Later Four Companies Of The Rifle Brigade
Were Thrown Into The Firing Line, And A Total Of Two And A Half
Infantry Battalions Held That End Of The Position.
It was not a man
too much.
With the dawn of day it could be seen that the Boers held
the southern and we the northern slopes, while the narrow plateau
between formed a bloody debatable ground. Along a front of a
quarter of a mile fierce eyes glared and rifle barrels flashed from
behind every rock, and the long fight swayed a little back or a
little forward with each upward heave of the stormers or rally of
the soldiers. For hours the combatants were so near that a stone or
a taunt could be thrown from one to the other. Some scattered
sangars still held their own, though the Boers had passed them. One
such, manned by fourteen privates of the Manchester Regiment,
remained untaken, but had only two defenders left at the end of the
bloody day.
With the coming of the light the 53rd Field Battery, the one which
had already done so admirably at Lombard's Kop, again deserved well
of its country. It was impossible to get behind the Boers and fire
straight at their position, so every shell fired had to skim over
the heads of our own men upon the ridge and so pitch upon the
reverse slope. Yet so accurate was the fire, carried on under an
incessant rain of shells from the big Dutch gun on Bulwana, that
not one shot miscarried and that Major Abdy and his men succeeded
in sweeping the further slope without loss to our own fighting
line. Exactly the same feat was equally well performed at the other
end of the position by Major Blewitt's 21st Battery, which was
exposed to an even more searching fire than the 53rd. Any one who
has seen the iron endurance of British gunners and marvelled at the
answering shot which flashes out through the very dust of the
enemy's exploding shell, will understand how fine must have been
the spectacle of these two batteries working in the open, with the
ground round them sharded with splinters. Eye-witnesses have left
it upon record that the sight of Major Blewitt strolling up and
down among his guns, and turning over with his toe the last fallen
section of iron, was one of the most vivid and stirring impressions
which they carried from the fight. Here also it was that the
gallant Sergeant Bosley, his arm and his leg stricken off by a Boer
shell, cried to his comrades to roll his body off the trail and go
on working the gun.
At the same time as - or rather earlier than - the onslaught upon
Caesar's Camp a similar attack had been made with secrecy and
determination upon the western end of the position called Waggon
Hill. The barefooted Boers burst suddenly with a roll of rifle-fire
into the little garrison of Imperial Light Horse and Sappers who
held the position. Mathias of the former, Digby-Jones and Dennis of
the latter, showed that 'two in the morning' courage which Napoleon
rated as the highest of military virtues. They and their men were
surprised but not disconcerted, and stood desperately to a slogging
match at the closest quarters. Seventeen Sappers were down out of
thirty, and more than half the little body of irregulars. This end
of the position was feebly fortified, and it is surprising that so
experienced and sound a soldier as Ian Hamilton should have left it
so. The defence had no marked advantage as compared with the
attack, neither trench, sangar, nor wire entanglement, and in
numbers they were immensely inferior. Two companies of the 60th
Rifles and a small body of the ubiquitous Gordons happened to be
upon the hill and threw themselves into the fray, but they were
unable to turn the tide. Of thirty-three Gordons under Lieutenant
MacNaughten thirty were wounded. [Footnote: The Gordons and the
Sappers were there that morning to re-escort one of Lambton's 4.7
guns, which was to be mounted there. Ten seamen were with the gun,
and lost three of their number in the defence.] As our men retired
under the shelter of the northern slope they were reinforced by
another hundred and fifty Gordons under the stalwart
Miller-Wallnutt, a man cast in the mould of a Berserk Viking. To
their aid also came two hundred of the Imperial Light Horse,
burning to assist their comrades. Another half-battalion of Rifles
came with them. At each end of the long ridge the situation at the
dawn of day was almost identical. In each the stormers had seized
one side, but were brought to a stand by the defenders upon the
other, while the British guns fired over the heads of their own
infantry to rake the further slope.
It was on the Waggon Hill side, however, that the Boer exertions
were most continuous and strenuous and our own resistance most
desperate. There fought the gallant de Villiers, while Ian Hamilton
rallied the defenders and led them in repeated rushes against the
enemy's line. Continually reinforced from below, the Boers fought
with extraordinary resolution. Never will any one who witnessed
that Homeric contest question the valour of our foes. It was a
murderous business on both sides. Edwardes of the Light Horse was
struck down. In a gun-emplacement a strange encounter took place at
point-blank range between a group of Boers and of Britons. De
Villiers of the Free State shot Miller-Wallnut dead, Ian Hamilton
fired at de Villiers with his revolver and missed him. Young
Albrecht of the Light Horse shot de Villiers. A Boer named de
Jaeger shot Albrecht. Digby-Jones of the Sappers shot de Jaeger.
Only a few minutes later the gallant lad, who had already won fame
enough for a veteran, was himself mortally wounded, and Dennis, his
comrade in arms and in glory, fell by his side.
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