THE SKIRMISH AT FIVE MILE BANK
THE CAMP, MAFEKING,
_October 14th, 1899_.
Early this morning a mounted patrol under Captain Lord Charles
Bentinck reported the Boers in strong position to the north of the
town, and engaging them at once a general fight ensued.
Colonel Baden-Powell, upon receiving this information, instructed
Captain Fitzclarence, D Squadron Protectorate Regiment, which is
commanded by Colonel Hore, to cover the right flank of the armoured
train, which had already moved out to support the patrol of A
squadron, and which, under the direction of Captain Williams, British
South Africa Police, drove the Boer artillery from two positions.
It may be said that this movement began the more serious and certainly
the more determined portion of the engagement. Captain Fitzclarence
was accompanied by seventy men. Upon the termination of the fight he
had twelve wounded, two dead, and two others wounded so seriously that
they since died. The firing-line at no time contained more than two
troops, who, in extended order, and having seized the little cover
which was available, hotly contested the position against four hundred
Boers. Upon the arrival of the squadron under Captain Fitzclarence the
Boers again began to fall back, and withdrawing their right flank from
its propinquity to the armoured train, they projected their entire
force well beyond the right flank of Captain Fitzclarence. The two
forces both in extended order, the one falling back upon the lines of
a position which had been carefully selected and which was admirably
adapted to their methods of fighting, the other pursuing, then
prepared to settle matters between themselves. Had Captain
Fitzclarence but realised it, and had this young officer not been so
intrepid, he would have recognised in this Boer movement the ruse by
which they hoped to entice the "Red necks" within range of a position
from which they could be more effectually surrounded. The motive in
their movement to the rear was to secure the ample protection which
was offered to them by the low ridge covered with timber, scrub, large
masses of rock, and cut up by many little sluits, which extended along
the line of their retreat. When once the Boers had gained this ridge
they faced about, though it must not be imagined their retirement was
in any way a mad gallop. They fell back in as good order as our
squadron advanced, but so soon as they had lined up upon the ridge it
could be seen how very greatly the Boer detachment out-numbered the
men opposed to them. Moreover, in a little their artillery again spoke
for itself, impressing the situation with still greater gravity. When
the Boer guns opened fire Captain Fitzclarence very wisely availed
himself of the shelter of three native huts, for the better protection
of the horses and any wounded that might come on. Leaving his horses
here, he advanced with his men in extended order, until he had secured
a line of front immediately adjacent to the Boers. Indeed, our
firing-line was at first only four hundred yards from the ridge; but,
after a short experience of such close quarters, it was found to be
wiser to take up a position some four hundred yards further off. The
action of Captain Fitzclarence in endeavouring to meet the Boer
commando was one of those inopportune acts of gallantry where loss,
should the fight be successful, is overlooked. Technically speaking,
of course, the strategy was all at fault, and it soon was seen how
very serious the situation of Squadron D had become. By good luck I had
joined this squadron in its move to the front, and it was very
interesting to observe how a force, whose composite qualities were
quite unknown, showed itself to be worthy of the utmost respect, and a
corps upon which every reliance could be placed. Our men did not seem
to mind the formidable odds against which they contended. The only
disconcerting thing at the outset of the action being the position of
the artillery on the Boer side, but for some reason the Boers ceased
their shell fire very shortly after the action had begun. This again
is another of those extraordinary blunders which creep into most
fighting. The Boers might have wiped Squadron D out of existence by
playing their nine-pounders upon our position. As it was, the Boer
commandant withdrew his artillery from the fight and relied solely
upon his rifles. From the little ridge, which, when our own
firing-line had fallen back, was barely five hundred yards distant,
there came a shower of Mauser and Martini bullets. The direction from
which the fire came at first suggested that the Boers were undecided
as to the area of the position which they would occupy, since shortly
after the action began the enemy's line of fire expanded until it
extended beyond our front. For the moment the firing-line developed,
continuing to expand until it became evident that the fire of their
either flank was here most effectually enveloping the rear of our
position, and endangering our line of retreat as well as those who had
been sent to the improvised hospital in the native huts. But it was
impossible to avoid such a contingency with the numbers against which
we had to contend. Indeed, there was no point from which this
enveloping movement could be escaped, since the men with Captain
Fitzclarence were already unduly extended. The rifle fire was very
heavy.
From the ridge of the Boer position our complete formation and the
situation of each unit could be seen. It merely required a little
sharpshooting, keen sight, and sufficient energy to cause a disaster.
Our men lay upon the ground seeking cover where they could find it,
but they had neither the trees, nor the low-lying shrubs, nor the
rocks, nor the sluits which had lent themselves to the Boers' shelter.
They simply lay, a determined body of men, individually keen for
distinction, and individually keen to put the Boers out of existence.
The firing became hot and so rapid that in a very short time the heavy
drain upon our ammunition was beginning to have effect. This again
establishes the position of D Squadron. There were no supplies, nor
was there any artillery support until too late. There was no
ambulance, and no effective preparation for retirement. The horses
behind the huts, the men in the front, were each in a position from
which it certainly seemed that escape was impossible. The Boers, upon
the contrary, had a train of supplies and an excellent line of cover
for retreat.
The first Boer shell killed two horses and reduced to ruins a hut from
the group which had given some protection to the wounded. The second
shell fell wide, exploding, with no effect, into a sand heap. Between
the intervals of shelling, the fire from the Boer Maxims whistled
across the open spaces between the two firing-lines with a discord
which was altogether out of harmony with the calmness and coolness of
our men who, so soon as they had settled down to the serious business
of the engagement, did not seem at all to mind the firing.
Two cousins, Corporal Walshe and Corporal Parland, Irishmen, were shot
dead very soon after the engagement opened, but the absence of
ambulance arrangements prevented those who were wounded in the
advanced position from falling back to the rear. With a quiet and
unsuspected courage they just stopped where they were shot until they
could muster sufficient strength to drag themselves to the rear. Each
wounded form became, as it crawled along, the objective of the Boer
rifle fire, and no few of those who had been hit in action were hit
again as they made their way to the field hospital. Here Major
Anderson, with whom I remained from the moment of my arrival until we
retired--who told me afterwards that it was a mere chance which caused
him to accompany the squadron to the field, since in the confusion and
din no one had thought to give him his orders--was busily dressing the
men as they came in. The total area of the improvised dressing station
was perhaps half a dozen yards; into that crowded six or seven horses,
seven or eight wounded men, the Surgeon-Major, his orderly, and all
those others who made their way through the firing-line from time to
time. There seemed to be indescribable confusion in this little spot.
The wounded men lay between horses' legs, rested upon one another,
crouched against the walls of the huts, each recognising that the
situation was one of gravity, and endeavouring to assist so far as he
was able; those who were not too severely wounded helped to undress
those who had been less fortunately hit, and to each as he fell back
from the firing-line to have his wounds dressed, there was thrown a
merry jest from his comrades. The nature of the wounds created no
little interest among the men, since it was the first time that any
one had seen the effect, upon human beings, of the Mauser bullets. One
man as he came back was advised not to sit down; another man, with
extraordinary coolness in seeing the nature of his wounds, which were
seven, exclaimed with a quaint blasphemy, that it still might be
possible for him to enjoy the functions of a married man. But if this
were the scene at the hospital base, the scene at our firing-line and
at that upon the Boer side was very different. We possibly occupied a
line of front some eighty yards in extent, and as the Boers saw that
the hospital hut was becoming the centre of our position, so they
extended their lines until a direct cross fire from the extremities of
the two flanks were added to the direct fire from the centre; each
man, therefore, was under a converging fire from three distinct
points, and had it not been that the Boers' aim was not so good as
their range our losses would have been much more serious than has
happily proved to be the case. We could see the Boers sitting in the
branches of the trees; we could see them crouching beneath bushes; we
could detect them, from the fire of their rifles, in the shelter of
the rocks and in the depths of the sluits. It soon became the first
serious consideration with our men to try to hit them as they sat in
the branches of the trees, and it was because Private Wormald caught
sight of a piece of a paper as it dropped from a tree that he was able
to shoot the Dutchman who was known to have shot the two cousins. It
was almost a unique method of warfare. Anon and again our fellows
enjoyed a little Boer potting among the foliage of the trees. Here and
there a body was seen to fall heavily from a branch, or to spring up
and fall heavily into a bush; that was as much as we could gauge of
the effect of our own handiwork. Those who were behind the stones were
possibly as safe as those who were in the sluits, but through the lack
of any effective support our shooting, good as it may have been, was
not sufficiently strong for us to maintain our position. If D Squadron
were to save itself from an unfortunate disaster it seemed that it
would have to fall back. The wounded men had come in so rapidly from
the front, and ammunition had been so heavily expended, that many of
those situated upon the extreme flanks of our position were completely
without ammunition. In one case five men had no ammunition left, and
one volunteered to go to the rear to obtain some from those who had
been wounded, and were consequently out of action. He successfully
accomplished this errand, sustaining, however, such wounds as must
prove fatal.
Captain Fitzclarence maintained his splendid isolation as long as
possible, and just as every one was wondering why, in the name of
Heaven, no artillery had been sent to support the squadron in a
position it was never intended to occupy, a gun detachment was seen
to gallop into action on the extreme right flank. Between our men and
the gun perhaps a mile stretched, and when we could see that they were
preparing to fire, each for a brief moment stopped to congratulate his
fellow upon the succour at hand. In this they didn't think of
themselves, but they hoped that with the aid of the gun they might
still be able to maintain their position and give the enemy a hiding.
Suddenly a cloud of smoke hung over the gun and a shell shrieked
through the air. We rapidly speculated upon the amount of damage it
would make, when, with noisy force, it burst among us. We thought at
first that the shell had fallen short, and we hoped the next would
reach the enemy, but when Lieutenant Murchison, who was in charge of
the gun, dismissed his second shell, and it was so well directed as to
fall upon one of the three huts behind which we were sheltering, the
luckless position of D Squadron received unmerited but instantaneous
aggravation and aggrievement, since it was turning the tables with a
vengeance upon the enemy when the guns coming to our support set,
forthwith, to shell us. The menace which our own artillery had thus
unconsciously become to one portion of our wounded men about these
huts had to be immediately removed, and I was one of two who were
permitted to carry intelligence of his mistake to the officer in
charge of the seven-pounder. In galloping across to the position of
the gun, the third shell thrown in this direction burst just past my
horse's head, the force of its wind almost lifting me from the saddle.
The moment was of interest, and I only realised my escape when, upon
returning, I found the base of the shell and my helmet lying quite
close to each other. When a new direction had been given to the guns,
and their fire brought to bear upon the position which the Boers
occupied, the rifle fire from the front of the ridge gradually
slackened, while, under cover of the very excellent work which this
gun was executing, our men fell back upon the hospital. Here an order
had just arrived instructing Fitzclarence to send back his wounded to
the armoured train, those uninjured covering the movement. While the
squadron was engaged in completing this order, no shots were fired
from the position of the Boers, and we concluded that they also were
engaged in withdrawing at discretion. Captain Fitzclarence, Lieutenant
Swinburne, and myself were the last to leave the line of action,
tailing off ourselves in the same open order that the remainder of the
squadron had been ordered to preserve. As we retired Captain
Fitzclarence put three wounded horses out of their misery, leaving
their bodies for the vultures that were already wheeling in circles in
the realms of space above us. These were the last shots fired in this
action, although through mistake, the Boers had fired upon the
ambulance train, mistaking it for a new instrument of destruction.
Subsequently we heard that the Boers buried their dead at
Ramathlabama, and we also have heard that all the houses in that place
have been seized as accommodation for the 107 Boers who were wounded
in the fight. These numbers may probably be exaggerated, but there is
no cause to doubt that their loss was much greater than ours, since
the proportion of their men to ours was greater than twelve to one.
Saturday thus initiated the Boer war along this frontier, and after
the morning's excitement the rest of the day passed without incident.
Colonel Baden-Powell, Colonel Hore, and Colonel Walford, the one as
the colonel in command, the others as the commanding officers of the
Protectorate Regiment and the British South Africa Police,
congratulated their men upon the stand which they had made in the
morning, and the courage which they had displayed. Brevet-Major Lord
Edward Cecil, C.S.O., described Captain Fitzclarence's movement as
brilliant. It is a question whether this movement was not, at least,
characterised by an equal amount of foolhardiness. However, the
officer himself showed such coolness in this his baptism of fire as to
deserve much congratulation upon his individual gallantry.