The Defense of Rorke's Drift by Alphonse De
Neuville. By about 6pm the Zulu attacks had extended all around the front
of the post, and fighting raged at hand-to-hand along the mealie-bag wall.
Lieutenant Chard himself took up a position on the barricade, firing over the
mealie-bags with a Martini-Henry, whilst Lieutenant Bromhead directed any spare
men to plug the gaps in the line. The men in the yard and on the front wall were
dangerously exposed to the fire of Zulu marksmen posted in the rocky terraces on
Shiyane (Oskarsberg) hill behind the post. Several men were hit, including
Acting Assistant Commissary Dalton, and Corporal Allen of the 14th. Surgeon
Reynolds treated the wounded as best he could despite the fire. Once the veranda
at the front of the hospital had been abandoned, the Zulus had mounted a
determined attack on the building itself, setting fire to the thatched roof with
spears tied with burning grass. The defenders were forced to evacuate the
patients room by room, eventually passing them out through a small window into
the open yard. Shortly after 6pm Chard decided that the Zulu pressure was too
great, and ordered a withdrawal to a barricade of biscuit boxes which had been
hastily erected across the yard, from the corner of the store-house to the front
mealie-bag wall. In this small compound the garrison would fight for their lives
throughout most of the coming night.
The VC Winners: Lieutenant
J.R.M. Chard, R.E.; Lieutenant G. Bromhead, 2/24th;
Surgeon J.H. Reynolds, A.M.D.; Acting Assistant Commissary J.L. Dalton, C. &
T.D.; Corporal Allen, 2/24th; Corporal C.F. Schiess, N.N.C.; Privates F. Hitch,
A.H. Hook, R. Jones, W. Jones, J. Williams, 2/24th.
The DCM Winners: Col. Sgt. F.E. Bourne2/24th; 2nd Corp. F. Attwood, A.S.C.; 2nd
Corp. M. McMahon, A.H.C.;Wheeler J. Cantwell, R.A.; Pte W. Roy, 1/24th.
Battle of Ulundi, 1879
Cetewayo, installed in power by the British, immediately became fired
with the ambition of conquest. The Zulus, over whom he ruled, are a
martial race, and he had no difficulty in making them a nation of
soldiers. Their raids into Natal rendered it necessary to organise a
punitive expedition, and three British columns marched into Zululand by
different routes. At Isandhlwana, on January 22nd, the British camp was
surprised and attacked by 15,000 warriors, and we suffered heavily. The
heroic defence of Rorke's Drift was on the same day, and on the 24th,
Sir Evelyn Wood won a victory at Inkanyana. In March a convoy was cut to
pieces near Intombi River and Prince Napoleon was killed, but in July
the battle of Ulundi broke the power of the Zulu nation and sent
Cetewayo a captive to London. Ulundi was the King's kraal and lay in an
amphitheatre of hills flanked by two great military kraals. Upon this
position the British advanced in hollow square. Halting within a mile of
the kraal this imposing force offered battle. Before them were ranged
30,000 dauntless savages armed with assegais, rifles and oval shields of
stout or ox hide. Lord Chelmsford's object was to draw them on to
the square and a score of mounted irregulars were accordingly sent
forward. The lure was a success. Enraged at the taunts of this handful
of men, the Zulus began to advance. The enemy extended their formation
so that they might envelop and crush the square. Like the waves of a
troubled sea, they rolled across the plain, chanting their war song
until the air reverberated with the wild weird music which none having
heard before can ever forget. A tempest of lead and iron received them,
and the shriek of shell mingled with their death cry. If for a moment
they wavered or fall back it was only to come on once more with fierce
and dauntless stride. But courage was vain against that quadruple line
of steel, to approach which was certain death. One chief, more daring or
skilled than the rest, dashed his warriors upon the right rear angle of
the square and threatened a hand to hand fight - bayonet against
assegai. But the guns were soon at work and rolled them back under a
storm of shrapnel. At last the savage hordes began to waver. "Go at
them Lowe," was the order, and Drury-Lowe led his lancers out of
the square at a gallop. An ambush checked their charge and emptied many
a saddle. Another moment and lance and sabre pierced and rent the black
mass. Yet the fight went on until the King's Dragoons and a flying
column advanced and drove the stubborn remnant of the enemy into the
hills and gave Ulundi to the flames. From this blow the Zulus, once the
masters of South Africa, have never recovered. Text by William Maxwell 1902.
