A Retirement Over That Open Plain At A Range Of
Under A Thousand Yards Would Have Been A Dangerous And Disastrous
Movement.
Having once got there, it was wisest and best to see it
through.
The dark Cronje still waited reflective in the hotel garden. Across
the veld streamed the lines of infantry, the poor fellows eager,
after seven miles of that upland air, for the breakfast which had
been promised them. It was a quarter to seven when our patrols of
Lancers were fired upon. There were Boers, then, between them and
their meal! The artillery was ordered up, the Guards were sent
forward on the right, the 9th Brigade under Pole-Carew on the left,
including the newly arrived Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. They
swept onwards into the fatal fire zone - and then, and only then,
there blazed out upon them four miles of rifles, cannon, and
machine guns, and they realised, from general to private, that they
had walked unwittingly into the fiercest battle yet fought in the
war.
Before the position was understood the Guards were within seven
hundred yards of the Boer trenches, and the other troops about nine
hundred, on the side of a very gentle slope which made it most
difficult to find any cover. In front of them lay a serene
landscape, the river, the houses, the hotel, no movement of men, no
smoke - everything peaceful and deserted save for an occasional
quick flash and sparkle of flame. But the noise was horrible and
appalling.
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