The History of Lumsden's Horse. Various
Читать онлайн книгу.
interest which the civilian reader may perhaps begin to share when he comes to know more of them.
At Cape Town Colonel Lumsden got the first news of B Company since leaving Calcutta. They had been ordered to East London to disembark there, and entrain at once for Bethulie, ‘right in the Orange Free State,’ as Colonel Lumsden remarked, adding, ‘So they bade fair to get there before us, despite our week’s start. But our latest news of them is that they have stopped at Queen’s Town, and we know no more of them except that they had a most successful voyage.’
A corporal of the Surma Valley Light Horse, however, supplies the necessary information. He tells how he went with an ambulance fatigue party, to which, among others, Dr. Woollright had been told off as an orderly, in charge of Trooper Seymour Sladden, who was very bad and had to be taken on shore at East London before the company knew its probable destination. From a little jetty that juts out from the wooded banks of the Buffalo River they drove in an ambulance with the sick man up those steep winding roads past the luxuriant Queen’s Park, with its odorous gum-tree groves, to the hill top. There they carried Sladden ‘into a nice clean hospital and left him in charge of kindly nurses, where everything looked very comfortable.’ Then, somehow, they managed to miss their officer and made inquiries for him in vain at Deel’s Hotel, with the result that when the corporal and his comrades reached the landing-stage they found to their ‘extreme joy the crew gone and no way of getting off to the ship, so returned to the hotel and had dinner. Afterwards very sleepy and went straight to bed, and slept like a hog. First time in bed for many weeks, and found it comfortable indeed.’ Other non-commissioned officers and troopers of B Company carry on the narrative in notes that diverge frequently and wander off to alien topics, so that for the sake of coherence they must be dovetailed together here in proper order, each chronicler in turn taking up the story. When those troopers who had not begun to realise the enormity of breaking leave returned to their ship early in the morning of March 27, they met with quite an ovation, which does not seem to have been disinterested, seeing that they were supposed to have brought off with them fruit, cigarettes, and other delicacies much in request. What they had would not have gone far to satisfy the cravings of a whole company for some change from bare rations. News that orders had come for Lumsden’s Horse to disembark, however, put everybody in high spirits at the prospect of being allowed to go on shore with freedom to forage for himself. But they reckoned without their host—the military commander—whose instructions brooked no delay. Kits had to be packed in a hurry while the ‘Ujina’ was being towed on a flowing tide across the troubled bar into port, where she moored alongside the railway wharf. Horses were then got on shore, but only to exchange cramped stalls for cattle-trucks, where they had still less room for movement. At this task the troopers toiled and sweated all through the fiercest heat of a summer noon, learning another lesson and not liking it much. Unaccustomed to such work, many got their toes trodden on by horses rushing down the steep gangway or narrowly escaped more serious injury before every fretful animal could be coaxed or lifted into the crowded trucks. Then there were saddles, kits, heavy baggage, and ammunition to be landed, and so without leisure for a single meal the troopers worked on far into the night. It was nearly 11 o’clock before the last section took its place in the train. ‘Something attempted, something done, had earned a night’s repose’; but there was little chance of getting that, packed together as they were nine or ten in a carriage. Time must have softened the impressions of these discomforts on the mind of one trooper, who, some days later, wrote:
We left East London on March 28 by rail en route for Bethulie, where it was intended we should quit the railway, mount our horses, and trek to Bloemfontein.
East London turned out in force to see us off. Little boys and girls (some of the latter not so very little, after all) were very keen to get hold of our shoulder badges as mementoes, and, needless to say, the susceptible ones of our corps were unable to resist the entreaties of the fair ones, and daylight showed a vacant place on many a shoulder-strap. This badge-collecting seems to be a great hobby out here just now; one boy showed me a belt simply covered with badges, which he had secured from the men of the different regiments that had passed through. We travelled in second- and third-class carriages, ten men in each, but it being quite cool we were not uncomfortable.
Another correspondent, whose experiences were evidently not so pleasant, takes a less roseate view. He says hard words about the South African war method of standing men, some forty-five or so in a cattle-truck, encumbered with heavy coats, rifles, and other baggage—a leaky roof, and no sides.
This may be economical, as the Major said, but on a wet blustry night, when buckets of rain, mixed with soot from the engine, are falling, it is not a style of travelling that conduces to comfort. Then there is still another African style—namely, ten men with rifles, &c., in a third-class carriage meant to hold eight only. Both of these methods we sampled on our way up to Bloemfontein. And right glad I was when we had done with it, and took to the saddle. Some, however, confessed to having slept very well that first night in such strange circumstances, tired out as they were by hours of previous toil, though they woke next morning very cold, with nothing to eat but one loaf, which ten men divided between them.
They had eyes for the picturesque as well as for the agricultural possibilities of a country where Nature does much and man apparently very little, except to stroll about watching the cattle graze and the crops grow, unless he happens to be a Kaffir, which makes all the difference. Chiefly, however, Lumsden’s Horse must have been struck by the barren, rocky kopjes that seemed to spring suddenly in the midst of fertility and rise range behind range, stretching away to the mountains, which looked so near that it was impossible for imagination to measure the breadth of intervening plains. As one of them wrote, acquaintance with this country for the first time ‘made us realise the fearful odds that Buller had to tackle’; and no doubt many other troopers went on fighting fanciful battles against a wily enemy who, driven from one position, would gallop off to occupy another kopje still more formidable, and so prolong that imaginary fight, while the train, like a British column, wound its slow way through tortuous defiles. Lumsden’s Horse, however, had eyes for other things also, as a candid chronicler admits in his simple narrative, which may now be allowed to run its uninterrupted course:
At several stations on our way there was the usual crowd of ‘loyal’ ladies of mature age, and the still larger crowd of schoolgirls. The people seemed very glad to see us. There was a lot of cheering and waving of handkerchiefs and pleasant greetings at every station. They gave us cigarettes and cheroots, and some men were seen to be sporting bows of red, white, and blue when we left—little attentions from some fair hands in return perhaps for Lumsden’s badges, of which many shoulder-straps were by that time bereft.
Early next morning saw us at Cathcart, where we stopped about two hours, and took the opportunity to water and feed our horses. There is a nice little inn here, and we went down in a body and indulged in delicious bread, butter, and milk. Oh, such a contrast to the same articles of diet in India! The weather at this time of the year is nearly perfect, the air being fine, dry, and invigorating; to the eye wearied by the flatness of the plains of India the undulating country, small hills and green valleys between, is very refreshing; but what strikes one, more especially in the Free State, which we marched through later, is the desolateness of the country, miles and miles of veldt dotted here and there with small houses. Cattle-farming seems to be the principal thing they go in for here, but the farmers say that, what with rinderpest and drought, it is very disheartening work. The cattle are very fine, and strike us especially coming from India, where one sees such miserable specimens. About midday we arrived at Queen’s Town, and were very much disgusted to hear that Lord Roberts had wired down that we were to detrain and go into camp, as he needed all the horse-waggons and cattle-trucks for carrying remounts (several thousands of which were collected at Queen’s Town) to troops at the front. The camp is situated about two miles from the railway station, but they have run a siding into it, so that the carriages containing ourselves and our horses were simply detached from the rest of the train and we were run into the camp. We did not take long in detraining and picketing our horses; the poor brutes were simply delighted to get on firm ground again, and when let loose indulged in all sorts of antics—rolling on the grass, kicking up their heels, and larking like colts, to show appreciation of their freedom. As our tents had not arrived yet, we were obliged to sleep out in the open;