With A Yell The Inniskillings
Sprang Out, Carried With A Rush The First Trench, And Charged
Desperately Onwards For The Second One.
It was a supremely dashing
attack against a supremely steady resistance, for among all their
gallant deeds the Boers have never fought better than on that
February evening.
Amid such a smashing shell fire as living mortals
have never yet endured they stood doggedly, these hardy men of the
veld, and fired fast and true into the fiery ranks of the Irishmen.
The yell of the stormers was answered by the remorseless roar of
the Mausers and the deep-chested shouts of the farmers. Up and up
surged the infantry, falling, rising, dashing bull-headed at the
crackling line of the trench. But still the bearded faces glared at
them over the edge, and still the sheet of lead pelted through
their ranks. The regiment staggered, came on, staggered again, was
overtaken by supporting companies of the Dublins and the
Connaughts, came on, staggered once more, and finally dissolved
into shreds, who ran swiftly back for cover, threading their way
among their stricken comrades. Never on this earth was there a
retreat of which the survivors had less reason to be ashamed. They
had held on to the utmost capacity of human endurance. Their
Colonel, ten officers, and more than half the regiment were lying
on the fatal hill. Honour to them, and honour also to the gallant
Dutchmen who, rooted in the trenches, had faced the rush and fury
of such an onslaught! Today to them, tomorrow to us - but it is for
a soldier to thank the God of battles for worthy foes.
It is one thing, however, to repulse the British soldier and it is
another to rout him. Within a few hundred yards of their horrible
ordeal at Magersfontein the Highlanders reformed into a military
body. So now the Irishmen fell back no further than the nearest
cover, and there held grimly on to the ground which they had won.
If you would know the advantage which the defence has over the
attack, then do you come and assault this line of tenacious men,
now in your hour of victory and exultation, friend Boer! Friend
Boer did attempt it, and skilfully too, moving a flanking party to
sweep the position with their fire. But the brigade, though sorely
hurt, held them off without difficulty, and was found on the
morning of the 24th to be still lying upon the ground which they
had won.
Our losses had been very heavy, Colonel Thackeray of the
Inniskillings, Colonel Sitwell of the Dublins, three majors, twenty
officers, and a total of about six hundred out of 1200 actually
engaged. To take such punishment and to remain undemoralised is the
supreme test to which troops can be put. Could the loss have been
avoided? By following the original line of advance from Monte
Christo, perhaps, when we should have turned the enemy's left. But
otherwise no. The hill was in the way and had to be taken. In the
war game you cannot play without a stake. You lose and you pay
forfeit, and where the game is fair the best player is he who pays
with the best grace. The attack was well prepared, well delivered,
and only miscarried on account of the excellence of the defence. We
proved once more what we had proved so often before, that all
valour and all discipline will not avail in a frontal attack
against brave coolheaded men armed with quick-firing rifles.
While the Irish Brigade assaulted Railway Hill an attack had been
made upon the left, which was probably meant as a demonstration to
keep the Boers from reinforcing their comrades rather than as an
actual attempt upon their lines. Such as it was, however, it cost
the life of at least one brave soldier, for Colonel Thorold, of the
Welsh Fusiliers, was among the fallen. Thorold, Thackeray, and
Sitwell in one evening. Who can say that British colonels have not
given their men a lead?
The army was now at a deadlock. Railway Hill barred the way, and if
Hart's men could not carry it by assault it was hard to say who
could. The 24th found the two armies facing each other at this
critical point, the Irishmen still clinging to the slopes of the
hill and the Boers lining the top. Fierce rifle firing broke out
between them during the day, but each side was well covered and lay
low. The troops in support suffered somewhat, however, from a
random shell fire. Mr. Winston Churchill has left it upon record
that within his own observation three of their shrapnel shells
fired at a venture on to the reverse slope of a hill accounted for
nineteen men and four horses. The enemy can never have known how
hard those three shells had hit us, and so we may also believe that
our artillery fire has often been less futile than it appeared.
General Buller had now realised that it was no mere rearguard
action which the Boers were fighting, but that their army was
standing doggedly at bay; so he reverted to that flanking movement
which, as events showed, should never have been abandoned. Hart's
Irish Brigade was at present almost the right of the army. His new
plan - a masterly one - was to keep Hart pinning the Boers at that
point, and to move his centre and left across the river, and then
back to envelope the left wing of the enemy. By this manoeuvre Hart
became the extreme left instead of the extreme right, and the Irish
Brigade would be the hinge upon which the whole army should turn.
It was a large conception, finely carried out. The 24th was a day
of futile shell fire - and of plans for the future. The heavy guns
were got across once more to the Monte Christo ridge and to
Hlangwane, and preparations made to throw the army from the west to
the east.
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