The starting point for the 2,500 strong Northern Column was the Boer hamlet of Utrecht. Having crossed the Blood river into Zululand on 7 January, the column then marched 10 relatively easy miles to a flat-topped hill called Bemba’s Kop where Wood built a fortified camp. His force was made up of eight companies of the 13th and 90th Regiments, six guns of 11/7 Battery, about 200 volunteer cavalry and 300 black auxiliaries who were given the rather flattering title of ‘Wood’s Irregulars’. The local Zulu chief, Tinta, duly tendered his submission and was conducted under a strong escort into camp, together with his people and his herds.
On the night of 20 January, accompanied by Buller’s mounted troops, Wood led a force into the nearby Zunguin mountains where they captured several herds of Zulu cattle and successfully skirmished with a sizeable force of about 1,000 warriors. When Wood’s force reached the eastern end of Zunguin they observed an estimated 4,000 warriors drilling in the shade of the adjacent Hlobane mountain; being heavily outnumbered Wood broke off his action, and during their return to camp the following evening the distant sound of guns to the south could be heard. This later proved to be Chelmsford’s 7-pounders firing at the wrecked Isandlwana camp when Chelmsford’s men returned, having earlier been decoyed out of camp by the Zulus. The following morning Wood received confirmatory news from Captain Gardner, an Isandlwana survivor, of Chelmsford’s crushing defeat. With the news came the realization for Wood of the serious implications of Chelmsford’s defeat for his own force. Accordingly Wood withdrew his Northern Column from their temporary camp at Tinta’s Kop to a safer hilltop location known as Khambula, which Wood immediately fortified. The new position was located 20 miles east of Utrecht.
After relieving the garrison at Rorke’s Drift, Lord Chelmsford withdrew back to Pietermaritzburg. Having reported his defeat to Sir Bartle Frere, he turned his attention to defending the unprotected colony of Natal from the threat of a Zulu attack. Anxiety among both the black and the white Natal population was high and Chelmsford was obliged to seek the support of the local press to prevent the panic from spreading. The Natal blacks feared Zulu revenge for siding with the British while the white population believed that their self-embellished pre-war prophecies were about to be realized. Durban, Greytown, Pietermaritzburg and Stanger were all placed on the defensive while the two supply depots of the surviving Centre Column at Helpmekaar and Rorke’s Drift were strongly fortified to discourage a Zulu incursion at those main border crossing points. Chelmsford had no military option other than to temporarily suspend the invasion of Zululand pending the arrival of reinforcements from England and, to keep his remaining troops safe, he ordered a general withdrawal of Centre and Coastal Column troops out of Zululand. Although it was completely at his mercy, King Cetshwayo never attacked Natal; he realized that by defending Zululand while remaining within his border, he had secured the moral high ground.
Wood’s Northern Column was unaffected by the Centre Column’s withdrawal to Natal and Chelmsford readily appreciated that he needed Wood to harass the northern Zulu tribes, particularly the aggressive abaQulusi tribe, and to discourage them from bolstering King Cetshwayo’s main army or, alternatively, moving south nearer to Natal. The abaQulusi were not strictly within the Zulu military system – they were descendants from a separate group originally formed by King Shaka – but nevertheless operated as an independent army across northern Zululand and were extremely loyal to King Cetshwayo. They dominated a large part of the territory through which Chelmsford’s second invasion force would need to pass; their stronghold was a 4 mile long almost unclimbable flat-topped mountain known as Hlobane.
To comply with Chelmsford’s wish, Wood ordered Colonel Buller, the commander of his irregular mounted men (all local volunteer horsemen except for a few Imperial officers) to conduct a number of harrying reconnaissances along the proposed route. On 1 February Buller attacked and destroyed an important Zulu homestead situated 30 miles east of the British camp at Khambula towards the further end of the Hlobane range of hills; the homestead was a traditional rallying point of the northern Zulus and hitherto regarded as impregnable. Buller’s mounted force captured some 300 head of cattle and destroyed the homestead’s 250 huts; a number of Zulus were killed in the raid without any losses to Buller. Shortly afterwards Prince Mbilini kaMswati, a pro-Zulu prince of Swazi origin, and Manyanyoba, another chief of the Ntombe valley district, led marauding parties of Zulus into the neighbourhood of Luneburg, now abandoned by the white farmers, and commenced an appalling massacre of the local tribesmen who had previously worked for white farmers. Their wives and children were especially brutalized, being killed either with spears or by being burnt alive in their huts. On 13 February Buller led a force to undertake retaliatory measures and succeeded in driving Mbilini and Manyanyoba’s men back into the nearby hills. Buller divided his force with half assaulting the ridges while the remainder attacked along the river valley. Five of the strongholds were successfully stormed; thirty-four Zulus were slain and a herd of 400 cattle was captured. Buller lost two auxiliaries in the action and returned to Luneburg that evening, intending to mount a second attack the following day.
Colonel Rowlands VC, commander of the reserve No. 5 Column, was coincidentally moving a strong force to attack the same stronghold, having failed to persuade the Swazis to co-operate with the British. On the same day Rowlands marched part of his column from Luneburg towards Derby followed by the remainder of his column under Major Tucker. The next day Captain Harvey, Tucker’s staff officer, took a patrol across the Pongola river and engaged a force of Zulus who had been harassing the line of communications between Luneburg and the camp at Khambula. Because the route between Luneburg and Derby passed only 4 miles from the stronghold of Prince Mbilini, a friend and ally of King Cetshwayo, the area remained open to such attacks, so much so that on 12 March a valuable British supply column was successfully attacked by the Zulus and plundered while crossing the Ntombe river.
The battle of Ntombe River (Meyer’s Drift)
No particular precautions appear to have been taken.
SURVIVOR’S REPORT2
Hitherto the area along the Transvaal border to the north of Hlobane had not caused Chelmsford any real concern. Following Colonel Hugh Rowlands’s timid advance against the hostile Sekhukhune in 1878, and in consequence having lost Chelmsford’s confidence, Rowlands was moved to Pretoria to watch over the disgruntled Boers’ increasing militancy. His
No. 5 Reserve Column had been relegated from an invasion force to one holding the northern border between Zululand and the Transvaal settlement at Derby. Gradually Rowlands’s command was stripped down as men were transferred to No. 4 Northern Column at Khambula hill under the command of Colonel Wood. The last regiment to be transferred was the 80th (South Staffordshire) Regiment under the command of Major Charles Tucker; this move commenced in mid February. By March the 80th had moved to their new post at Luneburg where Tucker was in command of five companies of the 80th Regiment so that all that remained to be transported from Derby was stores and ammunition. The route crossed the Ntombe river only 4½ miles from Tucker’s base at Luneburg but it was within sight of the mountainous stronghold of Mbilini. Due to the proximity of the Zulus, who were well known for their raiding abilities, these convoys required strong escorts and so Tucker’s companies were rotated to march to meet the wagons and to bring them safely to the hamlet.
On 1 March Captain Anderson’s D Company marched from Luneburg and linked up with a floundering twenty-strong wagon train bringing the garrison urgently needed supplies, a rocket battery and 90,000 rounds of Martini-Henry ammunition. Progress was painfully slow as the torrential rain had not let up for days, making the track virtually impassable. The wagons had to be manhandled most of the way and continually sank to their axles in thick mud, and after four days of toil the men were exhausted. Anderson then received an ambiguous message from Tucker, which he interpreted as a recall to Luneburg; he gratefully took his men, leaving the floundering convoy all
but unprotected. A small force of Mbilini’s warriors had been shadowing the convoy and when they realized that there was no escort they seized their chance and raided the wagon train. They ignored the wagoners and made off with a small amount of stores and some oxen.
When Anderson arrived back at Luneburg without the wagons Tucker was horrified and immediately ordered out a fresh company of 106 men under Captain David Moriarty to escort them to safety. When the relief reached the Ntombe river, Moriarty found that the wagoners had succeeded in bringing just two wagons to the south bank; meanwhile they had attempted to recover the remaining wagons but their efforts had been overwhelmed by the impossible conditions. The heavy rain had also caused the river to flood beyond its normal 30 yard width and to a depth of over 5ft; this forced Moriarty to leave thirty-five men under the command of Lieutenant Lindop on the south bank to recover the two wagons while the remaining soldiers were ferried across the river on an improvised raft. Moriarty took this force and after two days of backbreaking work the remaining wagons were recovered to the north bank. By 11 March the river was still in flood and totally impassable, but Lindop’s men had managed to bring another two wagons across the river to the south bank during a temporary drop in the river’s water level. Just as Moriarty’s force returned with the remaining seventeen wagons the river burst its banks, preventing them from crossing until the water level subsided; accordingly, Moriarty ordered the wagons to be laagered in a ‘V’ formation, with the two legs reaching the water’s edge.
During the afternoon Major Tucker, accompanied by Lieutenant Henry Harward, Sergeant Anthony Booth and thirty-two soldiers, arrived at the river crossing to assess the situation. Tucker found a bedraggled company of utterly exhausted men and their convoy of wagons virtually trapped by the high water on the northern bank; he realized they had laboured in continuous rain for four days without cooked food and he could do little to ease their predicament. He made suggestions for the wagons to be laagered correctly, although he noticed that there were growing gaps between the wagons and the river where the water level had begun to recede. Although the men were exhausted and highly vulnerable to attack, Tucker may have presumed that, as they were only 4 miles from their destination, the danger from attack was minimal. Instead of assuming command, he ordered Moriarty to remain in command but relieved Lieutenant Lindop and his men with Harward’s force; Tucker then returned to Luneburg.
Using an improvised raft, Harward and his men crossed the river to help Moriarty secure the camp. Some cattle had wandered off so Harward took a small search party and traced the cattle in the nearby foothills, killing a number of Zulus responsible for the loss. By the end of the day the wagons on the south bank were guarded by Harward, Sergeant Booth and thirty-four men. There were still seventeen wagons on the north bank; all were arranged in a defensive ‘V’ formation, under the guard of the remaining seventy-one men under Moriarty.
All settled down for the evening and began to have dinner. Sergeant Booth was in the laager when one of the European drivers drew his attention to an unknown black man eating corn and talking with some of the wagon auxiliaries. The driver expressed the opinion that this stranger was none other than Prince Mbilini, whose stronghold was only 3 miles away. Booth reported this suspicion to Moriarty who assured him that the locals were friendly. Moriarty added, ‘You’re as bad as your pals said of you; you would shoot your own brother.’3 Booth was later to write that he was not reassured and believed that, Mbilini or otherwise, the stranger was there to spy out the defences.
Sergeant Anthony Booth was an experienced 33-year-old NCO. Born in 1846 in a village near Nottingham, he enlisted in the 80th in 1864 at the age of 18. During his army career he had several promotions and demotions. He had served abroad since 1872 and was entitled to the Indian Service Medal bar ‘Perak’. Due to his length of service and experience he had been appointed quartermaster sergeant for this wagon detail, and he had spent much of the afternoon butchering two cattle to feed the men during the following days.4
The interior of the wagon laager covered little more than half an acre and was filled with the soldiers’ tents and oxen. Moriarty gave instructions for just two sentries and even felt safe enough to pitch his tent outside the noisome confines of the laager. Following the evening meal, Harward was sent back across the river to his own command. Moriarty’s exhausted men were grateful to have the shelter of their tents for the first time in days and retired early. On the other side of the river, Harward’s camp was fast asleep when, at about 4 a.m., Harward was awakened by the sound of a distant shot. Noticing that the sentries could not be seen and no one on the north bank had stirred, he ordered Booth to alert the north bank. Booth eventually managed to spread the warning but it had little effect and the camp continued to sleep.
Mbilini’s visit had disturbed Booth and he later wrote that he began to feel increasingly uneasy. He dressed quickly and, taking his rifle and ammunition pouch, climbed into one of the wagons for a smoke. Booth had every reason to feel uneasy for, unbeknown to the sleeping soldiers, Mbilini had mustered a force of about 1,000 warriors that was nearly upon the camp, having silently advanced under cover of the early morning mist. The Zulus were expecting little resistance and carried only their stabbing spears and knobkerries; they had left their shields behind though a few were armed with pillaged Martini-Henry rifles.
About 4.45 a.m. another shot was heard, causing Booth to jump from the wagon just as the Zulus emerged from the mist. Now less than 50 yards from the British position, they fired a ragged volley into Moriarty’s tents and then charged; within seconds they were overwhelming the sleeping camp. Moriarty dashed from his tent firing his revolver; he killed three warriors before an assegai finished him and with that he and most of his men died. Bemused and naked soldiers struggled from their tents only to be clubbed or stabbed to death in the nightmare of frightened cattle and terrified men. Some managed to plunge naked into the river and several managed to reach the south bank, now manned by Lieutenant Harward and a few men who attempted to cover their escape with steady rifle fire.
Booth rallied the remainder of the command and they commenced a sustained fire into the mass of Zulus on the far bank. Booth lost his helmet in the jostling and confusion but kept his men in a tight formation. He noticed that he was next to Lieutenant Harward’s horse, which was tied to the wagon. Harward appeared from his tent and shouted out, ‘Fire away, lads, I’ll be ready in a minute!’ He then mounted his unsaddled pony and rode off towards Luneburg, followed by an undisciplined surge of most of his men.
Booth later recalled that he was left with only eight of his company. While he and his small group kept up a steady rate of fire some of the men who had crossed the river managed to arm themselves and then grabbed whatever clothing was available. Booth realized his position was hopeless and, assisted by Lance Corporal Burgess, formed the remaining men into a tight square and prepared to retreat back towards Luneburg. Booth was later complimented for choosing to form a square rather than the more commonly used extended line.
Fortunately for Booth, the Zulus were more intent on plundering the two wagons than on pursuing his men, although the Zulus made a number of concerted efforts to overwhelm the small square. Booth controlled their rate of fire while keeping the square moving towards a deserted farmhouse that Booth had seen some 2 miles off. Apart from four men who panicked and fled the group, and who were promptly run down and killed by the Zulus, Booth managed to bring his remaining men to the protection of the building.
Meanwhile Lieutenant Harward had galloped the short distance to Luneburg where he arrived at 6.30 a.m. He roused Major Tucker and blurted out the news. ‘The camp is in the hands of the enemy; they are all slaughtered, and I have galloped in for my life.’ According to witnesses, Harward then fell onto the bed in a dead faint. Once revived, he managed to give more detail and then added that there could be no survivors. Tucker immediately ordered 150 men to turn out and quick-marched them towards the Drift. Tucker left on ho
rseback accompanied by several of his officers; within minutes they came upon Sergeant Booth’s party at the farmhouse, causing the attacking Zulus to flee. In typical style, Booth volunteered to accompany Tucker’s command back to the river but his offer was declined – Booth had done enough.
As Tucker’s men reached the rise overlooking the river they saw hundreds of Zulus moving away from the camp towards their nearby stronghold, most laden with plunder. On riding into the wrecked camp they discovered all their colleagues were dead, naked and mostly disembowelled. The Zulus had killed all the dogs, scattered mealies and flour and shredded the tents; all 300 camp cattle had been driven off. When the marching relief arrived, Tucker set them to work collecting the mutilated bodies, ferrying them across the river and burying them on the slope above the crossing. Being officers, the bodies of Captain Moriarty and a 28-year-old civilian doctor named William Cobbin were taken back to Luneburg for individual burial.
In the aftermath of the disaster at Isandlwana there was a considerable amount of covering up and Ntombe was no different. To conceal the embarrassment of his actions, Lieutenant Harward’s report stated that
The enemy were now assegaing our men in the water, and also ascending the banks of the river close to us; for fear therefore, of my men being stabbed under the wagons, and to enable them to retire before their ammunition should be exhausted, I ordered them to retire steadily, and only just in time to avoid a rush of Zulus to our late position. The Zulus came on in dense masses and fell upon our men, who being already broken gave way, and a hand-to-hand fight ensued. I endeavoured to rally my men, but they were too much scattered, and finding re-formation impossible, I mounted my horse and galloped into Luneburg at utmost speed, and reported all that had taken place.5
Crossing the Buffalo Page 26
