And Yet The Column
Still Plodded Aimlessly On In Its Dense Formation, And If There
Were Any Attempt At Scouting Ahead And On The Flanks The Result
Showed How Ineffectively It Was Carried Out.
It was at a quarter
past four in the clear light of a South African morning that a
shot, and then another, and then a rolling crash of musketry, told
that we were to have one more rough lesson of the result of
neglecting the usual precautions of warfare.
High up on the face of
a steep line of hill the Boer riflemen lay hid, and from a short
range their fire scourged our exposed flank. The men appear to have
been chiefly colonial rebels, and not Boers of the backveld, and to
that happy chance it may be that the comparative harmlessness of
their fire was due. Even now, in spite of the surprise, the
situation might have been saved had the bewildered troops and their
harried officers known exactly what to do. It is easy to be wise
after the event, but it appears now that the only course that could
commend itself would be to extricate the troops from their
position, and then, if thought feasible, to plan an attack. Instead
of this a rush was made at the hillside, and the infantry made
their way some distance up it only to find that there were positive
ledges in front of them which could not be climbed. The advance was
at a dead stop, and the men lay down under the boulders for cover
from the hot fire which came from inaccessible marksmen above them.
Meanwhile the artillery had opened behind them, and their fire (not
for the first time in this campaign) was more deadly to their
friends than to their foes. At least one prominent officer fell
among his men, torn by British shrapnel bullets. Talana Hill and
Modder River have shown also, though perhaps in a less tragic
degree, that what with the long range of modern artillery fire, and
what with the difficulty of locating infantry who are using
smokeless powder, it is necessary that officers commanding
batteries should be provided with the coolest heads and the most
powerful glasses of any men in the service, for a responsibility
which will become more and more terrific rests upon their judgment.
The question now, since the assault had failed, was how to
extricate the men from their position. Many withdrew down the hill,
running the gauntlet of the enemy's fire as they emerged from the
boulders on to the open ground, while others clung to their
positions, some from a soldierly hope that victory might finally
incline to them, others because it was clearly safer to lie among
the rocks than to cross the bullet-swept spaces beyond. Those
portions of the force who extricated themselves do not appear to
have realised how many of their comrades had remained behind, and
so as the gap gradually increased between the men who were
stationary and the men who fell back all hope of the two bodies
reuniting became impossible.
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