Buller, having selected the route which seemed at the time to be the line of least resistance, began on January 9 to transfer the bulk of his force from Frere to Springfield, a distance of sixteen miles, but owing to difficulties of transport and the necessity of accumulating a large stock of supplies at the new base, it was six days before the concentration was effected. One brigade was left at Chieveley to watch the Boer front at Colenso.

In Orders issued at Frere on January 9, Buller announced that he "proposed to effect the passage of the Tugela in the neighbourhood of Potgieter's Drift, with a view to the relief of Ladysmith." His scheme was based upon imperfect information and misleading maps, and was in fact not so much a surprise flank attack, as all his movements had to be made in full view of the enemy, as an attack from a position higher up the river that must be frontal, because the enemy would have ample time to make it so: and herein lay its weakness. When, however, he personally surveyed the situation from Mount Alice, which overlooks Potgieter's Drift, the aspect of the curving amphitheatre showed the danger of attempting to force the river at that point. On the N.E. was Vaalkrantz and Doornkop, and the high ridge of Brakfontein, which the enemy had already begun to entrench, and over which passed the road by which he proposed to reach Ladysmith, everywhere commanded by the heights, filled the quadrant towards Spion Kop on the N.W.

On January 13, Buller reported to the War Office that, having found the Potgieter's Drift scheme impracticable, he proposed as "the only possible chance for Ladysmith" to send Warren across at Trickhardt's Drift, five miles higher up the river. The new scheme was based upon a theory which had been evolved out of the experiences of autumn manoeuvre battles collated on the office desks of Pall Mall, that the easiest method of defeating the enemy with a small casualty list was to contain his front and attack one or both of his flanks; and General Officers had come to regard this as the regulation opening to which they were bound to conform.



Buller divided his force into two unequal portions. Warren with the stronger portion was to attack the Boer right which Buller believed to be weak, while Lyttelton with the remainder demonstrated at Potgieter's Drift. To himself Buller reserved the part of the Chorus in a Greek play, taking a general interest in the action, yet not personally concerned in it; and in that capacity he issued a stirring appeal to the relieving force.

On January 15 "secret instructions" were given to Warren. He was recommended, after crossing the Tugela at Trickhardt's Drift, to proceed west of Spion Kop, and to pivot his right and swing round on to the open plain in rear of the Boer position facing Potgieter's Drift.

Warren, who was not of opinion that the Boer right was weak, marched out of Springfield on the evening of January 16. Lyttelton had already started, and during the night occupied a position on the north side of the river near Potgieter's Drift.

The task before Warren was hard. In order to carry out Buller's plan he must cross an unbridged river and struggle through a country of which little was known. Next day two bridges were thrown over the Tugela above Trickhardt's Drift, which recent rains had made dangerous, and Hart's and Woodgate's Brigades were transferred to the left bank to cover the crossing: but it was not until sunset on January 18 that the entire force with its tedious transport was established on the north side of the river.

The mounted troops under Dundonald were sent out at mid-day to reconnoitre towards the N.W. and in the course of the afternoon his advanced squadrons came upon a Boer commando which was easily dealt with, but before the issue was decided, he had reported that he was engaged near Acton Holmes, and asked for help. Warren assumed that the mounted troops, which he had sent out to reconnoitre, had wilfully and prematurely forced on an action, and were now in trouble; and it was not until the next morning, after an infantry brigade had been moved out to support them, that Warren heard from Dundonald, whose previous messages had not clearly described the situation, that he was able to take care of himself. Dundonald had at first expected that the main body would follow him, and his reports seem to show that he had hoped to induce Warren to move towards Acton Holmes. He was rebuked for assuming, not unnaturally, that the objective of the operations was Ladysmith, and instructed that the objective was a junction with the other portion of Buller's force. He was summoned to Warren's headquarters and ordered to abstain from further attempts to ride round the enemy's right. Thus, as before at Hlangwhane, a promising cavalry movement by Dundonald was thrown away.

The deliberate march of the British Army from Frere and the delay at the Drifts gave the Boers ample time to prepare for the attack. On January 19, on which day Warren moved to Venter's Spruit three miles from Trickhardt's Drift, they were in occupation of the whole line from Vaalkrantz to the Rangeworthy Heights. Fourie was in command of the left, Schalk Burger of the centre, which included the important features of Green Hill, Spion Kop, and the Twin Peaks; and L. Botha of the right, in which was Bastion Hill.

There were two roads by which Warren could advance; one running by Fairview northwards from Trickhardt's Drift between Green Hill and Three Tree Hill, and the other eight miles longer by Acton Holmes. The length of the latter and a report from White that several commandos were on their way to Acton Holmes from Ladysmith, led Warren to adopt the former route.

He informed Buller of his decision, adding that certain "special arrangements" which he had made would oblige him to remain near Trickhardt's Drift, and that he must therefore have further supplies. The "special arrangements" were in fact the steps which every general would take before attacking a strong position not immediately accessible; namely to acquire ground from which it could be threatened and shelled. Clery was ordered to direct the operation, which Warren believed would entail "comparatively little loss of life."

Early on January 20 Clery with one brigade and artillery advanced up the re-entrant which springs from the river towards the east end of the Rangeworthy Heights, and posted his guns half way up the valley on Three Tree Hill. Hart, with a brigade of five battalions, was sent to occupy the irregular southern crest of the heights running from Three Tree Hill towards Bastion Hill. He drove the Boers out of their advanced trenches, but found that the northern and higher crest to which they had retired, could only be won by a frontal advance across open ground. He and his brave Irishmen were as ready as ever to push on in the line of the greatest resistance, but he was ordered by Clery to forbear. Meanwhile Dundonald, not deterred by the damping of his trek on the 18th, and while obeying an order from Warren to come to heel, seized Bastion Hill, thereby securing Hart's left flank on the crest. So far as they went, the operations of January 20 were successful. Warren's pivot movement was in train, the whole of his force was now threatening the Boer right which was widely extended but deficient in depth; and the day's casualties were few. Following the example of Buller, who delegated his authority to Warren, the latter entrusted the conduct of the day's operations to Clery, who in succession ordered the chief movement to be carried out by Hart. Next day the mounted troops on Bastion Hill were relieved by infantry.

Buller was aware that the Ladysmith garrison, weakened by sickness and privation, could give him little or no help; but at least during the earlier phase of the Trickhardt's Drift operations he was confident. On January 17 he told White that "somehow he thought he was going to be successful this time," and that he hoped to be within touch of Ladysmith in six days. His Head Quarters were at Spearman's Camp, a few miles south of Mount Alice, whence he rode over daily to note and criticize the tactics.

It now occurred to Warren that he might have been mistaken as to the significance of the position occupied by the enemy on the Rangeworthy Heights, and that it might be in reality a screen to hide a trek of the Free Staters back to their own country; and on this supposition, which was founded upon reports that the Siege of Ladysmith had been raised and that some wagons had been seen on trek westwards towards the Drakensberg passes, he applied for reinforcements to enable him to block the way.

Buller sent him Talbot Coke's brigade with some howitzers; and came over to consult with him on January 22. The situation was not satisfactory. Time was being wasted, Warren's "special arrangements" had done little, and now he had a new idea. Buller still advocated an attack on the enemy's right, while Warren wished to persevere with his advance by the Fairview Road; but he pointed out that Spion Kop, which his reading of the "secret instructions" had led him to regard as out of bounds, must first be taken. No definite action seems to have been decided on, and Warren was left to act within certain limits on his own responsibility. Finally, with the approval of the four infantry generals, he resolved to seize Spion Kop that night. The attack, however, was postponed until the following night, to give time for the position to be reconnoitred.

Spion Kop is a ridge of which the chief features are a pair of high peaks joined by a nek to a plateau, from which a spur, ending in a kopje called Conical Hill, juts out at right angles to the nek, which becomes a spur of the plateau at a Little Knoll east of the summit. Its tactical importance was derived from its height, as the summit, though not the peaks, is higher than any of the ground held by the enemy; and from its position, as it was on the obtuse angle formed by the meeting of Botha's line on the Boer right with Schalk Burger's on the centre, and enfiladed each of them. It was accessible from the British front by a slope which rises from the lower ground to another spur running S.W. from the plateau.

On the morning of January 23, Buller saw Warren, and again pressed him to make an attack on the Boer right; but finding that the orders for the assault on Spion Kop had already been issued, he refrained from vetoing it. He threatened, however, that if immediate action in some direction were not taken, Warren's force would be withdrawn to the south of the Tugela.

On the previous day Warren, betraying the Engineer officer unused to handling large bodies of men, and unfamiliar with the military unities, rearranged his command with a straight edge, and distributed it in one way for tactical, and in another for administrative purposes. All the troops lying west of an imaginary line became the left attack under Clery, while those east of it became the right attack. The latter, under Talbot Coke, were ordered to seize the Spion Kop position by night, and entrench it before daybreak, the actual assault being made by Woodgate with two battalions, some mounted infantry on foot, and a few Engineers. At sunset on January 23, the curtain fell upon the first act of the Tragedy of Spion Kop.

On the night of the January 23 Spion Kop was held as an observation post by a party of seventy burghers. When Buller first appeared at Potgieter's Drift, it was on the right of the Boer line, but now it was only the right of the centre under Schalk Burger. Little was known of its features and tactical value, beyond the information obtainable by a telescopic reconnaissance. It was a prominent object in the Boer position, and it seemed to be within the grasp of a night adventure. Woodgate left his rendezvous at 9 p.m., but it is doubtful whether he would have reached the summit before daybreak but for Thorneycroft, who was in command of the mounted infantry which bore his name, and who had before nightfall picked out and noted the recognizable objects on the slope. A staff officer from Head Quarters, who accompanied the column to direct the march, had had no opportunity of making himself acquainted with the way of access to Spion Kop, and Thorneycroft was ordered to act as guide.



The summit, but fortunately little more than the summit, was veiled in mist, and the crest was reached. Bayonets were fixed before the Boer picket was alarmed and opened fire, but the ammunition was spent without effect, as Thorneycroft's men had by order thrown themselves on the ground as soon as they were discovered. A charge into the mist drove back the picket and scared the main body off the summit. Thus before dawn on January 24, Warren was in possession of the hill which was believed to be the key of the Boer position, and the chief obstacle in the way of his advance seemed to be thrust aside: but the mist on Spion Kop was the forecast of the Fog of War which was soon to envelope him.

Woodgate, having the men, the tools and the ground, at once began impulsively to dig, without endeavouring to inform himself of the features of the position he had so easily won. A sort of a trench had been scratched on the summit by the weary men, when the mist rolling away for a little while disclosed the startling topography of the position. The surface of the plateau sloped gently at first, and then abruptly fell away, and the trench was found to be of little use. The enemy could approach on dead ground to within two hundred yards of it. Woodgate, seeing that the real defensible line was not the highest part of the summit, but the edge lower down, where the steep descent began, sent working parties to the front, but they at once came under fire. Soon the mist again enveloped the hill, and having disposed his force, he reported to Warren that he had established himself on Spion Kop.

The Boer outpost which had been driven from the summit belonged to Schalk Burger's command. With Botha's co-operation a storming force was soon brought together, and almost every point from which Spion Kop could be brought under fire was seized, even the Little Knoll near the summit, which enfiladed the main trench. Joubert telegraphed from Ladysmith that the position must be re-captured, and Kruger at Pretoria asked what was being done to win it back.

Little did Woodgate's force realize what the morning mist was hiding. Soon after 8 a.m. the sun dissolved the veil, and the storm burst. From the right the men in the trench and lower crest were enfiladed by the Little Knoll and the Twin Peaks; on their front and left they were rained on by bullet and shrapnel from Conical Hill, Green Hill, and beyond; with such effect that the lower crest had to be temporarily abandoned. Woodgate was soon mortally wounded and the command devolved upon Crofton. Spion Kop was the first position of great tactical importance won by the British Army on the Tugela, and the Boers were determined to recover it.

The naval guns posted on Mount Alice and at Potgieter's Drift opened fire not only on the Little Knoll near the Spion Kop plateau and on the Twin Peaks, but were also pitching their shells over the summit on to the Boer positions supposed to be in line with it, and a field battery on Three Tree Hill shelled the open ground on which the enemy was advancing.

Heliograms and flag messages from Spion Kop, orally handed in and incorrectly transmitted by scared signallers, bewildered the recipients and increased the density of the Fog of War upon the Tugela. To Lyttelton was flashed an appeal for help without a signature. A message sent by Crofton soon after he assumed command, in which he reported Woodgate's death and said that reinforcements were urgently required, was transmuted into a despairing cry which made Warren think that he had lost his head, and which led to his supersession. Warren replied that there must be no surrender, and that Coke was on his way up with reinforcements.

Warren and Lyttelton, as well as the Umpire in Chief, Buller, were too far away to be able to appreciate the situation on Spion Kop, or to know how much or how little of the ridge was in possession of the British troops. Lyttelton's naval guns, playing upon the Little Knoll, were twice silenced by a message from Warren, who was under the impression that the whole of the ridge from the Twin Peaks to the main position on Spion Kop was held. A demonstration made earlier in the day by Lyttelton towards Brakfontein was checked by Buller, who was unwilling to engage the enemy in that direction.

The Boers, a small party of whom before Woodgate's death had climbed the dead ground, and had come within fifty yards of the main trench, again attained the outer crest, and a counter attack led by Thorneycroft in person partially failed, and although the verge was not wholly abandoned, only the main trench filled with dead, wounded, and unwounded men parched with thirst, remained for effective resistance. Woodgate had already paid the penalty for the hasty and fatal act of squatting down in an indefensible position, and lay among the other victims strewn upon the plateau; but the British soldier is not easily discouraged by the errors of his leaders. The cry "nous sommes trahis" is never heard from his lips, and when called upon on active service,

To live laborious days and shun delights,

he rarely fails to do his duty.

At mid-day the situation on Spion Kop was hazardous but not hopeless. Reinforcements had arrived and were quickly absorbed in the works which they quickened with patches of new vigour, but the terrible hail of bullet and shrapnel was not abated. No definite orders had been given to Clery, who was on the southern crest of the Rangeworthy Heights, except that he was to "use his discretion about opening fire against the enemy to his front, with a view to creating a diversion," a discretion which he exercised by doing nothing.

Shortly before noon a step was taken by Buller, who was four miles away on Mount Alice, which enlarged the area of the Fog of War and brought Spion Kop within its chilling grasp. Thorneycroft was ordered to take command on the summit with the local rank of Brigadier-General, although there were several officers present senior to him: but many hours elapsed before the appointment was made known to all of those whom it most concerned. Coke, who was now on the S.W. spur, was unaware of it, and without communicating with Thorneycroft, sent at 12.50 p.m. to Warren a message which was not delivered till 2.20 p.m., that as the summit was crowded and the defence was maintaining itself, he had stopped further reinforcements.

Almost simultaneously with the despatch of this not unfavourable report, and long before it was received by Warren, two companies posted in a detached trench on the right threw up their hands, but not before they had lost all their officers. Out of the crest line sprang the Boers, who having made them prisoners, endeavoured to impose the surrender upon the men in the main trench.[27] Thorneycroft saw that if these wavered, as they seemed inclined to do, all was lost; and rallying the details within reach, he succeeded in thrusting back the intruders, who, however, had already sent their prisoners below the hill. His prompt action stayed the wave of doubt which threatened to flood the position, and compelled it to break before it could do much harm.

At 3.50 p.m. Coke, who was still on the S.W. spur, and therefore not in direct touch with Thorneycroft, informed Warren that the enemy was being gradually cleared from the summit, and that he had been reinforced with the Scottish Rifles from Potgieter's Drift by Lyttelton, whom Warren, after receiving Crofton's mis-transmitted message, had ordered to co-operate. He had already forwarded a letter written at 2.30 p.m. by Thorneycroft, stating that the force on Spion Kop was being badly punished by artillery, was in want of water, and was insufficient to hold the position. To this letter he had added a note of his own which showed that he did not attach much importance to it, saying that he had ordered more troops on to the plateau, where "we appear to be holding our own." This letter, with Coke's covering note, did not reach Warren until after he had received Coke's message sent nearly an hour later, and he assumed that the latter indicated the existing hopeful situation with which he had to deal. Of the physical features of the Spion Kop position he knew little more than what his telescope told him, and he read optimistically the meagre, inconsistent, and misleading reports which reached him occasionally from the summit. He hoped during the night to place some naval guns on the plateau: he was informed that an accessible spring of water had been discovered: reinforcements were at hand: there was nothing more to be done.

Lyttelton, when ordered to "assist from his side," acted with intelligence and discernment. Noticing that Spion Kop, whither he had already dispatched the Scottish Rifles, was full of men, he sent the King's Royal Rifles towards the flanking position on the Twin Peaks, and the battalion supported by the naval guns, and ignoring messages of recall prompted by Buller, who was watching the advance with anxiety, worked its way up and expelled a Transvaal contingent and a small body commanded by an Irish renegade, all of whom were hurled by the impact into a flight of eight miles. The position was at once entrenched and at 5 p.m. the right flank of Spion Kop was secured, but only for a time. Again, as after Lord Dundonald's movement on Acton Holmes, a promising enterprise was thrown away. Buller had from the first disapproved of Lyttelton's action, which still more widely distributed his already scattered command. He was too far away to see its bearing upon the situation, and now ordered him to recall the King's Royal Rifles, who after sunset were withdrawn from the position, which they had so gallantly captured in spite of warnings signalled from Spion Kop that it was strongly held by the enemy.

On Spion Kop the Fog of War hung more densely than ever. Coke, who was lame and unable to move freely about the position, believed that Hill, who had come up with a reinforcement soon after noon, and who was next in seniority to Crofton, was in command on the summit. He thought that Crofton had been wounded, and neither saw Thorneycroft nor knew until the following day that Warren had given him the local rank of Brigadier-General at Buller's suggestion. Thorneycroft was a junior major in the Army, having the local rank of Lieutenant-Colonel: and with two colonels senior to him present as well as a major-general, he was doubtful as to his status. No instructions reached him from Coke; he was unaware that the Twin Peaks had been taken by one of Lyttelton's battalions, and he was without means of signalling to Warren. He had no information of the measures which were being taken, such as the dispatch of guns, to make the retention of Spion Kop possible.

The men on the summit were utterly exhausted by fatigue, hunger, thirst, want of sleep, and exposure to the summer sun beating down upon the rocky surface, and their ammunition was running short. At 5.50 p.m. Coke reported "that the situation is extremely critical" and that the men "would not stand another day's shelling," but it was two hours before the message reached Warren. He ordered Coke to come down to consult him. Coke endeavoured to obtain permission by flash signal to stay where he was, but no oil could be obtained for the lamp, so regarding the order as imperative, he quitted Spion Kop at 9.30 p.m., leaving, as he thought, Hill in command. For four hours he strayed in the Fog of War before he found Warren's Head Quarters, which had come under shell fire, and which, unknown to him, had been moved from their original position.

Between 8 and 9, Warren received a letter written at 6.30 p.m. by Thorneycroft, who reported that the enemy's shell fire rendered the permanent occupation of Spion Kop impossible, and asked for instructions.

Coke's departure left the position without a clearly recognized commander, although he had done little more than attend to and distribute the supports and reinforcements on the S.W. spur. After the dispatch of Thorneycroft's letter at 6.30 p.m., the situation grew more hopeless every minute. The enemy's artillery was out of reach, the nature of the ground and the want of tools made it impossible to cut properly designed trenches, rations and water were exhausted, and nothing was known of assistance to be brought up during the night except that a mountain battery, which would be of little use against the enemy's guns, was at the foot of the slope.

For these reasons Thorneycroft justified in his official report his decision to retire from Spion Kop. With the acquiescence of all the senior officers, except Hill, who could not be found, he ordered a withdrawal at 10 p.m. The alternative seemed to be a Majuba surrender next morning. At 10.30 p.m. as the troops were beginning to move off the hill, he received a letter from Warren, asking for his views on the situation, and as to the measures to be adopted. It was now unnecessary to give these, and he sent a brief reply that he was obliged to abandon Spion Kop as the position was untenable.

The retirement was not made without protests from Hill and from Coke's staff officer who was still on the plateau. The former, eleven hours after Thorneycroft's appointment as Brigadier-General, believed, as he had every right to do, that he was in command, and halted the men; the latter sent round a memorandum to the commanding officers, asserting that there was no authority for the withdrawal. But the force of Thorneycroft's local rank prevailed, and the retreat was not stayed. Near the foot of the slope he found the mountain battery, and met a fatigue party on its way to prepare emplacements for two naval guns which were coming up, and received a message from Warren urging him to hold on to the position. It was too late. Ordering back the party and the battery, he went on to report himself to Warren, and arrived at Head Quarters almost simultaneously with Coke.

The Boers meanwhile were greatly discouraged by their expulsion from the Twin Peaks, and their failure to occupy the main position on Spion Kop. The guns which had tormented Thorneycroft for so many hours, and which were the chief cause of his retirement, were withdrawn, and Schalk Burger's commandos oozed away towards Ladysmith. But there was, however, a stalwart and not inconsiderable remnant of burghers who responded to Botha's expostulations, and stood fast as a forlorn hope determined to win back Spion Kop and the Twin Peaks. Their constancy was rewarded, and when at sunrise on January 25 they once more climbed the hill, they found to their astonishment and relief that it was still held—by more than 300 bodies of their fallen foes.

Such in brief is the tale of Spion Kop so far as it can be disentangled from the accumulation of messages, orders, reports, dispatches, and personal accounts, which obscure the subject. Many of these are inconsistent, not a few contradictory, and sufficient evidence might be found to support plausibly half a dozen conflicting theories of the cause of the disaster, and as many variants of the narrative.

At 2 a.m. Warren heard from Thorneycroft's lips—the latter's written message sent off at 10.30 p.m. on the previous evening not having reached him—of the evacuation of Spion Kop. At sunrise he was joined by Buller, who viewed the situation in a spirit of philosophic detachment. He had never cordially approved of the Spion Kop adventure, and was not surprised to hear that it had failed. Warren was inclined to persevere, but Buller decided to retire south of the Tugela and assumed the direct command of the Army, which on January 27 was once more drawn up on the right bank after an absence of ten days; with most of its superior officers discredited, with Ladysmith unrelieved, and the nation at home aghast at the disaster.

The lonely figure of Thorneycroft, the only man of action on the summit energizing and quickening the defence, stands out prominently in the confusion, gloom, and half lights of Spion Kop. Buller's impulsive intervention made him responsible for the position, and he tried to do his best. If the final act was an error of judgment, there is little doubt that but for Thorneycroft, the Boers would have rushed the plateau on the afternoon of January 24. He received no effective support from Clery and little from Warren, and was out of touch with Coke and the Colonels. His uncertainty as to his authority caused him to refrain from exercising it fully until the last moment. For the pain which the decision to withdraw must have given him, he deserves much sympathy. But although it was approved of by Buller, who probably felt bound to support his nominee, it was at least premature. He might reasonably have expected that an effort would be made during the night to relieve him, and might have postponed it for a few hours. It is unjust to judge a man in the light of eventualities which he could not reasonably be expected to foresee, but subsequent accounts from the Boer side show that the attack would not have been renewed the next morning if the enemy had found the Twin Peaks, for the evacuation of which Buller and not Thorneycroft was responsible, and Spion Kop still occupied.

Not only the inconvenience, but also the danger of suddenly conferred local rank were illustrated on January 24. Buller, hastily concluding from a garbled message that Crofton was incompetent, asked Warren to put Thorneycroft in charge. Thorneycroft heard of his appointment orally through an officer who had chanced to be at the signalling station, and the written message which never reached him was, it is said, picked up next day by a Boer! If the exigencies of war should ever require the sudden promotion of a junior officer to a position of great responsibility, it should not take effect until all concerned are notified. The defence of Spion Kop was, during the greater part of the day, conducted by a syndicate of officers acting severally.

The curtain had fallen, the drama was over, and the critics took up their pens. With Thorneycroft's report on the retirement from Spion Kop began a controversy which lasted for more than two years. Warren enclosed it in his own report to Buller, with the suggestion that a Court of Enquiry should be held to investigate the circumstances of the unauthorized withdrawal, and in succession each grade of the military hierarchy passed censure on the grades below. In Buller's covering despatch of January 31 with which he forwarded to the War Office, through Lord Roberts, Warren's Spion Kop report, he commented very unfavourably on Warren's arrangements and disposition of troops; and said that Thorneycroft had "exercised a wise discretion, and that no investigation was necessary": while to Warren's general report on the whole operations of January 17-27, he attached a memorandum to the Secretary of State for War, "not necessarily for publication," in which he not only blamed himself for not having taken command on the 19th, when he saw "that things were not going well," but also said that he could "never employ Warren again in an independent command"; as his slowness had allowed the enemy to concentrate and to increase the force opposed to him more than twenty-fold.

With this accumulation of censure Lord Roberts dealt in his despatch to Lord Lansdowne of February 13, written at a drift on the Riet River during the advance on Kimberley. The Commander-in-Chief confirmed all the censures passed by his subordinates and added some of his own. Buller was rebuked for not having intervened when he saw that a most important enterprise was not being "conducted in the manner which in his opinion would lead to the attainment of the object in view with the least possible loss of life on our side"; Warren was reproved because he did not visit Spion Kop during the crisis, and had instead ordered Coke to come to him; and while Thorneycroft's gallantry and exertions, without which the troops would probably have been driven off the hill during the day, were acknowledged, his action in ordering the retirement without endeavouring to communicate with Coke or Warren was pronounced to be a "wholly inexcusable assumption of responsibility and authority."

Never before had such an inconvenient batch of despatches been laid upon the desks of Pall Mall. To publish them and to proclaim to the world that the Natal Generals, when they were beaten by the enemy, had began to fight among themselves, was impossible. If they were withheld from publication, many awkward questions would be asked. The War Office temporized, and endeavoured to steer a middle course. Would Buller kindly substitute a simple narrative for his despatch? This Buller refused to do, and in April, 1900, the War Office published the despatches, imperfectly sterilized. As they now appeared, they were neither a simple narrative, nor a full revelation. Lord Roberts' criticisms on Buller were cut out. The memorandum, "not necessarily for publication," in which Buller reflected severely on Warren's incapacity was withheld. Only the censure passed upon Thorneycroft was allowed to appear. The junior officer was made the scapegoat of his superiors' mistakes. Of all the officers concerned, he alone had failed. The War Office had taken a politic but not straightforward course. The blame must be laid upon some one, and if it were laid upon Thorneycroft alone it would affect public opinion less mischievously.

It soon became suspected, however, that certain things were being kept back, and the controversy dragged on for two years; Buller to the end maintaining that as he was not present at, nor in command of, the Spion Kop operations, it was not incumbent on him to write a simple narrative of them; and that his duty was to write a critical account of the affair, such as would be sent in by an Umpire in Chief during peace manoeuvres.

Not until April, 1902, did the Epilogue of the Tragedy of Errors appear. The despatches, with the memorandum "not necessarily for publication," were published in full, as well as the "Secret Orders" given to Warren at Springfield, which were its Prologue.

Notes:

[Footnote 26: A detachment numbering about 600 only was sent.]

[Footnote 27: In the Fog of War some of the British soldiers thought that the Boers were coming up to surrender themselves, and acted in this belief for a brief period.]



CHAPTER VI

More Tugela Troubles

By a process of elimination Buller hoped in time to find the road to Ladysmith. He had tried in succession, but without success, Colenso, Potgieter's Drift, and Trickhardt's Drift. He now informed White that he intended to make another attempt, but Lord Roberts advised him to postpone it until his own advance should draw off the Free Staters and weaken the barrier on the line of the Tugela.

The situation in the besieged town was growing worse every day, but a proposal made by White as well as by the War Office that the garrison should endeavour to break out, was not sanctioned by Lord Roberts. White also was opposed to Buller's making another attempt to cross the Tugela, as he considered that the force would be more usefully employed in preventing the enemy from concentrating on Ladysmith.

[Sidenote: Map, p. 98.]

Buller's new plan was an advance by way of Vaalkrantz. Here the river winds in two salient loops towards the north, with a re-entrant loop between them, and there is a slight break in the heights on the left bank. The Brakfontein ridge slopes down towards Vaalkrantz Hill, between which and Green Hill there is a dip through which a road passes on to the open ground towards Ladysmith, eleven miles distant.

Buller proposed to occupy the ridge of Vaalkrantz with artillery, and after a feint attack on the Boer position on Brakfontein, to push through under cover of the guns. It was believed that the enemy's extreme left lay on Vaalkrantz, which was commanded by Mount Alice and Zwart Kop. Lord Roberts when informed of the project was not hopeful of its success, but did not veto it, although he thought that Buller would be better advised to abstain from offensive tactics.

The feint attack on Brakfontein was to be made by seven Field Batteries and a Brigade of Infantry, and was to be continued long enough to convince the enemy that it was "meant". It was then to be withdrawn and the real attack set in motion. The advance of the feint would be covered by heavy guns posted on Mount Alice, and concealed batteries on Zwart Kop would open on Vaalkrantz in support of the real attack.

The bulk of the infantry was posted in the east loop, so as to appear ready to cross the river and support the feint attack between the loops. As soon as the guns had driven the enemy into their trenches on Brakfontein, a pontoon bridge was to be thrown across the river south of Hunger's Drift, and the guns on Zwart Kop were to open on Vaalkrantz, and when this had been sufficiently bombarded, it would be carried by the infantry, and guns would be brought up to enfilade the Boer line; while the cavalry "when feasible" would push through under the ridge and threaten it from the rear.

It was a pretty tactical scheme, with much of the War-Game about it, and it depended for its success upon the practicability of using Vaalkrantz as an artillery position, and upon the correctness of the assumption that the enemy was not in force eastward of it.

Buller was not successful in placing his guns on Zwart Kop unnoticed by the enemy, who was warned in time. After Spion Kop, Botha went to Pretoria, and Schalk Burger took furlough. B. Viljoen was now in command. He saw the danger and applied to Joubert at Ladysmith for help, who thought he was over-anxious but sent him a heavy gun. Little however would have been done but for the intervention of the two civilian Presidents. Steyn appealed to Kruger who, having tried without success to induce Joubert to take command on the Upper Tugela, fell in with Steyn's suggestion that Martin Prinsloo, a Free Stater, should go there; and Botha was ordered back from Pretoria. Prinsloo took command of the Brakfontein position, Viljoen remaining on Vaalkrantz.

At sunrise on February 5 began Buller's third attempt to relieve Ladysmith. Wynne, who had succeeded Woodgate in command of the 11th Brigade, advanced in two lines up the slope towards Brakfontein, supported by the fire of forty-four guns. Nearly six hours passed before any reply was vouchsafed by the enemy. At mid-day some guns on Wynne's left front opened on the batteries, but not a shot was fired by the Boers in the trenches.

Already one field battery had been detached from the left of the line of guns, the first movement in the real attack, and had taken up a position to cover the pontoon troop which was throwing a bridge across the Tugela near Hunger's Drift. At noon the completion of the bridge was signalled to the feint attack. The batteries fronting the Brakfontein ridge were withdrawn, and Wynne's brigade which, having been marched up the slope, was now marched down again, came under a heavy but almost innocuous infantry fire, which at last broke out on Brakfontein.

To the Boers it appeared that another attack, determined while it lasted, but devoid of backbone, had been kept at bay. The guns on Zwart Kop opened on Vaalkrantz as soon as the detached battery was seen to be in motion; and the other batteries came into action as they arrived from the Brakfontein demonstration. There was some annoyance from casual rifle fire and a Maxim posted on the heights S.E. of the loop, but it did not seriously interfere with the work of the bridge-builders.

The rules of the game were strictly obeyed, and there was "a thorough preparation by artillery" before the infantry was allowed to advance. The movement was delayed until half a hundred guns were playing upon Vaalkrantz and the chance of a celer et audax exploit was lost. At 2 p.m. Lyttelton with two battalions of the 4th Brigade was permitted to cross the pontoon and with these he worked up under the protection of the left bank, and emerging upon Munger's Farm, rose thence to the southern edge of Vaalkrantz, and took hold of the ridge. Here he was joined by a battalion of Hildyard's Brigade, whose original orders to occupy Green Hill were cancelled, and later on by the remaining battalions of his own brigade; which Buller, wavering for a time, had held back, as the pontoon and the open ground were under fire from the right flank. At 4 p.m. Lyttelton was established on the main hill of Vaalkrantz, and during the night the position was entrenched. The occupation, however, brought two facts to light. Half a mile to the north of the main hill was another hill, only a few feet lower, unapproachable and in the enemy's possession; and it was not practicable, as Buller had hoped, to bring up artillery on to the position seized by Lyttelton.

At daylight on February 6, the situation was favourable to the Boers. Botha had arrived and had taken over the command from Prinsloo. The heavy gun sent from Ladysmith had been mounted on Doom Kop, which was now held by reinforcements under L. Meyer; other good positions east of Vaalkrantz had been strengthened; and some of the guns on the Brakfontein position had been moved round. Vaalkrantz standing between Doorn Kop and the Twin Peaks, was shelled simultaneously from the left front, and the right rear, as well as from Green Hill;[28] it seemed as if Spion Kop were about to be repeated.

Buller opened on Green Hill with artillery, and on the hill north of the main hill of Vaalkrantz, in the hope of making the North Hill assailable. In view of a retirement, a pontoon bridge was, at Lyttelton's request, thrown across the river under the main ridge. He discouraged a proposal made by Buller to attack the North Hill by a force creeping along the foot of the westward slope of Vaalkrantz, covered by fire from the ridge.

Buller was now stalemated. The artillery fire had not cleared the way to the North Hill, and Lyttelton was unable to move on it, but he said that he could hold on for the rest of the day if no more artillery were brought to bear on him from the S.E.

Finally Buller determined to shift the responsibility. He reported the capture of Vaalkrantz to Lord Roberts, and in effect asked what he should do with the white elephant. To carry out his plan would "cost from 2,000 to 3,000 men," and he was "not confident of success." Was Ladysmith worth it? Yes, replied Lord Roberts without hesitation, Ladysmith was worth it and it must be done.

In the evening Lyttelton, having thwarted an attempt by the enemy to recover Vaalkrantz, was relieved by Hildyard. On the following afternoon, Buller, in spite of Lord Roberts' message, made up his mind to withdraw. Further reconnaissances had shown that the North Hill, even if taken, could hardly be held. A council of war was summoned, at which, as might have been anticipated, Hart alone was for persevering, and at which Warren again put forward the scheme rejected by Buller at Frere, but now gladly adopted by him, of advancing on Ladysmith by way of Hlangwhane.

Orders were issued for the withdrawal of the force from Vaalkrantz during the night. It was skilfully carried out, and Buller was once more ferrying his men across the Tugela, having for the third time failed to reach Ladysmith.

On February 8 the Army was retracing its steps on the road by which four weeks before it had marched from Springfield to Potgieter's Drift; and on the 11th it was concentrated at Chieveley, from which eight weeks before it had been thrown at the Colenso heights. All the Tugela operations had been conducted in a rarified medium. Want of determination, want of system, the absence of maps, the lack of a sufficient staff, were responsible for two months of misadventure. Buller, like the Boers, was easily discouraged by failure, but unlike them was unable to quicken himself readily for a renewed effort. He lost confidence in himself, and then in his subordinates. Like a nervous child, he opened the door of a dark chamber, but was afraid to enter. The terror of the unknown drove him back in a panic. When his plans, which were usually well thought out, miscarried, he became peevish, and scarcely made an attempt to reconstruct them. Only an Army of which the backbone was the stolid, unimaginative Englishman of the lower classes, and which believed that its leader was doing his best, could have remained undemoralized by the campaign on the Tugela.

Buller possessed one quality which to a great extent outweighed his shortcomings as a military commander: namely the power of inspiring confidence. His men believed in him, and would do anything for him. They liked him for his bluff, John-Bullish, and rampant manner. The enlisted man is a curious differentiation from the class to which he belongs. His democratic instincts become less acute when he shoulders the Lee-Metford, and he readily accommodates himself to the will of a benevolent despot of robust appearance, and blunt and somewhat contemptuous address; whom in fact he prefers to the ascetic, dispassionate General Officer of quiet habit and speech.

The criticisms passed upon Buller were far more friendly in the men's than in the officers' bivouacs. Possibly the men's opinions, as being the more natural and spontaneous, were also the more correct. The enemy conducted the war upon principles which were strange to the British Army, and to which it had to adapt itself painfully; and the men seem to have recognized sooner than the professors the difficulties of the situation, and to have been less intolerant of ill-success.

Few general officers have ever revealed in their official communications more of the workings and the moods of their minds than did Buller in Natal. His telegrams and despatches always reflected the thoughts of the moment. After the Colenso fight, he candidly referred to it as my "unfortunate undertaking of to-day." Six days before the Vaalkrantz affair he told Lord Roberts that "this time I feel fairly confident of success"; and on the eve of the attack he said that "while I have every hope of success, I am not quite certain of it."

After the retirement, it was, "wherever I turn I come upon the enemy in superior force to my own." He subjected his personal and individual ideas and feelings to no restraint, and they incontinently leavened all his messages which were now confident, now diffident, and now querulous, and which read as if they were quotations from his private diary. From Vaalkrantz he heliographed to White that the enemy was too strong for him, and that the "Bulwana big gun is here"; and could White suggest anything better than an advance by way of Hlangwhane? In his telegrams from Chieveley to Lord Roberts, he complained of want of support, and of the feebleness of the resistance made by the Ladysmith garrison, which he professed to believe did not detain more than 2,000 men. Yet in recording his weakness, it must in justice be said that he gained and never lost the confidence of the rank and file of the relieving force, and that under any other leader it would probably have succumbed to its misfortunes.

On February 12 the re-concentration of Buller's Army at Chieveley was complete. The enemy's front had been greatly strengthened since the attack on Colenso. The Boers saw what Buller could not be persuaded to believe, that Hlangwhane was the key of the position, and extended their line thence in a curve through Green Hill and Monte Cristo, with a detached post outside it on Cingolo. These four hills and the ground between them Buller proposed to occupy, and then pass between Cingolo and Monte Cristo to a drift of the Tugela N.E. of Monte Cristo, cross the river and advance by the Klip Riyer on Bulwana. The two "iron bridges" at Colenso were impassable, but the Boers had thrown a bridge across near Naval Hill by which, and also by a ferry higher up, communication was kept up with their left flank.

The initial movement on February 12 was made appropriately enough by Dundonald, who two months before had seen the value of the Hlangwhane position, and who now perhaps as he marched out, realized the truth of the proverb tout vient ce qui sait attendre. He occupied Hussar Hill temporarily as a reconnaissance to give Buller an opportunity of surveying the ground over which he was about to operate. The Intelligence officers reported that the enemy was strongly posted at several points within the area and unmasked some of his slim tricks. In order to conceal the line of the trenches, the excavated earth was piled up some distance towards the front, and tents not intended for occupation were pitched to divert fire from the positions in which he lay. The war-craft which comes by instinct to nationalities not in an advanced state of civilization and leading simple lives face to face with wild animals and native tribes, and which the conventionally trained European soldier only learns by experience, strengthened the Boer commandos without an augmentation of individuals liable to be killed or wounded. The veld trenches which kept Methuen at arm's length at Magersfontein and the Boer devices on the Tugela seem to show that War is not a Science, but an Art, easily acquired by unprofessional soldiers.

On February 14 the movement began and a front at Hussar Hill was taken up, but owing to the heat and the scarcity of water, little was done during the next two days, except a bombardment of the Boer trenches and gun positions. The advance of the relieving force has been likened to the deliberate progression of a steam roller.

Clery having been invalided, the IInd Division was temporarily under the command of Lyttelton, whose orders for February 17 were to move upon Cingolo Nek and Green Hill. Dundonald was instructed to work in rear of the infantry and outflank any detachment of the enemy that might appear on the Nek. But Dundonald was not a military pedant devoid of initiative and tied to the letter of his instructions, and when the difficulties of the ground broke the touch between him and Lyttelton he was perhaps not sorry to find himself disengaged; and when he saw that the Boers were entrenched on Cingolo Ridge, he attacked instead of outflanking it.

While the commando on the ridge was occupied with the infantry, it was suddenly surprised from the flank by Dundonald's men, and was driven out of the trenches. Meanwhile one of Lyttelton's battalions, which in ignorance of Dundonald's movement, had been sent to clear Cingolo of some Boers who were firing on the advance and checking it, found when it reached the ridge that it had been forestalled in the capture.

When Lyttelton became aware that the enemy had been expelled, he proposed to avail himself of the success without delay, and push on to the Nek and Monte Cristo, while Warren's Vth Division attacked Green Hill; but Buller objected to an advance which could not be completed before nightfall. Lyttelton bivouacked S.W. of the ridge and Dundonald on the detached hill at its northern end. During the night, field guns were brought up the slopes and with much difficulty emplaced in a position from which shell fire could be directed on Monte Cristo.

If the movement of the day was not remarkable for speed and enterprise, it was at least directed with skill and without excessive caution; and Dundonald showed that his military spirit had not been chilled by previous rebuffs, one of them administered almost on the spot where he was now in activity.

At daylight on February 18, the movement was resumed, the immediate objective being the capture of Monte Cristo and Green Hill. One brigade was sent through the Nek on to the eastward slopes of Monte Cristo, while the other attacked the hill from the south. With the help of the ever-ready Dundonald the IInd Division established itself on the main hill of the ridge early in the afternoon. The Fusilier Brigade of the Vth Division was meanwhile acting in support; and advancing as soon as Monte Cristo was seen to be occupied, easily took hold of Green Hill. The enemy was now expelled from all the positions commanding the proposed line of advance over the Nek, and was retreating westward towards the positions near the right bank of the Tugela, but no attempt was made to pursue him. The motto of Buller's Army was festina lente and its track towards Ladysmith was in zigzag.

On the following day Hlangwhane was occupied by the British troops, and before noon on February 20, all the Boers had withdrawn to the left bank of the Tugela, and Buller was favourably placed for the advance by way of the Klip River on Bulwana. A reconnaissance, however, caused him to change his mind and to resume the movement at an acute angle by doubling back towards Hlangwhane and crossing the river by a pontoon bridge west of the hill.

His new plan was to capture a position between the Onderbroek and Langewacht Spruits, which appeared from a distance to be one hill, but which in reality was two, Wynne's Hill and Horseshoe Hill, which were separated by a donga. On the morning of February 21 he signalled his intentions to White, saying that he thought he had "only a rearguard before him"[29] and that he hoped to be in Ladysmith next day.

After the capture of Monte Cristo and the Hlangwhane position, some of the commandos seem to have trekked away towards the north, and even Botha for a time appears to have lost heart and to have suggested to Joubert that the siege of Ladysmith should be raised. The Boer leaders had already, like King Arthur,

Heard the steps of Modred in the west,

and their army in Natal had been weakened, before Buller's final advance, by the departure of commandos going to succour their brethren not only on the Modder, but also in the Cape Colony.

The situation on the Tugela was reported to Pretoria almost simultaneously with the news that Cronje was hemmed in at Paardeberg. But owing it may be to the distance which intervened between Kruger and the scene of action, the dour old voortrekker of Colesberg would not hear of any voluntary retirement before the enemy who had driven him out of the Cape Colony sixty years before. He sent an appeal to the Boers of the Tugela which, in an intense human document, displayed his steadfast and touching faith, and which might have been addressed by his prototype Cromwell to the Ironsides.

He rebuked the burghers for their cowardice, which he attributed to the waning of their trust in the power of the Almighty to help them in their distress, and with many instances and quotations from Holy Writ, he adjured them to stand fast in faith. He was confident that the cause which he in all sincerity believed to be the cause of the Church of Christ would prevail in the end, and justifiably encouraged by successes in the field against superior numbers he exhorted the commandos to endure without flinching the purification by fire. Kruger's passionate appeal availed, and the waverers returned to their posts. The incident disclosed the power of the factor of moral force, wherein the Boer strength lay; and it will in a great measure account for the prolongation of the war. When their cause seemed hopeless, they comforted themselves with the honest and irradicable belief that its righteousness was the assurance of final success. Though most of their leaders were incompetent, though they themselves were easily discouraged; disobeyed orders; often malingered and mutinied; quitted the field with their wagons which they were reluctant to abandon, under such frivolous pretexts that the verlafpest or leave-plague became a bye-word; though time after time their power of resistance seemed to be exhausted; though in their thousands they were distributed over the British Empire as prisoners of war; though their confident expectation of European intervention was not realized; though they were always greatly outnumbered; they continued stubbornly to defy for the space of two years and seven months the most numerous and the most efficient Army which has ever left the shores of Great Britain, until at last they were worn down by mechanical friction and attrition, and not by the stroke of war. When the Boers were driven out of the Hlangwhane positions, they took up a new position facing S.E. on the left bank of the Tugela. Their right was near the head of Hart's loop, and their centre came within a few hundred yards of the river at Wynne's Hill, whence the line was carried on towards Pieter's Hill.

At noon on February 21 Buller began once more to send his men across the Tugela, intending to content himself that day with establishing his force "comfortably" on the position north of the railway bridge enclosed by the bend of the river, which was now free of the enemy. He ordered Talbot Coke with the 10th Brigade of Warren's Division to pass over the Colenso Kopjes on to the open ground beyond, from which the Onderbroek valley could be enfiladed by artillery. He had received information that the enemy were there in force, and in the belief that "what Boers there were, were hiding in that kloof," he changed his plan of moving northwards at once on Wynne's Hill.

On February 21 Coke advanced in three lines, but soon after he had cleared the hilly ground, his scouting line came under fire from the Grobelaar slopes, and his right flank was also involved from the direction of Wynne's Hill. His Brigade was pinned to the ground by rifle and shell fire until nightfall, when it was retired to the Colenso Kopjes, where Wynne's Brigade of Warren's Division had arrived during the afternoon.



The route march to Ladysmith was checked. Instead of a mere rearguard to be driven in, as Buller had fondly believed, a strongly posted line, extending nearly four miles S.W. from Wynne's Hill, had to be attacked. The enemy had been so much encouraged by the failure of Coke's movement, that Botha telegraphed to Kruger that he had hopes of a "great reverse."

Warren thought that it would be necessary to diverge from the advance and take the Grobelaar slopes, and White reported that Boer reinforcements were coming in from the north. Towards evening on February 21, it seemed not unlikely that another Colenso, Spion Kop, or Vaalkrantz would soon be debited to Buller. The line of approach to Ladysmith was held by the enemy, and the British Army of relief, the greater part of which had crossed to the left bank of the Tugela, was entangled in the Colenso Kopjes, and the river loop.

Warren's general idea for the 22nd, of which Buller approved, was to attack Wynne's Hill with the 11th Brigade, leaving Horseshoe Hill to be dealt with by the artillery. Although the Boers on the Grobelaar slopes had been well pounded for some hours by the field batteries, Wynne considered that it would be unsafe to advance unless these slopes were actually taken, but he was overruled. He had also been promised support on his left rear, but only two of the battalions detailed for the purpose were at hand and these were fully occupied in offering a front to the Boers on Grobelaar, while the movement was in progress; and he advanced against the enemy's centre unsupported except by the long range fire of a brigade on Naval Hill across the river.

He had expected that the promised supports would secure his left flank by seizing Horseshoe Hill, and in default he was compelled to detach a portion of his own scanty force against it. At sunset the cutting edge of the advancing wedge was touching the enemy, but was unable to break into him, and Briton and Boer were face to face on Wynne's Hill and on Horseshoe Hill.

Reinforcements were brought up and defences were constructed during the night, while the Boers continually fired upon the confused units labouring in the darkness. The enemy had an entrenched position on Hart's Hill which enfiladed Wynne's Hill, and which Warren had not been able to take, as Buller hoped, with the 11th Brigade.

Next morning the 5th Brigade under Hart, which was in reserve near the river loop, was sent against Hart's Hill. He advanced, wherever possible, under cover of the steep left bank of the river along a trail so narrow that the men were compelled often to move in single file; and at one place, where the Langewacht Spruit enters the Tugela, it was necessary to make a detour and cross the spruit by the railway bridge, and to quit the dead ground and emerge on to a defile under heavy fire. The advance of the Brigade was retarded by the stringing out of the battalions, and from time to time Hart's Hill was shelled without seriously harming the enemy, who as usual was not posted on the apparent crest, but some distance in rear of it.

Two battalions of the 4th Brigade, which had been lent to Hart, were so far behind that as only two or three hours of daylight remained, he decided to attack without them. For impetuous gallantry the advance of the Irish regiments was not surpassed by any other exploit in the War. Working up on difficult ground to the sound of the Regimental calls, and then almost brought to a standstill by the barbed wire fences of the railway, which became a trap of death, they rushed the slope, pushing the enemy's outposts before them, and won the crest: and then in the failing light which compelled the supporting artillery to discontinue the bombardment and relieve the enemy from the pressure of shrapnel, they saw the Boer positions still above them. The crest was false.

It was a cruel disappointment to brave men who had struggled so well, but they did not flinch. A charge was made across the plateau, but it soon was withered by fire and few of the men reached the Boer trenches. Two more battalions of the 4th Brigade arrived at dawn, but the reinforcement came too late. The troops were reorganized, as far as possible, on the slope leading down from the crest, but were eventually compelled to retire across the railway to the lower ground by flanking fire, which Hart succeeded in silencing, and was able to reoccupy the dead ground below the false crest with fresh troops.

The failure of the attack did not deter Buller from pursuing his plan, and on February 24 he proposed to renew it and to operate against Railway Hill, which stands fourth in the line of hills running in a N.E. direction from Horseshoe Hill to Pieter's Hill; but by Hart's suggestion the movement was postponed, and in the end, abandoned. The greater part of his Brigade was dangerously and densely posted on the lower ground, and when during the night a surprise party of Boers opened fire, there was some fear of a general panic. The situation was precarious. The Boer line had not been pierced: on each side it outflanked Buller and fronted the Tugela loops in which the greater portion of his force was huddled. It was fortunate for him that DeWet had gone to the Modder.

On the night of February 24 began the third movement in zigzag. The general direction of the first was N.E.; of the second W.S.W.; of the third East. It was discovered that there was a path by which troops could pass east of Naval Hill down to the right bank out of the enemy's reach, and that they could cross the Tugela by pontoon. Buller then determined to transfer the bulk of his force back to the Hlangwhane side of the river over the pontoon bridge by which he had crossed to the left bank three days before. The plan involved not only the concentration of a clubbed and unwieldy force on the right bank, but also the necessity of keeping it there until the passage of the last detail allowed the pontoon bridge to be taken up and moved to the new place of crossing, three miles below.

An armistice, restricted to the arena of the recent fighting, was granted by the Boers on February 25, for the purpose of bringing away the wounded and burying the dead; and during the barter of news on the very narrow strip which separated the British fallen from the enemy's positions, the burghers refused to believe that Cronje was surrounded at Paardeberg, and retorted that Lord Roberts had lost all his transport and supplies at Waterval Drift, and was helpless.

The cessation of the music of war during the armistice dismayed the garrison of Ladysmith, which feared that it must indicate another failure; for owing to spies and the leakage of plans, Buller was afraid of informing White fully of his position and intentions, and during the final advance he usually restricted himself in his heliograms to the expression of his hopes or to the reasons for their non-fulfilment.

On the enemy's side, in spite of a strong line held in sufficient numbers, the moral position was weak. Botha, who commanded the Boer right, distrusted Meyer, who was in charge of the threatened left. The war-sick burghers skulked in their laagers, and it is said that even necessary movements within the line were not ordered, from a fear lest the burgher, when once on his feet, would march in the direction which soonest took him out of his enemy's reach. To Botha, Buller's retirement across the Tugela came as a gleam of hope. If it did not signify a retreat, as he suggested to Joubert, it at least indicated that the attack on the line of hills would not be immediately renewed.

On February 26, the preparations for the fifth attempt to relieve Ladysmith were completed. Horse, Field, Howitzer, Mountain, and Naval Guns, to the number of nearly three score and ten, were in position on the northern features of Hlangwhane, Naval Hill and Fuzzy Hill, and also on Clump Hill, N.W. of Monte Cristo. The relieving force was arranged in two commands; the troops west of the Langewacht Spruit being placed under Lyttelton, the rest being assigned to Warren. On Hlangwhane was Barton with the 6th Fusilier Brigade; and W. Kitchener, now in command of the 11th Brigade, was also on the right bank. On the left bank near Hart's Hill were Norcott and Hart with the 4th and 5th Brigades. Under Lyttelton was the 2nd Brigade, the 10th Brigade, though in his section, being placed under Warren's orders.

On the previous day, a mounted brigade had been sent to the east to deal with an expedition under Erasmus against the British lines of communication south of Colenso. He led it timidly, and it was easily checked, and the brigade was brought back to the river.

Buller's scheme for the operations of February 27, was an attack on Pieter's Hill by Barton, followed in succession by attacks on Railway Hill by Kitchener, and on Hart's Hill by Norcott, supported by artillery fire from the positions on the right bank. By the evening of February 26 the troops for the main attack had recrossed the Tugela, and the pontoon bridge west of Hlangwhane could now be removed. Early in the forenoon of February 27, it was thrown over the river S.E. of Hart's Hill, where the left bank afforded a covered way of approach to Pieter's Hill, and the fourth and final member of the zigzag advance was traced, on this occasion towards the north. For the seventh time Buller ferried the Tugela with his men, who impelled alternately by the impulse of his initiative and by the resilience of the enemy, had been tossed like a tennis ball from bank to bank at Trickhardt's Drift, Vaalkrantz, and Hlangwhane, yet whom nothing could dishearten. As they heard the news of Cronje's surrender at Paardeberg, they were crossing the newly placed pontoon bridge, and on it they set up a signpost bearing the legend "To Ladysmith."

Barton led the way across the bridge, then turning to the right, crept down the left bank of the river for two miles, and mounted the slopes of Pieter's Hill, when he became aware of the great strength of the Boer position. It was hedged in by a river, a wooded donga, and a valley; along its westward face ran a line of kopjes, ending in a detached rocky hill; and it was supported by fire from Railway Hill. The nearer kopjes were carried without much difficulty, but a sweeping movement to clear the plateau as with the swing of a scythe, was checked by heavy fire from the east, and failed to gather in the rocky hill which commanded the outlying kopjes, and which the enemy succeeded in reinforcing during the fight, and in holding for several hours.

Until the development of the attack on Railway Hill by Kitchener, Barton's Fusiliers were able to do little more than maintain themselves, as their reserves had been absorbed and their ammunition was running short. A final attempt was made, with partial success, at the close of the day, to occupy the rocky hill, but at the cost of many casualties. The enemy was not entirely expelled, but those who remained disappeared during the night.

Kitchener followed in Barton's track as far as the gorge which separates Pieter's from Railway Hill. In spite of the Boer rifles and of the shrapnel of the British gunners on the right bank playing upon the Hill, whose attention was eventually drawn to the situation by the bold advance of two companies to a position from which they could be seen and recognized through the gunners' telescopes, the eastward edge of Railway Hill was won. But a portion of Kitchener's command in rear was magnetically attracted away from the direction of the advance by a flanking fire from Hart's Hill and, by diverging towards it, broke the continuity of the line facing the position entrenched by the Boers. Kitchener was, however, able to fill the gap, and he expelled the burghers, most of whom fled before the charge got home; and Railway Hill was won.

Norcott's Brigade was nearer to its objective than either of the brigades which had preceded it, as it was lying south of Hart's Hill between the railway and the river; and although deprived of a considerable portion of his command by a demand for help which purported to have come from Railway Hill, he finished his task in three hours. He toiled up the dead ground to the apparent crest of Hart's Hill, and then came face to face with the higher position, which three days before had so cruelly baffled the Irish Brigade. But the Boers were not now in a mood to stay. The shrapnel from the right bank, which they had not to meet when Hart charged across from the crest in the failing light, was now hailing on them. All but a few stalwarts took to flight, and Hart's Hill was taken before sunset on February 27.

The capture of the hills supervening on the bad news from Paardeberg shattered the Boer Armies in Natal. Botha's left had been defeated; and although his right had not been seriously attacked by Lyttelton, but only prevented from effectively reinforcing the hill positions, it fell away towards the north. He was not able to stay the general retreat, but he hoped at least to join Joubert and cover it with the aid of the besieging force. Joubert, however, had already raised the Siege and was retreating towards Elandslaagte.

Next morning Barton on Pieter's Hill vainly appealed for permission to press forward, but Buller would only put the two mounted Brigades under Dundonald and Burn-Murdoch on to the enemy's trail. Dundonald made for Ladysmith, and Burn-Murdoch was instructed to act on the right front towards Bulwana, but was soon called upon to assist Dundonald in driving in a Boer rearguard. He then resumed his advance, and from the east covered Dundonald, who being fired on from Bulwana thought it advisable to send his Brigade to a safer position in rear, and having done so, rode on at the head of a body of colonial troops, and as the sun was setting on February 28, marched into Ladysmith and ended the four months' Siege. It was a fitting exploit to be performed by the grandson of that Lord Cochrane who at Aix Roads nearly a century before had similarly chafed and strained at the leash of a superior officer's reluctance.[30] Burn-Murdoch came into action with a rearguard covering Bulwana, which was evacuated during the night. He bivouacked near the Klip River, and next morning proposed to pursue the enemy, but Buller whistled him to heel. The relieving force advanced with deliberation, and on March 3, entered Ladysmith, and unravelled the Natal entanglement which at one time seemed likely to wreck the South African Campaign.

The flight of the Boers continued for three days. Ladysmith, which lay directly in the line of the retreat, divided it into two streams, one of which flowed towards the Drakensberg, while the other went in the direction of Elandslaagte and Glencoe, some of the fugitives not outspanning until they reached Newcastle. So great was the demoralization that Kruger hurried down from Pretoria to Glencoe in the hope of staying it. He succeeded in persuading the burghers to hold the line of the Biggarsberg, but was almost immediately summoned away to the arena in the west; and only a few hours after he was upbraiding the fugitives from Ladysmith and the Tugela for their irresolution and want of faith, the fugitives of the Modder were streaming past him at Poplar Grove.

Buller has been severely criticized for allowing the Boers to retreat unpursued, taking with them all but two of their guns. Assuming however that his appreciation of the situation was correct, he probably acted wisely. He thought that his first duty was to put food into Ladysmith. All his guns, except one Field Battery at Colenso and one Horse Artillery Battery with Burn-Murdoch, as well as all his supply and regimental transport, were still on the right bank of the Tugela, for the crossing of which he had but one pontoon bridge. He therefore decided that the wagons must have precedence, and that the army must wait.

He was misled by his recollections and by his experience of the Parthian tactics of the burghers whom he commanded during the Zulu War of 1879, and from whom he says he learnt "all that he knew" about rearguards. He believed "that an attempt to force a Boer rearguard is merely a waste of men." Yet only a week had passed since he told White that he thought there was "only a rearguard" between him and Ladysmith.

Thus in the glamour of an ancient rearguard reputation the enemy disappeared.

Notes:

[Footnote 28: Not the Green Hill near Spion Kop. There were several Green Hills on the left bank of the Tugela.]

[Footnote 29: White, however, said that he saw no signs of a general retreat.]

[Footnote 30: The Cochrane daring and resourcefulness were not confined to the men of the clan. During the Jacobite troubles Grizel Cochrane, when her father was sentenced to death for treason, turned highway-woman, and held up the coach which was bringing his death warrant from London, and abstracted it from the mail-bag.]



CHAPTER VII

Ladysmith at Bay

Eighty-seven years before the outbreak of the South African War, the British Army was besieging the city of Badajoz, in Spain. When it was taken by assault, a Spanish matron and her sister were molested and came for protection to the British Camp, where they were received by Harry Smith, a young Captain in the 95th Regiment, who when the Peninsular War was over, married the girl fugitive, Juana Maria de los Dolores de Leon.

After a distinguished military career in the East Indies and elsewhere, Sir Harry Smith went out to South Africa in 1848 as Governor of the Cape Colony, and its dependencies; and in that year he proclaimed the country between the Orange and the Vaal to be British Territory.

The Boers of the Great Trek resented the annexation, and one Pretorius took the field, but was beaten on August 29 at the battle of Boomplatz by Smith, who had under his command six companies of infantry and two squadrons of cavalry; a force which strangely contrasts with the masses of soldiery opposed to Pretorius' successors, Joubert, Botha, Cronje, De Wet, and Delarey.

Harrismith, in the Free State, was named after him; his services in the Sikh War were commemorated by an Aliwal on the Orange; while upon a new township in Natal, she who was once Donna Juana Maria de los Dolores de Leon of Badajoz on the Guadiana, bestowed the commonplace designation for which she had exchanged her retinue of tuneful Spanish, and it was called Ladysmith.



After fifty years of obscurity, Ladysmith suddenly became the pivot upon which the fortunes of the British Empire were poised. Its loss, at least during the early weeks of the siege, would not only have thrown a British Army into captivity, but would have left an encouraged and very mobile enemy, replenished with the spoils of war, free to march irresistibly towards the sea.

In November, Buller was prepared, if Ladysmith should fall, to abandon the whole of Natal except Durban. He had private information that, if the Boers reached the coast, a certain European power would intervene. There was also the fear that another reverse would call out the disaffected Dutch in the Cape Colony, and the danger lest the British nation, treacherously harassed by the cries of the disaffected at home, who sympathize with the misfortunes of every nation but their own, would again write off South Africa as a bad debt, and offer peace on ignominious terms. In India the news of the capture of White, a former Commander in Chief, and of his removal as a prisoner of war, would have seriously, if not fatally, impaired the British raj.

At a later period, when the reinforcements had arrived and the plan of campaign had been altered to suit the situation in Natal, the loss of Ladysmith would not have so vitally affected the position in South Africa; and, in fact, Buller on December 16, authorized White to surrender.

On November 1, the commanders of the allied forces, Joubert and A.P. Cronje, decided to invest and bombard Ladysmith, confidently expecting that the only obstacle in the way of the procession to the sea would soon be removed by the fall of the intimidated town. They were even urged by some of the subordinate leaders, who, as a rule, were never so venturesome as when there was no immediate prospect of meeting the enemy, to mask White and march at once upon Durban, but Joubert would only sanction a minor effort in that direction which was postponed until it was too late to be effective.

The last man to leave Ladysmith was French. He was ordered to Capetown to meet Buller, who was persuaded by his report on the situation that White's force was insufficient to keep Natal from being overrun, and that the worst might be feared. The escape of French, by a margin of a few minutes only, made him available for employment in an arena more suited to his capacity than a besieged town; and his subsequent good work in the Cape Colony, south of the Orange River, and during the advance on Kimberley and Bloemfontein, showed how ill the fortune of war served the Boers, when they just failed to capture the train which was taking out of their clutches the soldier who was to relieve Kimberley and head off Cronje at Paardeberg before the relief of Ladysmith was effected.

White has been blamed for keeping the whole of his strong force of cavalry in Ladysmith. He had with him four regiments of regular cavalry besides five irregular colonial corps. For the space of three months the action of the British Army was hampered by the absence of the mounted troops interned in Ladysmith and engaged in garrison duties, until at last the horses were either killed for food, or, when forage was exhausted, turned out on the bare veld under the enemy's fire, to support themselves as they could. White justified, or it may be, excused, his retention of the cavalry, by its mobility, which virtually increased the effective strength of the garrison, and enabled him to reinforce rapidly any threatened section of the defence, as for example, during the attack on Caesar's Camp. It is no doubt arguable that cavalry was more useful within the lines of investment than it would have been, if squandered over the whole area of the concurrent operations elsewhere; and if so, the limits of its tactical employment have been considerably extended.[31]

White's force, which numbered about 13,000 men, occupied a perimeter of fourteen miles on the hills and kopjes nearest to the town, and was enveloped by an outer perimeter of thirty six miles held by 23,000 Boers. The positions N.E. of the Klip River were occupied by the Transvaalers, and the opposite semi-circle by the Free Staters.

On November 2, began the bombardment, which the enemy fondly hoped would bring White on his knees within a week; the first death casualty during the siege being a naval officer who had reached Ladysmith only a few hours before the investment with a re-inforcement of long-range naval guns from the fleet; and during the next two days it was continued from Pepworth, Bulwana, and elsewhere, with such effect as to induce White to ask, at the instigation of the civilian authorities, permission to send away the women, children, and other non-combatants. This somewhat naive request was naturally disallowed by Joubert, who, however, consented to the formation of a neutral camp for them and the sick and wounded at Intombi, within the area of the siege, and dependent for its supplies and maintenance upon the resources of the garrison. Joubert put into Ladysmith 200 derelict Indian coolies from the Natal collieries, an act which was perhaps justified by the code of war, which sanctions the employment of any means by which the difficulties of a besieged town can be increased; but a subsequent attempt made by Schalk Burger during Joubert's advance on the raid towards the south, to saddle White with the Indian refugees from the Transvaal was successfully resisted.

On November 9, the enemy was foiled in an attack on Observation Hill and Wagon Hill which were not then held in force, and for eight weeks the siege was carried on with so little vigour, and confronted with so much skill, that the British casualties in killed and wounded during that period numbered less than 250. When the Boers found that the walls of Ladysmith did not at once fall to the sound of the artillery, they began with equal confidence to rely upon the indirect casualties caused by sickness and privation, and awaited the result without impatience in their laagers. During the last fortnight of November a strong column under Joubert was detached to raid into Southern Natal. It was prudently but not enterprisingly led, did little harm, and returned with slight loss.

Meanwhile the enemy's artillery had been considerably re-inforced, and the British gun ammunition was beginning to run short. The capture of a large herd of cattle by the Boers, who neatly drew the animals away from the town by exploding shells behind them, entailed a reduced meat ration. In order to co-operate with the relieving force under Clery, who at the end of November was within signalling distance, White exercised a part of the garrison as a striking column, which, when the time came, he proposed to take out under his own command, and to clear the line of approach from the South.

Three weeks after the abortive attack of November 9, Joubert returned from his expedition to Estcourt. A council of war was held, and an assault on the Platrand[32] was determined on for the 30th. On the previous evening the commandos detailed as covering parties on the left flank went into position on Rifleman's Ridge, and awaited the main attack. Meanwhile much had happened in the laagers. The decisions of the Boer Krijgsraad seem to have been subject to confirmation by a minor convention composed of the subordinate officers. These took counsel during the night, and resolved that "the plan was too dangerous to attempt." When the covering parties opened fire at dawn there was no assaulting column to cover.

The activity during December was confined to the defence. On the night of the 7th a raid on Gun Hill, an underfeature of Lombard's Kop, silenced—at least in Natal—two heavy guns which were worrying the garrison. By the rules of the game the pieces were injured beyond repair by the gun-cotton charges which the sappers had fired in the breeches and muzzles; but the heavier gun was removed to Pretoria, where it was made serviceable. It was eventually sent to Kimberley, and its arrival greatly alarmed the timid and irresolute diamond men, whose life was easy and almost luxurious when compared with the privations which the steadfast garrison of Ladysmith endured for four months. On the same night Limit Hill, which the enemy seized a few days after the investment, was recovered.

A heavy gun was emplaced by the Boers to the front of the northward section of the defence, on a hill in the angle between the Bell Spruit and the railway to Harrismith. The approach to it was commanded by Bell's Kopje and Thornhill's Kopje, but a Battalion of Rifles under Metcalfe wriggled in between them at midnight on December 11, without alarming the enemy, and almost reached the crest of the eminence which was thereafter known as Surprise Hill, before the Boers opened fire. The assaulters encircled the emplacement, but could not find the gun. In a little time it was discovered outside the work, and disabled, but not permanently. The Boers on the flanking kopjes were now on the alert; and the battalion as it withdrew down the slope met in the darkness a small but determined detachment which had formed up athwart the line of retirement. The obstacle was rushed with the bayonet, and the expedition returned to Ladysmith with a loss exceeding 12 per cent of its strength.

The gun raids were almost the only offensive action taken by the defence during the siege, and though successful as far as they went, they did not greatly reduce the strength of the enemy's artillery and were not continued. He had still more than a score of pieces with which he daily bombarded the town; but no attempt to assault it by a moving force was made for some weeks. His confidence in the final issue was unimpaired; he had but to squat in his trenches worrying the garrison with shell fire, and the inevitable surrender must come.