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. It would not be
fair, however, to suppose that they had failed because they ended
where they began. Their primary object had been to prevent the
further advance of the Freestaters into the colony, and, during the
most critical period of the war, this had been accomplished with
much success and little loss. At last the pressure had become so
severe that the enemy had to weaken the most essential part of
their general position in order to relieve it. The object of the
operations had really been attained when Clements found himself
back at Arundel once more. French, the stormy petrel of the war,
had flitted on from Cape Town to Modder River, where a larger prize
than Colesberg awaited him. Clements continued to cover Naauwport,
the important railway junction, until the advance of Roberts's army
caused a complete reversal of the whole military situation.
CHAPTER 15.
SPION KOP.
Whilst Methuen and Gatacre were content to hold their own at the
Modder and at Sterkstroom, and whilst the mobile and energetic
French was herding the Boers into Colesberg, Sir Redvers Buller,
the heavy, obdurate, inexplicable man, was gathering and organising
his forces for another advance upon Ladysmith. Nearly a month had
elapsed since the evil day when his infantry had retired, and his
ten guns had not, from the frontal attack upon Colenso. Since then
Sir Charles Warren's division of infantry and a considerable
reinforcement of artillery had come to him. And yet in view of the
terrible nature of the ground in front of him, of the fighting
power of the Boers, and of the fact that they were always acting
upon internal lines, his force even now was, in the opinion of
competent judges, too weak for the matter in hand.
There remained, however, several points in his favour. His
excellent infantry were full of zeal and of confidence in their
chief. It cannot be denied, however much we may criticise some
incidents in his campaign, that he possessed the gift of impressing
and encouraging his followers, and, in spite of Colenso, the sight
of his square figure and heavy impassive face conveyed an assurance
of ultimate victory to those around him. In artillery he was very
much stronger than before, especially in weight of metal. His
cavalry was still weak in proportion to his other arms. When at
last he moved out on January 10th to attempt to outflank the Boers,
he took with him nineteen thousand infantry, three thousand
cavalry, and sixty guns, which included six howitzers capable of
throwing a 50-pound lyddite shell, and ten long-range naval pieces.
Barton's Brigade and other troops were left behind to hold the base
and line of communications.
An analysis of Buller's force shows that its details were as
follows: -
Clery's Division.
Hildyard's Brigade.
2nd West Surrey.
2nd Devonshire.
2nd West Yorkshire.
2nd East Surrey.
Hart's Brigade.
1st Inniskilling Fusiliers.
1st Border Regiment.
1st Connaught Rangers.
2nd Dublin Fusiliers.
Field Artillery, three batteries, 19th, 28th, 63rd; one squadron
13th Hussars; Royal Engineers.
Warren's Division.
Lyttelton's Brigade.
2nd Cameronians.
3rd King's Royal Rifles.
1st Durham Light Infantry.
1st Rifle Brigade.
Woodgate's Brigade.
2nd Royal Lancaster.
2nd Lancashire Fusiliers.
1st South Lancashire.
York and Lancasters.
Field Artillery, three batteries, 7th, 78th, 73rd; one squadron
13th Hussars.
Corps Troops.
Coke's Brigade.
Imperial Light Infantry.
2nd Somersets.
2nd Dorsets.
2nd Middlesex.
61st Howitzer Battery; two 4.7 naval guns; eight naval 12-pounder guns;
one squadron 13th Hussars; Royal Engineers.
Cavalry.
1st Royal Dragoons.
14th Hussars.
Four squadrons South African Horse.
One squadron Imperial Light Horse.
Bethune's Mounted Infantry.
Thorneycroft's Mounted Infantry.
One squadron Natal Carabineers.
One squadron Natal Police.
One company King's Royal Rifles Mounted Infantry.
Six machine guns.
This is the force whose operations I shall attempt to describe.
About sixteen miles to the westward of Colenso there is a ford over
the Tugela River which is called Potgieter's Drift. General
Buller's apparent plan was to seize this, together with the ferry
which runs at this point, and so to throw himself upon the right
flank of the Colenso Boers. Once over the river there is one
formidable line of hills to cross, but if this were passed there
would be comparatively easy ground until the Ladysmith hills were
reached.
