With Buller in Natal, Or, a Born Leader, G. A. Henty [best novels to read .TXT] 📗

the natives had breakfast ready, and they had scarcely eaten this when a trumpet sounded to horse. Five minutes later the mounted infantry belonging to the regular regiments and the Colonial Horse formed up, and, led by Lord Dundonald, marched north-east, followed by the three infantry brigades and some batteries of artillery. When within a couple of miles of the nek, the mounted infantry galloped forward, and selecting a spot where the ascent was gradual, pushed rapidly up the hill until they reached its brow. Here the horses were placed in a depression, and the men scattered themselves across the crest. They were but just in time, for a considerable force of Boers from Monte Cristo were hurrying along to assist the defenders of Cingola, it having now become evident to them that this was the point to which the infantry moving across the plain were making.

A brisk fire was opened as they approached, and the Boers at once stopped in surprise, for as they came along they had been unable to see that the cavalry had quitted the rest of the column, and had therefore no idea whatever that their way to Cingola was barred. As the rapid fire showed them that the nek was held in force, they did not think it prudent to advance farther, but after an exchange of fire fell back to Monte Cristo. The task of the infantry was now comparatively easy. Cingola was not held in any great force; and seeing that their retreat along the nek was cut off, and that they could not hope to resist the strong force that was approaching, the enemy contented themselves with keeping up a brisk fire for a time, and then retreated hastily down the northern face of the hill, and scattered among numerous kopjes between it and the river. Lyttleton and Hildyard's brigades occupied the peak, and Barton, with the Fusilier battalions, remained to the left of its base.

As the mounted infantry had, before opening fire, taken shelter behind bushes and rocks, there were only two or three casualties, and they were much disappointed that the affair had been so trifling. It was afternoon now, and for the rest of the day comparative quietude reigned, although Monte Cristo threw an occasional shell on to the crest of Cingola. The mounted infantry remained all night in their position, acting as an advanced guard to the infantry; but they had orders to descend the hill before daybreak and return to Chieveley, there being no water obtainable for their horses, and their services not being required for the succeeding operations. The next morning (Sunday) a battery of field-artillery, which had been taken half-way up Cingola, began to shell Monte Cristo, and as if this had been the signal, the whole of the artillery on the plain opened a terrific fire on the entrenchments of Monte Cristo, Hlangwane, and Green Hill, which was close to Monte Cristo.

On the morning of the 18th, Lyttleton and Hildyard's brigades moved forward to storm the precipitous peak, and Barton's brigade marched against the tangled and difficult ground that surrounded Green Hill. The Queen's on the right and the Scotch Fusiliers on the left led the attack against the peak. The hillside was partly wooded, but although the smokeless powder gave little indication as to the progress the troops were making, occasional glimpses of the Boers flitting among the trees showed that these were falling back. The roar of musketry was continuous, as Hildyard's brigade and Lyttleton's were both engaged. For a short time there was a pause, and then Lyttleton's men, having gathered at the edge of a wood some couple of hundred yards from the summit, advanced with a rush up the terribly steep rocks. The Boers fired hurriedly, but the bullets flew for the most part far over the heads of the Queen's, and then, fearful of being caught by Hildyard's men, who were also rapidly coming up, they fled hastily.

The opposition had finally been trifling. The vast majority of the Boers had cleared off, and the rest, after emptying their magazines, had followed their example before the troops gained the summit, upon which a heavy cannonade was at once opened from Grobler's Hill, Fort Wylie, and other Boer positions. This, however, gradually slackened under the storm of lyddite shells with which they were pelted by the naval guns, and the important position of Hlangwane was at last secured, and no time was lost in getting up guns and preparing for a farther advance. Barton's brigade had been equally successful in their attack, and half an hour after the capture of Monte Cristo the Fusiliers crowned the summit of the wood-covered Green Hill.

The Boers' defences were now examined, and proved to be of a most formidable nature. On the south face of the hill the trenches were in tiers, line behind line. Most of them were fully six feet deep, and in many cases provided with shelter from the weather by sheets of corrugated iron, taken from the roofs of the houses in Colenso. In some cases these were supported by props, and covered with six feet of earth. These had evidently been used for sleeping and living places. The ground was strewn with straw, empty tins, fragments of food, bones, cartridge-cases, old bandoliers, and large quantities of unopened tinned food and sacks of mealie flour. Here and there were patches of dried blood, showing where the wounded by our shell had been brought in, and laid down until they could be removed to the hospital under cover of night. On the plateau the scene was similar. Here every irregularity of ground had been utilized, and long lines of trenches intersected it, showing that the Boers had intended to make a desperate resistance even after we had won our way up the hill. These were in a similar state of litter and disorder.

Although they had saved their guns, they had left behind them large quantities of ammunition and provisions in the hurried flight, necessitated by our attack being delivered in a direction from which no danger had been apprehended, Four waggons full of ammunition had been left by them in a kloof near the river. These had been observed by the Engineers in the balloon, and their position had been signalled to the naval brigade, who, turning their guns upon them, before long succeeded in blowing them up.

When the infantry prepared for their final rush the Boers appeared, indeed, to be entirely disconcerted at an attack from an altogether unexpected direction. While for weeks they had been working incessantly to render the hill impregnable, they had prepared it only on the face against which they made sure the British infantry would dash itself. Nevertheless, in this, as in every action, the Boers, as soon as they saw that there was a risk of the position being taken, began early to make preparations for retreat. While keeping up a very heavy musketry fire on the woods through which the British infantry were advancing, they began to withdraw their guns.

The speed and skill with which on every occasion throughout the war they shifted heavy pieces of artillery from one point to another, or withdrew them altogether, was a new feature in warfare. Except when the garrison of Ladysmith, on two occasions of night sorties, surprised and destroyed three of their guns, they scarcely lost a piece either in the numerous actions during our advance to Ladysmith, or in their final retreat from that town. And similarly on the other side, of the very large number of guns employed at the fight on the Modder, at Magersfontein, and in the siege of Kimberley the whole were, with the exception of a few pieces captured when Cronje was surrounded, withdrawn in spite of the hurried evacuation of their position, a feat almost unparalleled even in an army accompanied only by field-artillery, and extraordinary indeed in the case of works mounting heavy siege-guns.

No farther advance was made till the afternoon, when General Buller arrived on