TRANSFER OF THE GOLD COAST REGIMENT
TO PORTUGUESE EAST AFRICA
The actual movements and whereabouts of von Lettow-Vorbeck and his
troops were, as usual, still largely a matter of conjecture, but every
base which he had possessed in German East Africa was now in the hands
of the British. He was known to be short of supplies, of food, of
equipment, and of ammunition; the end of the dry season was drawing
near, and the Portuguese were aware that he was approaching the
frontier, and were strongly encamped at Ngomano, on the right bank of
the Rovuma, about fifty miles upstream from the point at which the
German force had crossed the river. The Rovuma is here a fine river,
with a bed of sand and shingle, about half a mile wide from bank to
bank. At this season, however, it was shrunken to such an extent that
the running water measured only a hundred yards or so across, and was
easily fordable at many points. The banks of the Rovuma were low and
water-worn; the country in the vicinity was flat and covered with
vegetation, which owed such fertility as it possessed to annual
extensive inundations. In the rainy season the valley of the Rovuma
would clearly be even more uninhabitable than the basin of the Rufiji
had proved to be in 1916-17.
There were many sanguine people in the British camp who held that with
the expulsion of von Lettow-Vorbeck from the territory that had once
belonged to Germany the campaign in East Africa—which had already,
nearly a year before, been publicly declared to have been practically at
an end—was now at last definitely concluded. Since the first
pronouncement to that effect was made, the enemy, quite unperturbed by
this pious expression of opinion, had kept the field continuously, had
fought a series of vigorous rear-guard actions, among which those at
Njengao and Mahiwa on the Lindi road were of considerable magnitude, and
had incidentally cost the British taxpayer an average of over twelve
millions sterling _per mensem_. Now, even if fighting did not cease, the
campaign, it was thought, could henceforth be conducted upon a much more
modest scale; but most of the men who had fought against von
Lettow-Vorbeck, and who had had opportunities of gauging the resolution,
the determination, the resourcefulness, and, if you will, the dogged
obstinacy of the man, were convinced that he would carry on the fight so
long as he had an _Askari_ to fire a rifle, and a cartridge to be
discharged. It was also regarded as probable that he and von Tafel might
still be able to join forces.
On the night of the 21st November the Gold Coast Regiment, which had not
entered Newala, camped on the road halfway between that place and
Lulindi, and on the following day retraced its steps to the latter. On
the 23rd November, No. 1 Column marched from Lulindi to Luatalla, where
it was joined by the 55th Rifles and the 1st Battalion of the 3rd King’s
African Rifles from Newala. Word was here received that von
Lettow-Vorbeck’s column was moving down the right, or Portuguese, bank
of the Rovuma, and it was reported by natives that von Tafel had
recrossed the river to the left bank, and was moving slowly and with
great difficulty through the bush in the neighbourhood of Miesi, which
lies halfway between the Mwiti and Bangalla rivers, both of which are
left tributaries of the Rovuma. No. 1 Column was ordered to proceed to
the mouth of the Bangalla River, by forced marches, for the purpose of
trying to cut off von Tafel, and of preventing him from effecting a
junction with von Lettow-Vorbeck. The Cavalry was to move in advance of
No. 1 Column, and No. 2 Column was simultaneously to march down the
Bangalla River from the north.
At 4 p.m. on the 24th November, therefore, No. 1 Column, with the Gold
Coast Regiment leading the advance, set out for the mouth of the
Bangalla, and at midnight bivouacked in column of route along the
roadside. At 5.30 a.m. on the 25th November, the march was resumed, and
the junction of the Bangalla with the Rovuma was reached at 10.30 a.m.
During the march a solitary bull buffalo, outraged by this intrusion
upon his privacy, savagely charged the column, went through it like a
clown through a paper hoop, knocking over two carriers, and so vanished
into the bush.
During the march a distance of 24 miles was covered, and it was
calculated that since leaving Ruponda, nine days earlier, the main body
of No. 1 Column had marched no less than 174 miles—an average of over 19
miles _per diem_—while many of the units composing it, of which the Gold
Coast Regiment was one, had materially exceeded that average. This would
have been a sufficiently fine performance anywhere and in any
circumstances for a body of infantry impeded at every step by a large
number of carriers; but in the East African bush, at the fag-end of the
dry season, when everything is at its dryest and hottest, it represented
a really considerable feat.
On the 26th November, word having been received that an enemy force,
composed of thirty white men and an unknown number of _Askari_, had cut
the Column’s line of communication to the north-east, the 129th Baluchis
were dispatched toward Luatalla for the purpose of dislodging it; and at
9 a.m. the remainder of the column marched from Bangalla to Miesi by the
road which it had followed on the preceding day. On arrival here it was
learned that the 129th Baluchis, who at this time consisted of only
about 130 rifles, had had a sharp engagement with the enemy on the banks
of the Mwiti River, that they had had the worst of the encounter, and
that they had been compelled to retire, leaving a considerable amount of
small-arms ammunition in the hands of the Germans. This, however, was
subsequently recovered, the enemy having had no means of carrying it
away.
The 2nd Battalion of the 2nd King’s African Rifles were sent to a place
called Jumbe Nambude, with half of A Company of the Gold Coast Regiment,
to form a flank guard to the Column; but at 6 p.m. this half-company
returned to Miesi, having seen nothing of the enemy.
During the night the enemy with whom the 129th Baluchis had come into
collision retired, and communication with Lustalla was restored. Half of
B Company, under Captain McElligott, was sent to patrol the Mbalawala
hills, to the north of Miesi, and thence to send out parties to
reconnoitre to the north and north-west. It was thought that von Tafel’s
camp was near Nambingo, to the west of Miesi, between the Bangalla and
Mwiti rivers.
On the 28th November No. 1 Column marched back to Bangalla, at the
junction of the river of that name with the Rovuma, where the perimeter
camp formed on the 25th November was reoccupied. Here Captain McElligott
with his patrol rejoined the Gold Coast Regiment. Very shortly after the
arrival of the column in camp, a British aviator effected a landing on
the sand and shingle of the Rovuma’s dried-up bed, and when he came up
to the camp it was found that he was Lieutenant Nash, who, in 1913-14,
had been engaged in surveying the line of the projected railway
extension in the Gold Coast from Koforidua to Kumasi. After he had
partaken of such frugal fare as the mess of the Regiment afforded—for at
this time the whole force had for some days been on greatly reduced
rations—Lieutenant Nash resumed his journey, a squad of Gold Coast men
being sent out to give his machine a “push off,” as the sand and shingle
of the river-bed proved to be rather heavy going. Nash flew down the
river for a few miles, and then finding that his stock of petrol was
running short and that his machine must be lightened, he dropped all the
bombs he had with him into the Rovuma. Thus in a double degree the Gold
Coast may claim to have had a special share in the surrender of von
Tafel and his forces; for the explosion of Nash’s bombs led the German
Commander to believe that von Lettow-Vorbeck’s troops were heavily
engaged with the British between him and Newala. He had already learned
that the latter place had been evacuated; his whole force had consumed
practically all its supplies; ammunition was running very short; and now
it seemed that he was separated from von Lettow-Vorbeck on the left bank
of the Rovuma by a British column. This decided him to surrender, and
that afternoon he sent in his Chief Staff Officer and another member of
his staff with a white flag. They were received by a detachment of the
Pioneer Company of the Gold Coast Regiment, and were forthwith conducted
to Colonel Orr, the Column Commander.
The German officers, one of whom spoke English perfectly, stated that
von Tafel had destroyed his last ammunition and buried or burned all his
arms of precision. He asked to be allowed to surrender unconditionally,
and suggested that his force should be marched into the British camp,
and should occupy near it any area that might be chosen for the purpose.
These conditions were approved, and late that afternoon the German
force, consisting of 190 Europeans and about 1,200 _Askari_, with their
carriers and camp-followers, waded across the Rovuma which they had
crossed the preceding evening and came into camp.
The whole movement was carried out with machine-like precision. The
little column marched, as though on parade, to the area which had been
allotted to it for its encampment, in which each company at once took up
the position habitually assigned to it. Baggage having been deposited in
a most orderly fashion, the men of each company instantly set to work to
construct bush-huts for their European officers, while the carriers
cleared the grass and underwood with their matchets, and prepared less
elaborate huts for the _Askari_. The work was done with great rapidity,
and on a system which had evidently become so instinctive that each cog
knew to a nicety the precise place which it occupied in the elaborate
mechanism. But what chiefly impressed the British spectators was not
only the discipline and the order, but the almost unbroken silence which
prevailed throughout. Silence in the ranks is easy enough to secure
among men subject to strict military discipline, but no Englishman has
yet learned the secret of imposing a like silence upon a mob of male and
female African carriers. The result was impressive, but it may perhaps
be hoped that the British never will achieve this particular miracle.
Those who know the natives of Africa will agree that it is only to be
wrought by means of methods that have always found greater favour in
Prussia than they are ever likely to secure in Great Britain. The cowed
and silent carrier was the inevitable adjunct to the German _Askari_, an
analysis of whose privileged position has been attempted in an earlier
chapter of this book.
Though von Tafel’s men did not appear to be at all near starvation,
they, and especially the Europeans, had not been full-fed for many days.
In illustration of this it may be mentioned that a Tabora sovereign—the
handsome gold coin, bearing the Prussian arms on the obverse and an
African elephant on the reverse, and with no bevelling to its edge, of
which von Lettow-Vorbeck had caused a few thousand to be coined at
Tabora during the early days of the campaign—was freely offered that
afternoon for a tin of honest bully-beef. No. 1 Column, however, was
itself very hard-up for rations; and on the morrow von Tafel’s men,
under the escort of the 55th Rifles, were sent up the bed of the
Bangalla River to join the Lindi road at a point to the south-west of
Massassi, and thence to march along it to the sea. They were fed by
means of the consignments of rations which were being dispatched from
Lindi for the use of the British columns in the field; and the latter
accordingly, for a space, went shorter of supplies than ever.
* * * * *
On the 29th November, orders were received to break up No. 1 Column. All
the Indian units were directed to proceed to Massassi, and all the
African units—the Gold Coast Regiment, the 2nd Battalion of the 2nd and
the 1st Battalion of the 3rd King’s African Rifles—to Naurus, where they
were to join up with No. 2 Column. The Indian and African troops were
designated A Column and B Column respectively; and the command of the
latter was entrusted to Colonel Rose, Lieutenant S. B. Smith acting as
his Staff Officer.
B Column started upon its march on the 30th November, and moving _viâ_
Nambere and Maparawe, reached Naurus, without incident, on the 2nd
December.
The strength of the Gold Coast Regiment at this time was as follows.
There were actually present in the field 19 British officers, including
2 doctors and 2 officers attached to the transport; 8 British
non-commissioned officers, of whom 3 belonged to the transport; 850 rank
and file, including 18 signallers and 84 Gold Coast Volunteers, the
majority of the latter being employed as orderlies; 106 gun and
ammunition-carriers; 35 stretcher-bearers, 21 servants, 5 clerks, and
1305 carriers. The potential strength of the Regiment, however, largely
exceeded these figures, for 11 British and 2 British non-commissioned
officers were now available at Mpara, Mingonyo or Lindi, some of whom
had returned from leave, while others were newly posted for service with
the corps; and new drafts having arrived from the Gold Coast, 510 rank
and file and 106 gun and ammunition-carriers were in readiness to join
the Regiment. The total available force, therefore, at this time,
numbered 1360 rank and file and 212 gun and ammunition-carriers, and it
was once again very fairly well officered. The Regiment also possessed,
in addition to its machine-guns, 2 Lewis and 4 Stokes guns.
On the other hand, the quality of the rank and file was not quite up to
the standard of the original force which the Gold Coast had put into the
field in July, 1916. The men at that time composing the Regiment were
seasoned soldiers, all, or nearly all, of whom had recently seen active
service. They were “made” soldiers to a man, and had every one of them
been subjected to a long process of training and discipline. Gaps in
their ranks, after the arrival of the first fully-trained draft which
had joined the Regiment in December, 1916, had been filled, in the first
instance, by hastily collected levies of greatly inferior quality, and
as early as the fight at Nahungu, at the end of September, 1917, it had
not been thought expedient to make use of all of them in the
firing-line. Subsequent drafts were far superior to these, and had also
undergone a more prolonged training, but they, of course, lacked the
experience of the men belonging to the original Expeditionary Force and
of those who formed the first draft of reinforcements. On the whole they
acquitted themselves very well; but the Gold Coast Regiment at the end
of December, 1917, though numerically stronger than it had been at any
period during the whole campaign, was not, perhaps, such a homogeneous
and thoroughly efficient force as it had been on its first arrival in
East Africa.
* * * * *
On the 3rd December, the Pioneer Company of the Gold Coast Regiment,
under Captain Arnold, was sent to Wangoni, on the banks of the Rovuma,
to relieve the 1st Battalion of the 3rd King’s African Rifles, and the
rest of the Regiment was employed during the next few days in
road-making, in cleaning up old camping grounds, and on other fatigues.
On the 5th December a draft consisting of 5 British officers, 2 British
non-commissioned officers, and 401 men, nearly all of whom were new
drafts from the Gold Coast, reached the Regiment from Mpara.
On the 9th December, Colonel Rose, who had been summoned by General Van
der Venter to General Headquarters, which were established at that time
at the mission station at Ndanda, handed over the command to Major
Goodwin, and set off for his destination by motor-car; and it was
announced that the Gold Coast Regiment was about to be sent by sea from
Lindi to Port Amelia in Portuguese East Africa. It also leaked out that
von Lettow-Vorbeck, having reached a point on the left bank of the
Rovuma near Ngomano, had waded across the river, his men having at that
time barely fifty rounds of small-arms ammunition per head, and being to
all intents and purposes at the end of their resources. He had then
surprised the Portuguese camp at Ngomano so effectively that he
succeeded in capturing _inter alia_ a million rounds of small-arms
ammunition, several guns, and a supply of canned European provisions
sufficient to meet the requirements of his force for at least three
months. Having thus secured to himself a new lease of life, he was now
proceeding to make things as unpleasant as possible for the Government
of Portuguese East Africa.
* * * * *
On the 9th December the Gold Coast Regiment marched to Bangalla—not the
place where the river of that name debouches into the Rovuma, but the
spot where that stream is bridged by the road which leads through
Massassi from Makochera, on the Rovuma, to Lindi on the sea. From this
point the Regiment marched up the main road, reached Massassi Mission
Station on the 12th December, picking up at that place a signal section
of Royal Engineers, and pushing on to Chigugu the same day. Marching
distances which varied from nine to sixteen miles daily, the Regiment,
on the 15th December, reached Mahiwa, where General O’Grady’s Column
from Lindi had fought one of its big battles. On the morrow at Mtama,
nine miles further up the road, it was learned that Major Shaw, with
Captains Harris and Watts, and Lieutenants Pike, Smith and Biltcliffe
and 250 men of the Gold Coast Regiment, had already sailed from Lindi
for Port Amelia. On the 17th December Mtua was reached, and Lieutenant
Withers, Colour-Sergeant Thornton, and A Company, with two machine-guns
and their teams, were then dispatched to Lindi by motor-car to embark
for Port Amelia. The authorities were evidently in a hurry, and von
Lettow-Vorbeck was reported already to have two companies of his
_Askari_ within ten hours’ march of Port Amelia.
Next day, the Regiment moved on two miles to Mingoya, where it held
itself in readiness to embark at Arab House, the landing-stage at Lindi,
which lay some six miles further up the road.
Meanwhile Colonel Rose had reported himself to General Van der Venter,
the Commander-in-Chief, and to General Sheppard, the Chief of Staff, at
Ndanda Mission on the Lindi main road. He was here informed that it had
been decided to send a column forthwith to assist the Portuguese at Port
Amelia, where much consternation had been caused by the approach of von
Lettow-Vorbeck’s forces: that the column would be composed mainly of the
Gold Coast Regiment; and that the command would be entrusted to Colonel
Rose.
The Gold Coast Regiment had now been serving continuously in East Africa
since its arrival at Kilindini on the 26th July, 1916. During the
seventeen months that had thereafter elapsed the Regiment had been
constantly on the march or in action, save when it had been camped, as
for instance at Njimbwe, at Mnasi, at Rumbo or again at Narungombe, in
close proximity to the enemy, with whom its patrols and outposts had
been in almost daily collision. Thanks to the efforts of the Government
of the Gold Coast, and to the highly efficient work performed by
Lieutenant-Colonel Potter, D.S.O., who had assumed command of the
training depôts in that colony, the Regiment had been constantly and
regularly reinforced: but after the remainder of the regular force,
originally left behind in the Gold Coast, had been sent to East Africa,
the quality of some of the drafts had by no means equalled the high
standard at which the Regiment had always hitherto aimed. The Nigerian
Brigade, which had reached East Africa some months after the arrival of
the Gold Coast Regiment, was about to be sent back to Lagos: but the
Gold Coast Regiment, which had enjoyed less than three months’ rest at
Kumasi after the conclusion of the campaign in the Kameruns, was still
to be kept in the field.
It was realized by all, however, that a great compliment to the
Regiment, and a tacit recognition of the fashion in which it had borne
itself, were implied in this selection of it, out of all the available
troops, to undertake yet one more campaign; and if there were some who
thought that the men were being tried almost too severely, the rank and
file accepted the new duties which were about to be imposed upon them
with their usual philosophy and good temper.