THREE YEARS OF WAR IN EAST AFRICA
_BY THE SAME AUTHOR_
WILD LIFE
IN CANADA
With Illustrations from Photographs
by the Author
LONDON: JOHN MURRAY
[Illustration: LUKIGURA RIVER.
_Frontispiece_]
THREE YEARS OF WAR
IN EAST AFRICA
BY CAPT. ANGUS BUCHANAN, M.C.
WITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.
1920
FIRST EDITION _July 1919_
_Reprinted_ _January 1920_
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
FOREWORD
Captain Buchanan has done me the honour of asking me to write a short
preface to a work which seems to me at all events of peculiar interest.
To write a preface is a difficult task, unless one has some real _raison
d’être_ for the task; yet I find it difficult to refuse, if only for my
intense admiration for the part played by the battalion with which the
author was so long and honourably associated—the 25th Royal Fusiliers.
The author’s qualifications to write this work are undoubted, not only
from his stout record as a soldier, but also through his previous
experience as a traveller, explorer, and student of Natural History. When
war broke out Captain Buchanan was engaged on behalf of the Provincial
Government of Saskatchewan, Canada, in investigating the country in the
far north, west of Hudson Bay, and studying and collecting the rarer
flora and fauna. He had been for nearly a year many hundreds of miles out
of touch with any other white man. The first rumour of war did not reach
him until the end of October, when he at once struck south to a Hudson
Bay Fort, which he reached at Christmas. Without delay he left to join
up, and in but a month or two had changed his habitat from almost the
Arctic Circle to the Equator.
Readers will be able to follow the fortunes of that wonderful unit,
the 25th Royal Fusiliers, through the campaign, and will perhaps gain
thereby an insight into this strangest of all side-shows more true and
illuminating than a more comprehensive work. There was little that
this old Legion of Frontiersmen missed. Comparisons are odious; yet
I think it may safely be said that no other white unit took so full
a part in the diverse stages of the campaign. They bore the long and
arduous months of frontier and railway guarding in 1915. They took no
mean share in the spectacular capture of Bukoba. Their mounted infantry
as well as ordinary rank and file, took part in many of the small but
intensely trying patrols through the thorny scrub along the Serengeti
plains. General Smuts’s operations around Kilimanjaro saw them. Right
to the fore were they in the long and tiring treks, varied by frequent
and fierce rear-guard actions, which took place down the Pangani and
southward through the bush and forests to the capture of Morogoro; and
onwards again right down to the Rufiji. They bore that cruelly hard
period through the rains of 1916, when they held the Mgeta line against a
numerically superior foe, living literally in a swamp for months, riddled
through and through with fever. In January, 1917, when General Smuts made
his final effort to crush the opposition, Colonel Driscoll and his men
were right in the van, and here among others they lost Captain Selous,
that great hunter and greater English gentleman. After a brief period in
the south we find them back in time for the final stages of the campaign.
Here they went in from Lindi to take part in the fighting of 1917,
fighting so bitter that all the previous work was but as child’s play in
comparison. Lest it seem that I exaggerate, let me say that, with a force
of about half the size, the casualties during these last four months were
three times as great as those throughout the whole previous two years.
There was indeed hardly an action in which the battalion did not take
part, until that day on the 18th of October, 1917, when, while covering a
temporary retirement, they were overwhelmed by immensely superior numbers
and cut to pieces.
The author does not harp overmuch on the sickness and privations of his
comrades—he has been through too many of them to do so; but I am reminded
of the remark of one of them during the not infrequent periods of
grousing which every respectable British soldier must have. “Ah, I wish
to h⸺ I was in France! There one lives like a gentleman and dies like a
man, here one lives like a pig and dies like a dog.” There may have been
something in this remark, yet I have thought as I saw the 25th staggering
on, absolutely in rags, many with fever actually on them, nearly all
emaciated and staring-eyed, that they were living, if not like gentlemen,
at all events like Men.
There is one point of view that I would like to put before readers in
estimating the debt that those of us _who live_ in Africa owe to these
men—and that is this: when once the coastal belt was reached, and after
the departure of General Smuts and practically all his South African
fighting troops, it became apparent that European infantry, generally
speaking, could no longer compete on even terms with the native soldier.
The handicap of climate became too great. The European could no longer
stand marching under a load, and more than that, the continual fever and
sun sapped the “essential guts,” so that it became _almost_ impossible
for white troops to meet the German-African troops—led, of course, by
trained and well-fed German officers and N.C.O.s—with any fair prospect
of success. Such a fact boded ill for the future prestige of the white
race. Yet it may be said that the Fusiliers soared triumphant even over
this handicap; and they can boast, without fear of contradiction, that
up to the very end no German field company would look with other than
apprehension to meeting the 25th on even terms. I have always felt that
the prowess and endurance of these fine men during these last months have
done more to uphold our prestige and ensure the firm future of our rule
than is likely to be adequately realised.
An estimate of the campaign as a whole is scarcely yet possible. It will
probably be years before a just view can be taken of a side-show that
is believed to have cost more money and many more lives than the whole
of the South African Campaign. Many mistakes were made, and it is more
than possible that the lion’s share of what credit posterity may have
to bestow will fall on Von Lettow and his comrades. Yet there were many
factors which caused the task which Generals Tighe, Smuts, Hoskins, and
Van Deventer did eventually accomplish, to be of almost unparalleled
difficulty.
The question asked very often, and one which is likely to be of
interest to posterity, is: How were the Germans able to prolong their
resistance and, in fine, to make such a determined struggle against
our very superior forces? In answer the following points seem to merit
consideration.
In the first place the enemy had in the person of Colonel Von Lettow
an outstanding personality, and a soldier whose merit it is hard to
over-estimate. It will, moreover, always form one bright spot on the
blackened German escutcheon that in his operations during the campaign,
personally speaking, his conduct was as clean as it was efficient.
When war broke out the local military position was overwhelmingly in
favour of the Germans. They had ready, at a conservative estimate,
2,000 to 3,000 trained whites and 8,000 native troops, with some 70
machine-guns and 40 guns. Against this we, on our side, had in British
East Africa about 700 native soldiers and 2 machine-guns, one of which
was out of action, and not more than 100 whites with any military
experience at all. This force might possibly have been duplicated in
Nyasaland. With this early crushing superiority it is obvious that
expansion on the one side was easy—on the other a matter of extraordinary
difficulty.
In connection with this point it must also be borne in mind that in
British East Africa the natives are for the very large part, not
soldiers, but agriculturists by nature; whereas German East Africa teems
with natives who form as fine material for soldiers as any in the world.
This point is always worth remembering since, because of it, while
Germany held German East Africa, she was a potential menace to the whole
continent.
Unity of command again was with the Germans to a striking degree. For
on our side was ever command so divided? Our main force working from
East Africa contained troops from almost every portion of the globe,
speaking different tongues, having different habits, eating different
foods, fighting in different ways. From Nyasaland and Rhodesia, General
Northey with his small force brilliantly fought his way into the enemy’s
country, for long not only not under our Commander-in-Chief, but not
even administered by the War Office. From the west our most gallant
Allies the Belgians pushed forward to Tabora, and later worked in direct
co-operation into the very heart of the enemy’s country. On the south
there were the Portuguese.
The advantages which the Germans had over us in this matter were worth
many thousands of rifles.
It is certainly undeniable that after the first eighteen months our
combined force largely outnumbered our adversaries. Yet at his strongest
Von Lettow probably mustered 25,000 to 30,000 rifles, all _fighting_
troops. A not inconsiderable army on the basis that we, on our side, had
to estimate that it took four to five soldiers to get one fighting man
into the firing line.
It will naturally be assumed that at all events in the matter of
equipment and arms we had the advantage, but until the very latest stages
it may be doubted if this was so. Two incidents will illustrate this.
During the latter part of 1916 a German prisoner, being taken past a spot
where some of our artillery units, which shall be nameless, were parked,
remarked, “the movable armament from the Ark, I should imagine!” And,
indeed, his naval guns, his 42-in. howitzers, and quick-firing mountain
guns were far ahead of anything in our possession. Again, late in 1917,
a German doctor came in to demand back one of his medical panniers
abandoned on the field. We returned it with reluctance, as it was a very
fine set, the latest model in 1914. However, in response to repeated
and urgent indents and “hasteners,” new equipment for our own medical
department was that moment arriving. It was far in advance of anything
we had seen on our side, but was plainly marked 1906. I shall not soon
forget the sneer on that doctor’s face.
It is true that twice in the campaign the Germans were on short commons
in the matter of small-arm ammunition, in spite of their enormous pre-war
accumulation, but in each case, most unfortunately, a blockade runner
relieved the situation. Later on, unfortunate captures prevented a
shortage which would have appeared inevitable.
Again, the Germans worked throughout on interior lines and were able,
for the most part, to choose the areas in which their resistance would
be stiffest. Such spots were naturally where they would gain the fullest
advantage from their knowledge of the country, and where the evil climate
would exact the most murderous toll from our white and Indian troops.
These considerations should, I think, be borne in mind by those who feel,
as many must, that the cost in blood and money was altogether in excess
of the results obtained. In any case it is to our credit that having
put hand to the plough we did not turn back. It is for those who in the
future will reap the benefit to see that the worthiest use is made of the
vast country which the efforts of those who have fallen have placed in
our hands.
The wild animal and bird life encountered throughout the campaign formed
a most distinctive feature. This especially applies to the last stages,
when the fighting in the south-east corner of the Colony was conducted in
territory almost virgin to the naturalist. This applies equally to the
insects both large and small, which in many cases were as unpleasant as
they were intrusive. Captain Buchanan is well qualified to discourse on
these subjects, and his observant notes are most instructive. Let us hope
that some day he may find an opportunity of renewing his researches under
happier circumstances.
In conclusion of these few remarks let me wish Captain Buchanan the
utmost success in putting his book before the public. If only others read
it with the same interest and enjoyment with which it has filled me, I
can only think that the author’s work will not have been in vain.
CRANWORTH.
PREFACE
In accomplishing the conquest of German East Africa, many columns were
put in the field. Those had their starting-points from the British East
Africa frontier in the neighbourhood of Kilimanjaro Mountain, from Lake
Victoria Nyanza, from the Belgian Congo, from Rhodesia, and latterly from
the East Africa coast. To cover wide fronts of great extent of country,
the forces from each of those bases advanced in their particular area
in two, three, or more columns. This narrative deals directly with the
operations of a single column, but, as operations throughout the columns
were similar, it may be found, in part, to be generally descriptive of
much that was experienced by all columns.
On actual operations in German East Africa—not including the operations
on the frontier during 1915, nor the countless distances covered on
patrol—our unit marched some 850 miles with the column, in the following
stages: Kilimanjaro area, 194 miles; to the Central Railway, 335
miles; Morogoro-Rufiji area, 260 miles; and Lindi area (to date of my
departure), 61 miles. Those distances are not direct to their objective
as the crow flies, for they had often a zigzag course, and sometimes even
doubled back to a fresh starting-point.
It has been my endeavour to include every detail of experience, and, in
doing so, I trust that at some points I have not laid too much stress on
the hardships of the campaign. They were all in the day’s work, and were
taken as such, no matter how irksome they were. Of them General Smuts, in
a dispatch of 27th October, 1916, said:
“Their work has been done under tropical conditions which not
only produce bodily weariness and unfitness, but which create
mental languor and depression, and finally appal the stoutest
hearts. To march day by day, and week by week, through the
African jungle or high grass, in which vision is limited to
a few yards, in which danger always lurks near, but seldom
becomes visible, even when experienced, supplies a test to
human nature often, in the long run, beyond the limits of human
endurance.”
Little reference has been made in the narrative to the number of our
casualties, nor was that possible. A recent casualty statement—at the
end of 1918—records the casualties of the East African Campaign as: 380
officers killed, 478 officers wounded, 8,724 other ranks killed, 7,276
other ranks wounded, 38 officers missing (including prisoners), and 929
other ranks missing (including prisoners) = 896 officers, 16,929 other
ranks.
This is the only statement of casualties I have seen, and I give
these figures with every reservation, doubting the aggregate and its
completeness.
They will, however, suffice to show that there is a remarkable percentage
of killed, and this may largely be put down to the closeness of the
fighting, and that at times the attacking forces were advancing on
entrenched positions without protection of any kind to themselves.
ANGUS BUCHANAN.
CONTENTS
PAGE
FOREWORD ix
PREFACE xviii
CHAPTER
I. OUTWARD BOUND 1
II. FRONTIER LIFE 17
III. CATTLE RAIDERS 43
IV. THE FIRST ADVANCE 64
V. THE SECOND TREK 87
VI. THE THIRD STAGE 125
VII. THE END OF THE CAMPAIGN ON GERMAN SOIL 173
VIII. NATURE NOTES 200
IX. HERE AND HEREAFTER 225
INDEX 242
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
LUKIGURA RIVER _Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
KILIMANJARO 34
THE NECK AT “GERMAN BRIDGE” 92
GERMAN PAPER RUPEE 106
NATIVE KRAAL 144
A GOOD BAG: 268½ LB. OF IVORY 160
TANDAMUTI 188
OSTRICHES 202
LIST OF MAPS
FROM THE FRONTIER TO MOROGORO 86
MOROGORO TO RUFIJI RIVER 124
LINDI AREA 172
THREE YEARS OF WAR IN EAST AFRICA
CHAPTER I
OUTWARD BOUND
It was raining in London. It had been raining all day, and for many days
previous, and to-night the atmosphere of damp and greyness pervaded the
very soul of the city outdoors.
[Sidenote: FRONTIERSMEN AT WATERLOO]
Number Seven platform, at Waterloo Station, was crowded with troops and
baggage, about to depart for service with the B.E.F. in East Africa. They
had arrived at the station at 6 p.m. At 11 p.m. they were still there
grouped about in talkative jollying clusters, apparently indifferent to
the delay in entraining.
Everyone knows this type of crowd nowadays, but in this case, and as
commonly with men garbed in identical uniform, no one could tell with
any accuracy the remarkable variety of character of the men, or the
extent of their notability. Joe Robson, who was standing apart—a quiet
onlooker—thought: “It is almost a pity that the individual loses his
individuality in the army and becomes a stranger in a strange crowd.”
What would that group of schoolboys say, and the inquisitive idle crowd
in general, if they knew that here in the ranks, beneath the guise of
homogeneous khaki, were gathered many men from all the world over? Men
who had come to fight for their native land from Honolulu, Hong-Kong,
China, Ceylon, Malay States, India, New Zealand, Australia, South and
East Africa, Egypt, South America, Mexico, United States of America, and
Canada? Men from the very outer edges of the world; in Ogilvie’s words:
Lean men, brown men, men from overseas,
Men from all the outer world; shy and ill at ease.
Some were men who had taken part in Arctic exploration; others were of
the North-west Mounted Police and of the British South Africa Police;
even a cowpuncher or two from under the flag of the U.S.A. were amongst
this force of frontiersmen. And there were among them: good sorts, bad
sorts, rich sorts, keen sorts, game sorts—all sorts!
Here also, holding the rank of subalterns, were some famous hunters,
setting out again on adventure. F. C. Selous, the renowned big-game
hunter and naturalist and explorer, was there, and Cherry Kearton, who,
like his brother Richard, “shoots” with his camera and has specialised
in photographing big game in Africa. Then there were George Outram
and Martin Ryan, hailing from divergent corners of our colonies, who
were reputed old hunters who knew, by long association, the vast
hunting-grounds in Africa, as well as you or I, perhaps, know our grouse
moor at home. And, lastly, at the head of all stood Colonel Driscoll, the
leader of “Driscoll’s Scouts” in the South African War.
Yes, there was a spirit of romance on Number Seven platform on this
evening of April 1915. But, as is often the case with romance, it was
obscure to the ordinary vision of the spectator, and but dully realised,
if realised at all. So, for the most part, those troops remained
commonplace, and passed from London, as thousands of other troops do, out
to an unknown destination under cover of the night.
It was 2 o’clock next morning when, after long waiting, the train finally
drew out of Waterloo. Between 11 p.m. and 1 a.m., by twos and threes,
friends of the troops had taken their last farewells and departed, taking
sadness with them, and leaving, here and there, a disconsolate soul
behind.
How many touching, aye, last farewells have been witnessed by the
soulless shed of that vast station since war began! How many brave souls
have laughingly departed never to return!—their one great love their
Home, their Empire’s honour.
The battalion’s destination—the port of sailing—was unknown, except to
those in command, but in the early dawn of morning it became apparent to
all, as we passed along the borders of Somerset and Dorset and on through
Devon, that we were _en route_ to Plymouth.
At 10 a.m. we drew up in Plymouth Docks, there to embark on H.M.T.S.
_Neuralia_ (Glasgow).
The day was spent in embarking the troops and baggage to their allocated
stations on board ship; and in the depth of a pitch-black night, when all
was ready, we cleared the docks and steamed slowly out of Plymouth Sound,
in company with others of a convoy, and commenced our voyage “outward
bound” to Africa.
[Sidenote: ON BOARD A TROOPSHIP]
There are times in all men’s lives when they go through experiences
that remain for ever remarkable, either because they are so new and
unexpected, or because they contain so much of pain and hardship. The
men new to travel—and there were a number of them—who embarked on the
good ship _Neuralia_ will remember, to the end of their days, their first
experiences on board a troopship and their first voyage to the tropics;
for it contained, for them, all the hardship of their new life of
soldiering, and all the romance and pleasure of seeing a completely new
and unexpected world.
Conversation on board ship dealt largely with contrasts. Old pictures
were compared with new and, in most cases, within the mind of the
intelligent individual each fresh experience brought new expression and
wide awakening. Young men who short weeks before, and all their lives,
had enjoyed all the comfort and ease of home life were now feeling the
first rigour of army service.
Robson, an observant old soldier, heard much of his neighbours’ little
troubles. It was common to hear the warm, soft, white-sheeted bed at home
ruefully recalled by the men, when rolled in coarse grey blankets on the
hard deck, or, chrysalis-like, bound in hammocks slung from the ceiling
in the impure atmosphere below. Also to hear, when men viewed their
portions of bare, often ill-cooked rations, fond recollections of Sunday
dinners at home, or a lucid description of a favourite dish. Personal
comparisons those, which would have in time become odious had they not
usually evoked laughter from some buoyant spirit, and the request to
“Shut up, you old Funeral!”
It was much the same with everything of this new environment—the men’s
clothes, their boots, their fatigue work (deck-scrubbing, etc.), all
were of a rougher nature than that to which they had been accustomed in
pre-war life.
The process of securing and ensuring hardihood had begun, and, as time
went on, the men, particularly the good ones, came to see the purpose of
it and, generally, to laugh more than to “grouse” at their difficulties.
Were they not, after all, starting out on the greatest adventure of
all—the stern pursuit of a perilous quest—and was not a rough life part
of the setting to be expected and contested?
“Assuredly yes,” thought Robson. “I who am an old traveller know it.
Before you again see England you, who are ‘green hands,’ will have
seen and experienced what ‘roughing it’ really is, and you will be the
stronger men for it; you who live through.”
While the change of personal surroundings was being discussed and
searching out men’s weaknesses, the _Neuralia_ was proceeding daily on
her way—overjoying the men, in their idle hours, with the new scenes
constantly presenting themselves, and stirring awake excited anticipation
of the adventurous country to which they were going.
[Sidenote: GIBRALTAR]
The ship’s course—the war-time course—held south, well west of France and
Spain and outside the Bay of Biscay. The first few days had been dull,
for sea-sickness and strange quarters affect the best of spirits, but by
the time the ship ran into Gibraltar, on the fourth day, everyone was
about deck and cheerful.
No shore leave was granted at “Gib.,” nor was there any real time for it.
The ship lay off “the Rock” only a few hours—the time required to take
off, from launches, a few troops for Malta and some fresh vegetables.
From the sea the towering Rock looked magnificent—grave, strong-featured,
impressive. From the ship’s side the eye could just discern the houses
around the base of the promontory, clustered like molluscs on a rock, the
white-bright dwellings of the inhabitants rising tier above tier from the
water’s edge to the sheer rock face a little distance inland from shore.
A few light sailing craft were dodging about in the foreground, out on
their habitual occupation of the day, making pleasant pictures when they
swept past with full white sail taut in the breeze. Alongside, a number
of native row-boats, which had raced for the ship from shore as soon as
it anchored, were doing thriving business in cigarettes, cigars, and
tobacco, which gaily dressed Moors, and other low-caste tradesmen, were
disposing of rapidly at their own figures to the improvident Tommies.
Dear old Gib., so proudly British, to many it was the entrance to the
promised land of adventure, and the portal of farewell to things that are
near and dear to home.
The ship sailed amid the gay raillery and cheers of Tommies to the
barter-boats, but behind the laughter there lurked, perhaps, a tear, for
this was the final, irrevocable, parting of the ways.
The good ship was now in the Mediterranean Sea—fast bidding good-bye to
Europe, and with Northern Africa distantly in sight, at times, on our
starboard beam.
It pleased many on board, at this stage, to get a hint of Africa’s
vastness. Here were they sighting the Continent on the fifth day out
from England, and yet they knew that they must have about twenty days of
travel, hugging her shores, before they could reach their destination on
the East Coast of that same continent.
This set some of the more enterprising Tommies to establishing a “range
card,” and, after questioning good-natured ship’s officers, they arrived
at the information that our journey from Gib. to Mombasa was one of
roughly some 6,000 miles.
This “range card” was:
Miles
Gibraltar to Malta 1,200
Malta to Port Said 1,125
Port Said to Aden 1,675
Aden to Mombasa 1,950
Total 5,950
It was pleasant, now, forging ahead day after day, through sunny seas,
neither storm-disturbed nor storm-delayed. Fair weather and placid
sea, and the mellow wind of a southern spring—indeed we had found the
Mediterranean in gracious mood. And under a clear sky is there another
sea like that of the soft cobalt blue of the Mediterranean? It is not
the commonplace sea, for it has lost all that is grey or blackish, and
lives completely and wholly blue—blue as the overhead April sky; even
more blue, more alluringly attractive.
[Sidenote: MALTA]
On the morning of the eighth day the ship worked slowly into the snug but
narrow harbour at Malta, while all along deck deeply interested troops
conversed on the unfolding view of this quaint and foreign port, dressed
for the business of war and bristling with grim fortifications.
British and French warships lay in harbour, and merchant vessels of all
kinds—suggestive of the great activities of war in this quarter of the
world, for here routes touched to the war zones of Egypt, Gallipoli,
Mesopotamia, India, and Africa.
Here, as at Gibraltar, the boat hawking tobacco vendors arrived alongside
from shore in their small craft, plying clamorous trade with the
good-natured troops, until the arrival of the coal barges put them to
flight.
The ship coaled all day and late into night; a process conducted by
swarms of gibbering ill-thriven Maltese natives, meagrely garbed in
ragged loin-cloths, who filed, endlessly, up plank gangways from the
barges to the coal bunkers in the ship’s side, each with his loaded
wicker basket hoisted shoulder high.
Coaling is a filthy business. Before evening, despite awnings and closed
port-holes, the fine coal-dust had sought its way into every conceivable
corner of the ship, to be roundly abused and accused by a thousand
discomforted Tommies. None were sorry to get it over, and all rejoiced
when, the following morning, the ship hove anchor and took again to the
clean-winded open sea.
Before departing, at early dawn, it was a strange sight to see row-boats
from shore dredging the shallow harbour, with small bag nets, for the
oddments of coal which had fallen overboard during the process of
coaling—patient labour for a mere pittance of reward that forcibly
suggested the value of fuel to the low-caste natives of the island.
Fair weather continued, and the next few days were as pleasant and
generous of speed as those preceding our arrival at Malta. A noteworthy
occurrence was the northern-bound migration of bird life which was
encountered on the 19th and 20th of April. Many swallows and doves were
seen and a few yellow wagtails, while a whitethroat and a screech owl
were picked up on deck. At the time most migration was observed the ship
was about in a longitudinal line with the island of Crete.
On the morning of the twelfth day the ship arrived at Port Said, at
the entrance of the Suez Canal, and anchored for a few hours—not long
enough to go ashore and get any real first impression of the place. But
it marked an important stage in the voyage; and the colonial, somewhat
oriental, appearance of the town on the west shore of the Canal entrance,
close to which the ship had anchored, was predictive of things Egyptian,
and of the weird beauty and strangeness of the Land of Deserts.
[Sidenote: THROUGH THE SUEZ CANAL]
Leaving Port Said, the Suez Canal was entered, and slowly the ship
proceeded on her course up the narrow fairway; but not before sand-bags
had been stacked on the bridge for protection from enemy sniping, for we
were now in a theatre of war.
On entering the Canal, which, between its low banks, is straight and of
apparent width of a city thoroughfare, the first view, at this season,
is of mud flats and shallow sheets of water, like flooded fen country;
colourless of green, except for a few isolated tufts of grass or dwarfed
shrub.
Soon this changes to the dry level plain of sand desert, endless as far
as eye can see on land, and featureless in geographical outline if one
seeks profile or form. There were many outposts stationed along the
Canal, safeguarding it from Turkish enemy who longed to wreak destruction
on it. And they made picturesque scenes, those outposts on the desert,
with their chalk-white groups of clustered conical tents, standing
prominent in the unbroken desolation of pale wastes of sand. On the
outskirts of camp were a few patient camels and some soldiers—helmeted
British Tommies or turbaned Indians—all sharply outlined in firm
silhouette, since they were darker in colour than the dead flat
background.
By evening the ship was well up the Canal, and the scene was very
beautiful and impressive then. Far as the eye could see on either side
were deep desolate stretches of limitless desert, unbroken by the
slightest undulation. Overhead, the sky was soft and peculiar; singularly
wistful and hazed and unlike any sky one sees at home, while a brilliant
rainbow, foreboding, perhaps, a light shower of rain, lit up and went out
low on the north-east horizon, away, apparently, at the uttermost edges
of the world, where sand and sky merged almost without any visible line.
It was strange brooding country, and it infused a vein of solemnity into
the atmosphere, for it held a suggestion that it had something to say,
could it but give utterance, as an unexpressed thought may do which lies
dormant for unknown ages through the long, long life of mankind.
At daybreak the ship arrived at Port Suez, having completed the passage
through the Canal during the night. Here ammunition was taken on board
before proceeding onward a few hours later.
Suez was left with regret. Many were sorry to go to sea from a land so
attractively picturesque and so full of indefinite mystery.
[Sidenote: IN THE RED SEA]
And in after days it was men’s habit to look back on this one brief
glimpse of Egypt and recall it as the most novel and memorable picture of
the many which unfolded before their eyes on their voyage to Africa. The
fast-moving ship was now sailing the Red Sea, and we were experiencing
that for which it is famed—excessive heat. Damp, cold, and wintry it
had been in England when the troops had sailed, and men had cursed the
weather roundly, as soldiers will, but now, lolling listlessly about
deck, victims of oppressive heat, they would fain have recalled a little
of that northern temperature for the benefit of bodily comfort. However,
the heat brought about one good service, for it caused the “powers that
be” to issue orders for all ranks to hand in their home service kit
to Stores and be supplied with the light tropical khaki drill outfit
customarily worn in hot climates.
The troops were now settled to the routine of ship-board, and in leisure
hours even the novelties of sea and new scenes became less astonishing
the more they grew familiar with them.
The days in the Red Sea passed without particular incident. The weather
remained phenomenally fine, and the sea charmingly clear and blue—almost
as blue as that of the Mediterranean. Large numbers of flying fish
were seen soon after leaving Port Suez; the first of their kind to be
observed. With their transparent wings and long bodies they looked like
magnified dragon-flies in their short flights over the water.
About this time the shortening of the hours of daylight was noticeable.
On the 26th of April dawn was at 5 a.m. and dusk at 6.45 p.m. The North
Pole Star, too, was now low on the horizon, as the ship drew farther and
farther away from the northern hemisphere, and nearer to the Equator.
On the 17th day land was in sight on both bows. Strange land; of
pronounced geographical change in the formation of the prominent
mountains. They were not generally round and rolling and soft as the
hills at home, but flat-topped, and severe as a cliff-head at their
summit, their steep-rearing slopes terminating abruptly in a definite
horizontal line. The whole was apparently rock and boulder, barren of any
covering of foliage.
The sight of land was a forewarning of approach to Aden, and late at
night, some hours after dark, anchor was dropped outside the harbour.
There was little sleep for anyone on board at Aden, unless you had
cast-iron nerves and hearing, for coaling was started almost immediately
the ship anchored, and continued throughout the night. The uproar of a
thousand puny jabbering Lascars, and the run of the coal down the chutes,
made merry music for devils’ ears, but not for sleepless Tommies.
Next morning, before sailing, Aden was viewed from the ship’s side, but
it was too far to land to glean much. The settlement was at the base of
towering ragged mountains and, judging by the gathering of houses close
to the shore front, it was apparently a small place, and principally a
military station.
Here, for the first time, numbers of that well-known camp thief, the
Egyptian kite, were seen gathering their food by robbing the defenceless
gulls of the meat scraps that they picked up overboard.
[Sidenote: NEARING EAST AFRICA]
At 10.30 a.m. Aden was left behind. It was the final port _en route_, and
the ship steamed down the Gulf against a light headwind on the last lap
of the voyage. She was soon well out to sea, and land was not sighted
again until, six days later, her destination was approached. The third
day out from Aden, in dead calm weather in the Indian Ocean, the best run
of the voyage was recorded—337 miles.
Otherwise the final days were uneventful, except that there was a good
deal of bustle and confusion in preparation to land. Arms and ammunition
were issued, equipment fitted, and everything got in readiness for
the journey up country to the frontier, which was to be immediately
undertaken on arrival in port.
On the morning of the 4th of May the battalion landed at
Mombasa—twenty-four days after our departure from Plymouth.
The bugle sounded _Réveillé_ at 5 a.m.—one hour earlier than usual; and
while all were dressing, low-lying shore came into sight, rich with
abundant tropical tree growth, and green, for it was the rainy season
and leaf was new. A little later the ship anchored in the harbour of
Kilindini, and, in due course, commenced the disembarkation of troops
and stores into barges, and thence to the landings on shore. It was late
evening ere the labours of transportation had ceased and all were landed
and entrained, ready to proceed up country in the narrow, antiquated,
wood-seated carriages of which the train was composed.
There had been no time for cooking, and everyone was hungry, for the last
meal had been at 12 noon on the previous day. However, some hours after
commencing the train journey, the train was stopped at a small wayside
station about midnight, and hot tea and rations were served to the
famishing troops. In after days all knew much more about going hungry—not
for a day, but for many days—but, looking back now, it was strange that
the very first experience in Africa was one of short rations and lean
“interiors.”
Thus an imperial unit had come to East Africa; to join Indian and Native
African forces already holding the frontier against the enemy in German
East Africa.