Clements Drew In His Wings Hurriedly And
Concentrated His Whole Force At Rensburg.
It was a difficult
operation in the face of an aggressive enemy, but the movements
were well timed and admirably carried out.
There is always the
possibility of a retreat degenerating into a panic, and a panic at
that moment would have been a most serious matter. One misfortune
occurred, through which two companies of the Wiltshire regiment
were left without definite orders, and were cut off and captured
after a resistance in which a third of their number was killed and
wounded. No man in that trying time worked harder than Colonel
Carter of the Wiltshires (the night of the retreat was the sixth
which he had spent without sleep), and the loss of the two
companies is to be set down to one of those accidents which may
always occur in warfare. Some of the Inniskilling Dragoons and
Victorian Mounted Rifles were also cut off in the retreat, but on
the whole Clements was very fortunate in being able to concentrate
his scattered army with so few mishaps. The withdrawal was
heartbreaking to the soldiers who had worked so hard and so long in
extending the lines, but it might be regarded with equanimity by
the Generals, who understood that the greater strength the enemy
developed at Colesberg the less they would have to oppose the
critical movements which were about to be carried out in the west.
Meanwhile Coleskop had also been abandoned, the guns removed, and
the whole force on February 14th passed through Rensburg and fell
back upon Arundel, the spot from which six weeks earlier French had
started upon this stirring series of operations.
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