by David Gilman
‘Aye, he’s in one of them horse stalls the captain here broke down.’
Flynn led the way, stepping over men so badly injured they were barely conscious. Radcliffe was amazed that so few cried out or moaned in pain. Laleham was right – these soldiers knew how to suffer. Flies buzzed and settled into blood-soaked dressings; levies removed soldiers who had died, their places immediately taken by more wounded.
There could be no doubt that if Edward Radcliffe had been with any of these men his chances of survival would be slender. Flynn settled next to one of them in the corner of a stall; the others squatted next to him.
‘I’ve come to take you back up the line, Scouse. Sar’nt Major says you’re malingering,’ Flynn said po-faced.
‘Bastard...’ the wounded man muttered and then sighed as a grin broke Flynn’s face.
‘Even so, listen to me, these fellas need some help.’
Radcliffe held the knife: ‘Where did you get this?’ he asked.
The man’s eyes shifted to Flynn.
‘Tell the man, Scouse. You’re in no trouble, I promise ya.’
The wounded man’s breath was ragged: ‘A boy...’
‘Was he a soldier?’ Radcliffe asked.
The man shook his head, and it was obvious that there was little chance of him speaking for long.
‘Was he alive?’ said Radcliffe.
‘Head... Shot... in the head.’ A trickle of blood dribbled from the corner of his mouth. Radcliffe could press him no further despite his anxiety. ‘Dead... Lad was... a goner...’
Radcliffe suppressed the shock that threatened his composure but he involuntarily stepped back from the wounded man. Pierce said nothing, watching his friend assimilate the news like any lawyer taking information into consideration.
‘He’s not dead, Ben. I don’t believe that.’
‘Facts don’t look good, Joseph. He said he took the knife off –’
‘He’s not dead. I’d know if he was. I’d know it,’ Radcliffe insisted. ‘How many men have we seen that we thought dead?’
‘All right,’ Pierce acknowledged. ‘If he wasn’t in uniform then he was probably with the militia and if he survived he might be attached to the Irish,’ he suggested.
‘Were there any irregulars in this fight for the hill?’ Radcliffe asked Flynn.
‘They was out on a flank. Dozens of ’em. Most of ’em recruited from towns along the way. They got the chop from what we could see.’
‘He might be lying out there,’ Pierce said.
Radcliffe turned to Flynn. ‘Can you show us on a map where the Royal Irish positions are?’
‘You’ll need no map, major. Just follow the dead and dying.’
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Stretcher-bearers and levies moved among the scattered bodies to the rear of the distant gunfire. Slaughtered horses and mules lay bloated in the day’s heat as walking wounded made their way back to the rail junction ten miles to their rear. It was obvious to both men that most of the badly wounded wouldn’t make it alive. The jolting wagons and rough handling from the bearers, scared of still being in enemy range, would add to their misery on their final journey. The front line was a thousand yards ahead but Boer Mauser fire could still reach the dead and dying if they chose to. That they didn’t, except for the occasional shot that zipped through the air as a lethal reminder, proved that the Boers were more interested in those soldiers still living and who, with what seemed to be an increasingly unlikely miracle, might still attack their positions. The open plateau offered scant cover; soldiers huddled behind anthills and pressed their bodies as low as they could into any undulation in the hard ground, using the shallow craters from the Boer shells. The kopjes rose up, slabs of rock haphazardly tumbled atop each other. The artillery shelling had lessened and Radcliffe realized the enemy must be moving their guns further back behind the rising ground. The Boer sharpshooters would keep the infantry soldiers at bay. The two men tied off their horses on a wheel of a field gun lying on its side, its mules lying dead in their traces. A few paces away was the crater from the enemy’s shell. What remained of the gunners lay scattered. Their officers were experienced men, tough campaign soldiers who’d bought their commissions in the Royal Horse Artillery and fought in the Sudan campaign; they knew what they were doing.
But that meant nothing when you lined up like toy soldiers on a general’s campaign table, thought Radcliffe as he and Pierce weaved through the debris. The guns’ limbers, and the mules and horses that had pulled them, lay ripped and shattered from the Boer bombardment. The haze that settled over the battlefield shifted slightly, exposing another half-dozen slaughtered men and their guns. With parade-ground precision the British Army liked to set up its artillery in neat rows of six in full view of the enemy lines, just to the rear of its own front-line infantry – an easy target for the pinpoint accuracy of Boer gunners.
Rifle fire pinged across the hard ground as Radcliffe and Pierce crouched and ran zigzagging to where they could see soldiers huddled for safety in what was once an animal trail, and which over the years the seasonal heavy rains had widened into a dried-out and eroded watercourse. The donga was the most immediate cover they could both find and they slithered into it as one of the men crouching there cursed them for bringing fire down on to their position.
‘That’s enough!’ Sergeant McCory told the complaining soldier as he scurried along the line to Radcliffe and Pierce. ‘I’ll be damned. You’re a sight for sore eyes, Mr Radcliffe, sir. I don’t suppose you’ve brought any reinforcements with yourself and Mr Pierce?’
‘I doubt there are any to bring, sergeant. You got any men up in the kopje?’
‘Aye, the colonel flanked them with a couple of companies and got into those boulders, among all that undergrowth, but the Boers can see the smoke from their rifles so they’re getting hammered – and we can’t help ’cause the Boers use smokeless cartridges. Just can’t see the buggers.’
‘Where are your officers?’ Radcliffe asked the hollow-eyed sergeant.
‘Dead mostly.’
‘And Lieutenant Baxter?’ Radcliffe queried, hoping that if he had been fortunate enough to find the Royal Irish, then so too would have Edward.
‘I think he’s with C Company down the line. I can’t get a runner across to him.’
‘And the militia?’ Radcliffe asked, hoping that the volunteers would have been kept somewhere in reserve.
‘God knows. They were supposed to outflank them but I doubt the poor bastards ever got through that gap between the kopjes. We’re caught in a crossfire. Our guns to the east are out of range. We were told our cavalry would sort them good and proper. They were supposed to cut the bastards down.’
‘Well, they didn’t, so they can’t help you now. The shooters on that hill can keep you here in this bottleneck for as long as they like unless you root them out of those boulders,’ Pierce told him, looking across to where the Boers hid on the broken hillside.
‘And every time we try, we make fifty yards and we lose more men than we can afford. The colonel’s isolated up there somewhere,’ McCory said, nodding towards the kopje, ‘and we don’t have any field guns left to keep their heads down.’ He nodded towards a wounded soldier behind him, his back wedged against the trench wall, a groundsheet covering him. He looked to be barely old enough to enlist and his ghostly pallor told the men he had lost a lot of blood. ‘He’s all that’s left of them gunners.’ He lifted the groundsheet to expose the man’s shattered leg. ‘We did what we could. It won’t be enough.’
Radcliffe quickly assessed their chances. ‘There’s a three-inch twelve-pounder back there on its side. If you could get a few shells on to their flank, you’d buy yourself enough time to get across this open stretch of ground and on to that hill. Then it’s down to each man and a bayonet,’ he said.
‘Aye, the Dutchies shite their breeches when they see the steel coming at ’em. But we tried to get back to that gun. Once they see us trying for it, they pick my la
ds off. We tried, Mr Radcliffe, I promise you that.’
Radcliffe looked across the killing zone: it was obvious from the sprawled bodies that men had tried to reach the gun. ‘You can’t stay here and they’ll shred you out there, right enough. There’s some dead ground back there. You get a gun in position they won’t be able to get a shot unless they show themselves.’
As if in answer, a Boer artillery salvo landed less than fifty feet to their front, forcing the men to flinch, crouching into the dirt as the explosion and percussion showered the air with stone and shrapnel.
Radcliffe grabbed McCory’s shoulder: ‘If we can get rounds on them can you get men up there?’
‘If the gun covered our flank we can try,’ the seasoned fighter said.
Radcliffe looked at Pierce and then back to the gun where their horses were tethered. Realization hit Pierce. Radcliffe was going to get them killed.
‘You can outshoot them,’ Radcliffe said. ‘Their Mausers have five-round magazines, your Enfields have ten. Lay a steady fire on them – don’t matter if you can’t see them, just lay it on them. And then get to Lieutenant Baxter. If he’s alive, you need his company with you. Send runners down the line, sergeant.’
‘Jesus, you’re thinking dangerous thoughts,’ Pierce hissed at Radcliffe.
‘We have to risk it,’ Radcliffe answered.
‘The hell we do,’ Pierce replied.
Radcliffe ignored him. ‘Sergeant, rapid independent fire on that hillside for as long as you can. If we make it to that gun we’ll put a couple of shells on them and then you get your men on your feet. Understood?’
‘Yessir. We’ll cover you.’ He turned to the men. ‘All right, lads, listen up...’
‘Do I get a say in this?’ Pierce said, grabbing Radcliffe’s arm, feeling the cancer of fear creep back into him, as if it had never left. ‘Joseph, we’re getting too old to hot-foot it back and get that gun working.’
‘Let’s play the hand we’ve got,’ Radcliffe said.
‘No, let’s not. Let’s wait until dark and then get back to the rail sheds. We can ride our way around this mess.’
A rattle of gunfire splattered close to the donga as if confirming Pierce’s fear that to venture back to the upturned gun was to be torn apart by Boer bullets.
‘Ben, I have to do this. I need to know if my boy is out there. I would never hold anything against you. I’ll do this on my own if I have to.’
‘That gun weighs six hundred pounds, for Christ’s sake. It’s going to take at least half a dozen men to right it. At least. And what do we know about arming the ordnance?’
Radcliffe realized Pierce was right. He shouldered past McCory and held the wounded gunner’s face in his hand. ‘Son,’ he urged him, gently tapping his face. ‘Son, can you hear me? Gunner? Come on, man!’ He slapped the boy’s face harder, and the other soldiers in the trench started to look belligerent at the wounded man’s treatment.
The gunner’s eyes opened and Radcliffe eased a water canteen to his lips. The man nodded his thanks, eyes focused on the civilian.
‘Listen to me, son, I have to get your gun working. What do we do with the ammunition? How do we set it? Can you tell me that?’
The young man’s forehead creased, uncertain at the request.
‘You arm the shells? Is that right? Son? Listen to me. You understand what I’m asking you?’
Military discipline cut through the dying man’s befuddlement and pain. It was a routine that he had practised time and again while bellowed at by his battery sergeant, who now lay blown apart out there near his gun. The instilled drills surfaced in his memory.
‘Fifty-seven fuze... set the fuze... rotate the time ring... fuze burn time... turn the ring... until the arrow... set the fuze...’
Radcliffe was losing him. What little strength the lad had he was gathering to force the air through his lungs, willing himself to obey the stranger and answer his questions. Radcliffe cupped the dying man’s face in both hands, drawing all his concentration. ‘I don’t have time to set fuzes, son, I just want the damned thing to explode when it lands. Understand?’
He nodded. ‘Leave... one safety pin... leave it... for percussion... it’ll... explode... when it hits.’ He gripped Radcliffe’s arm in a final effort to emphasize his instructions. Radcliffe pressed his hand against the man’s face, a brief moment of comfort for the gunner whose eyes glazed and stared into oblivion. The boy was dead.
‘Ready, Mr Radcliffe!’ Sergeant McCory called, his men waiting, rifles at the ready.
‘Goddammit,’ Pierce said.
*
From the time Belmont had left Verensberg and returned to headquarters for his orders it had taken him and his fifty rough riders the better part of two days to get behind the Boer guns that defended the hills holding up the British advance. Their local guide had taken them over difficult terrain which had slowed their pace and now Belmont cursed that they were hours later than planned and that British troops were dying because of the delay. He had whipped the turncoat Boer with a sjambok, and the yard-long, finger-thick rhino hide whip had cut the man to the bone. He was lucky to escape with only a thrashing. The delay had cost English lives and hurt Belmont’s pride. The kopje’s jumbled slabs of rock fell back on the reverse of the hills. They gave way to scattered boulders and brush until the hillside levelled out into an uneven plain that would allow the Boers to escape. Belmont drew up the men and put field glasses to his eyes. There were half a dozen Boer field guns at the base of the hillside, and he could see that men and horses were being prepared to move the guns away. They had inflicted terrible punishment on the infantry on the other side of the hills, and those Boers whose rifle fire could still be heard would be on the front slopes sharpshooting the exposed troops that lay pinned down on their advance. He passed the glasses to Lieutenant Marsh.
‘Half a dozen guns where the hill bellies out. Further back in those rocks is where the sharpshooters will have their horses held. If we drive straight at them they’ll be forced to try and get their guns up the slope. You take half a dozen men behind that rise in case any escape. The Boers can’t afford to lose any of their guns. We’ve got them.’
‘Claude, damned if I’m going to let you have all the fun. Sergeant White can take the men on the cut-off,’ Marsh said, drawing his sabre. This would be a gallop into the exposed Boers’ flank and they’d put them to the sword. The Boers’ fear of lance and blade was well known and Marsh could barely contain his eagerness.
The men readied themselves to advance.
Belmont drew his sabre. ‘Do you hear that?’ he said quietly.
Marsh steadied his horse. ‘The guns?’
Belmont shook his head. ‘Thought I heard a fiddle playing.’
*
Liam Maguire kicked his brother hard. ‘Put that thing away, you idiot.’
‘Ah, there’s enough noise to drown a regimental band,’ Corin said, but did as he was told. The riders could be seen in the distance and they were coming straight into the ambush that Liam had set.
Liam looked at his commando as each man prepared himself. There had been shellfire from the English artillery bursting on the hilltop behind them. The Boers on the other side of the hill would be feeling the lash of shrapnel and the violence from the Irish infantry moving beneath its cover. It would soon be Irishman against Irishman when the bayonet charge came over that ridge.
‘You’ll wait for my command. And when we’ve taken these bastards, we escort the guns to safety. I don’t want none of you staying back here; the other commando has to take care of itself.’
The Boers had almost finished lashing their guns, but turned when they heard the thunder of ironclad hooves. For men on the ground the sight of a cavalry charge and the glint of steel as the horsemen hunkered low across their horses’ necks could crush the bravest of hearts. They, like the advancing horsemen, did not know that an ambush was in place. Flustered, even panicking, they tried to complete the task of attaching the limb
ers to the horses’ traces. Some took up a kneeling position and levelled their rifles. Any moment now they would be trampled. Most recognized the inevitable: they would abandon their guns and run for their lives. The English would have the Boers’ precious few pieces of artillery.
Liam let the first horsemen gallop through and then opened fire, his own shot followed by a volley that took several men from their saddles. Horses screamed; legs and hooves flailed; roses of blood blossomed on men’s tunics.
Belmont wheeled the men around and bellowed the command to retreat. There was no choice. At least half the riders were already whipping the flat of their sabre blades on their horses’ rumps. But more of his men fell. Horses careered in the echoing gunfire. Moments before Belmont’s men were cut to pieces the dragoons’ sergeant and half a dozen men who had ridden to the top of the rise laid down fire on Liam Maguire’s position. It bought vital moments. Belmont saw Marsh’s horse go down. A soft-nosed bullet had passed through the horse’s head into his friend’s hand as they gripped the reins; then the ragged bullet had ripped on through his elbow before striking him in the chest. The over-eager lieutenant was badly wounded and the crashing impact of the fall knocked him unconscious. Belmont had already sheathed his sabre and fired his revolver into the hillside as he spurred his horse towards the fallen officer. As he dismounted and ran the last few feet towards Marsh bullets whipped the air around him. Survivors had retreated to the mouth of the gully and added their fire to that of the sergeant and his men. It would have little effect other than to let the Boers know that the fight was not yet over and help redirect fire from Belmont, who now dragged Marsh into cover behind his dead horse.
Belmont seemed to lead a charmed life. Three bullets had ripped his tunic and trousers, but none had drawn blood. It was as if his disregard for the hell fire around him acted as a shield. Coolly, he pulled Marsh upright, tugged at the trailing rein of his own horse, bringing the skittish mount closer to him, and heaved the lighter man across his horse’s withers. His actions prompted a couple of the Boers to stand free of cover in an attempt to get a clearer shot at the audacious officer, but Belmont’s men’s cut them down. He spurred the horse away as the sergeant’s men continued their rapid carbine fire. That Belmont was as courageous as he was tough would soon run through the ranks, but the raid to seize the Boer guns had ended in disaster. There were fewer than a dozen men who were not wounded, and fifteen lay dead, shot through more than once.
