. He and Fairbrother talked as if equals for a quarter of an hour, during which Somerset – with unexpected patience, thought Hervey – remained content to listen without understanding.

  At length Fairbrother turned to Somerset. ‘I believe I now have it. Gaika can muster seven thousand warriors at his own call, and his two vassal chiefs a further ten. He speaks of the Zulu in most measured terms, however. He says it had first been his intention in the event that they invade the Xhosa territory to hide all his corn and drive the cattle, of which he has twenty thousand head, towards the Keiskama. He says the Tambooka tribe, whose territory is nearest the Zulu, have already lost much of their cattle and are powerless to resist. When I told him he would have the immediate support of a thousand of the King’s troops, and artillery, he expressed himself willing to meet the Zulu in battle, and not to cross the Keiskama.’

  Somerset’s mouth fell open. ‘You told him we would support his warriors?’

  ‘I did. But it was a mere matter of pride. He would do precisely what you wanted him to do were we to confront the Zulu. He puts on a brave face, but he is terrified for his life.’

  Somerset said nothing.

  Fairbrother waited. He had said all there was to say to Gaika; if Somerset wished to repudiate the offer…

  The comm
ander of the Kaffraria Field Force braced himself. ‘Very well. Please ask Chief Gaika when we may march.’

  Hervey’s head swam as he sat down in a camp chair in the welcome shade of his tent. The Xhosa mead had been strong, and the sun had seemed twice its usual power. Johnson brought him the blackest coffee, and he opened his journal and picked up his pen, as he had intended to do before Gaika had invited – summoned – the officers to feast.

  29th December 1827

  The country is so very like the Wiltshire plain that at times I almost imagined to see Dan Coates riding to his sheep. The march from Grahams-town, nine days, has been uncommonly tiring though, two hundred and thirty miles is the reckoning. Not so great a distance, perhaps, compared with marches in India, and the Peninsula, but the going has not been easy for the men of the 55th, and the waggons have frequently fallen behind. The artillery is six guns: four 9-pdrs and two 6-pdrs, drawn by oxen, and are a day’s march to our rear. I cannot but think that a pair of galloper guns would be of better service, and were the troop to remain long in the Cape I should have a pair made. Our horses are good doers, perhaps better so than would have been the troopers brought from England, and our sick have been few. Private Attewell was left with an orderly two days ago at the Kei River, very sick of a sting.

  E.F. has been sent to find Dundas – the excellent fellow from Graham’s-town who is sent to speak with Shaka Zulu – to tell him what Somerset has decided. We are now to rest here a day while the artillery rejoins and Gaika sends word to his other chiefs…

  ‘ ’Ow’d tha like thi steak, then, sir?’ Johnson had left Hervey in peace with his journal for half an hour. He considered that to be more than enough time spent on a book of any description, even the Bible (on which he spent no time at all; but the Bible he knew to be special).

  Hervey looked at him, puzzled. ‘I said that I have eaten enough for three men already.’

  Johnson was equally puzzled. ‘That’s what ah said, sir: were it good?’

  Hervey’s brow furrowed deeper. It was a trivial matter, but he was not going to let it pass. ‘No, Johnson, you said, “How would I like my steak?” ‘

  ‘Ah didn’t! I asked ‘ow’d tha like thi steak!’

  Hervey’s mouth fell open. ‘Precisely!’

  ‘What, sir?’

  Hervey sighed, thinking. ‘A moment. How would you ask, “How did you like your steak”?’ ‘‘Ow’d tha like thi steak.’

  ‘And how would you ask, “How would you like your steak”?’

  ‘‘Ow’d tha like thi steak.’

  Hervey raised his hands, smiling. ‘As tricky as translating Xhosa. You see my difficulty.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘The words are exactly the same.’

  ‘Ay, sir, but ah wouldn’t ask thee ‘ow’d tha like thi steak doin when ah knew th’d ‘ad plenty already!’

  Hervey shook his head with mock gravity. ‘How could I have made such a mistake?’

  ‘Because tha’s tired, an’ that mead.’

  Hervey looked long at him. ‘Johnson, is there any of the India ale left?’

  ‘Couple o’ bottles.’

  ‘Then fetch two, and I’ll tell you about Gaika’s hut, and what I think we’ll do next.’

  Not long before dusk Fairbrother returned unexpectedly – and urgently. Hervey was first alerted by a trail of dust which he observed through his telescope a full ten minutes before making out the rider. The lathered flanks of Fairbrother’s Caper testified to their hard gallop: he had left his escorts far behind. He looked more purposeful than troubled, however, as he dismounted in the Sixth’s lines. But all knew that a man did not ride as hard as he had for no good reason.

  One of the dragoons took the reins. The horse was blown but by no means finished, Hervey noted: Fairbrother had judged it well. There were some who believed it necessary to ride a horse into the ground when carrying an urgent dispatch, but Hervey had always been of the opinion that the precise moment of collapse was never predictable, and therefore that it was too hazardous a principle to follow. ‘What’s the alarm?’

  Fairbrother took off his shako and wiped his brow with his forearm. ‘Dundas,’ he began, shaking his head, and taking a long drink from a flask of Cape wine which Johnson had produced from nowhere. ‘Done the deucedest thing. I ought to report to Somerset straight away.’

  ‘He’s still at Gaika’s hut. I’ll send word.’ He turned to find Serjeant Wainwright already standing at attention. ‘We need to alert Colonel Somerset. Will you present my compliments, tell him that Captain Fairbrother is returned, and ask if he will come here or if he wishes us to attend on him.’

  ‘Sir!’ Wainwright saluted and spun round, setting off towards the kraal in a brisk march that would have matched a Xhosa’s lope.

  ‘Now,’ said Hervey when there was no one within earshot, and sitting down in one of the camp chairs that Johnson had brought. ‘What’s the business with Dundas?’

  Fairbrother settled heavily, and blew out his breath. ‘He got up to the hills in the Tambooka country the day before yesterday, about thirty miles north and east of here. He had a report of a force of Zulu advancing towards the Bashee. The Tambooka were to make a stand east of the river.’ He took another draw on the flask. ‘So he crossed the river a few hours before dusk and met Voosani, the Tambooka chief, who told him the Zulu had already taken several thousand head of cattle. Dundas said he would assist him recovering them. Why he believed that recovering the cattle was a more effective means of conveying the message to Shaka I have no notion.’ He took yet another long draw.

  ‘And?’

  Fairbrother shook his head. ‘It might have passed with no great harm, for it seems Dundas’s original intention was to block the ford through which the Zulu intended driving off the cattle. But as they approached, apparently with just a few drovers, he decided he’d attack. The drovers were seen off easily, but then he ran into the Zulu rear guard, and it was a desperate business for a while, until powder began to tell. He reckons to have killed fifty of them, but then came word that several thousand were moving on the ford, and so Dundas got the Tambooka to recover what cattle they could, but even these had to be abandoned as the Zulu began pressing them. So Dundas decided to escort Voosani to his kraal to try to rally more warriors, which is where I found him, and he at once sent me back to alert Somerset.’

  Hervey began unfolding his map. ‘How long do you think it will take us to get up to the Bashee? What is the country?’

  ‘The infantry won’t manage in less than a day. But why exhaust ourselves? Why not wait for the Zulu to come to us? They’ll burn the kraals and take the cattle and the corn, but it might have to be the price if we’re to be certain of stopping them. The Tambooka will flee this way. We could rally them and have another five thousand or so.’

  ‘Do the Zulu have muskets?’

  ‘The scouts didn’t speak of them.’

  Hervey was trying to calculate time, distance and relative strengths. ‘Do you not think we might overawe them with a show of force – the troop and Rifles, I mean – while the infantry and the rest march up?’

  ‘Divide one’s force?’

  Hervey raised his eyebrows. ‘In ordinary, of course, it’s folly; but in an exigency … I wish I had some better idea of how the Zulu fight.’

  He and Fairbrother had talked a good deal of Shaka’s system, such as they knew it. However, the accounts came either from (as Somerset called them) rascals, freebooting Englishmen, or else from the defeated tribes, and were hardly reliable therefore, given as they usually were in wide-eyed terror or with nefarious intent. It was evident that the Zulu did not simply overwhelm their opponents by sheer numbers – a great host of savages bearing down on their peace-able neighbours like the wolf on the fold. There were, it seemed, well-formed regiments – impi – who moved quickly and under strict discipline. Their weapon was the short spear, the iklwa, which was not thrown but thrust, like the jabbing sword of the Roman legions. And there was no doub
t that a Zulu warrior was possessed of singular courage. But as to what this amounted to in the field neither Hervey nor Fairbrother could tell. Of one thing, however, Hervey was sure: dash, the bold offensive action which in India could turn the tables so spectacularly when the situation looked desperate, might not serve here. For if, as the stories went, the warriors were more afraid of Shaka’s vengeance than of death at the hands of the enemy, they would not be so easily scattered as the bandits who passed for soldiers in India.

  ‘We have lost the element of surprise, of course,’ said Hervey, rising as he saw Somerset approaching. ‘They know there are white faces with the Xhosa now, and guns. The only thing left to dismay them is numbers or some clever manoeuvre.’

  Fairbrother said nothing. What he knew of his friend’s capacity for audaciousness was considerable. From all he had read, and even more from those he had spoken to, he judged this measured response to be uncharacteristic – as well as intriguing.

  Somerset was a shade unsteady and his speech not entirely even. Hervey felt only sympathy, and nodded to Johnson, who knew what was required.

  Fairbrother made his report.

  Somerset, sitting low in a camp chair, sipping repeatedly at his strong black coffee, began to look uncertain. His fighting, such as it was, had been on interior lines, east of the Fish River, with a number of strongpoints around which to rally. Here in open country, a thorn-fenced kraal the only feature, and his force not yet even united, he saw the possibilities of defeat only too clearly. His distaste for Fairbrother was now all but gone. ‘I am grateful for your timely intelligence, Captain Fairbrother. Admirable. And Dundas?’

  ‘As I said, Colonel, I believe he may be able yet to bring over Voosani and his men.’

  Somerset nodded slowly. ‘That is what Gaika said – that Voosani will fight if we support them.’ He looked at Hervey. ‘Colonel, what is your opinion?’

  Hervey was surprised to be asked; Somerset had scarcely spoken half a dozen civil words to him since Cape Town. He sensed he was not being asked the best course of fighting the Zulu, however; rather whether they should fight at all. ‘Well, Colonel, General Bourke’s orders are clear enough, and we know what is the lieutenant-governor’s intention behind them. We have not been able to deliver an ultimatum to Shaka, but if we don’t make a stand against these Zulu here then an ultimatum would have no effect. I see no occasion to withdraw.’