The Dash for Khartoum: A Tale of the Nile Expedition

Many of the camels had to be left behind, and those that remained were only sufficient to carry the absolutely necessary stores, the rations for the men, and a quantity of corn that would suffice but to give two feeds of eight pounds each to the animals, who were, therefore, obliged to depend almost entirely on such sustenance as they could pluck from the mimosa shrubs and the dry yellow grass. The men carried a hundred and seventy rounds each. There were a hundred rounds per gun for the artillery, but only a thousand rounds were brought for the Gardner gun, a quantity sufficient but for five minutes' work when in action.

The journey was over a gravelly plain, and the halt was made at six o'clock in the evening. Fires were lit of the shrubs and dry grass; the camels were unloaded and fed, and were ranged in such order that in case of attack the troops could form square at the angles of the mass, and thus support each other and protect the convoy.

At three in the morning the trumpets and bugles sounded. The fires were soon blazing again, and at half-past four breakfast had been eaten, the camels loaded, and the column on its march again. At ten o'clock there was a halt for two hours for dinner and a short rest; and it was not until just as they were going to start that the rear-guard arrived, having been delayed by the breaking down of numbers of the camels, many of which had fallen dead as they walked, while others incapable of movement had to be left behind to take their chance of recovering sufficiently to browse upon the bushes and make their way back to the wells. As the loads of those that fell had to be distributed among their already exhausted companions the prospect was far from cheerful.

Starting at twelve, the column passed a conical hill known as Gebel El Nur an hour later, and entered a broad valley covered with grass and trees twenty feet high, and where, doubtless, water could be obtained had the force been provided with little Abyssinian pumps. At five o'clock the column halted, and as the ground was sandy passed a more comfortable night than the one before. Every one was in good spirits. The men found the journeys by day far less fatiguing than those at night, and were able to obtain refreshing sleep in the cool night air.

Before daybreak they again started over a gravelly plain, hoping to reach the wells of Abu Klea that evening. They halted at eleven in a valley flanked by hills. The track, according to the maps, lay over a steep hill in front and then along a pass between two hills, the wells lying some three miles beyond the pass. Dinner was cooked, and as soon as they had finished their meal the Hussars started for the wells, as their horses had had no water since leaving Gakdul. The rest of the force were stretched upon the ground taking it quietly when two of the Hussars returned at full gallop with a message to the general, and the order was immediately issued for the men to fall in and for the officers to examine their arms and ammunition. Then the news spread through the force that the enemy had been discovered in large numbers upon the hill, and were evidently prepared to bar the way to the wells.

The change effected by the news was wonderful. It had been generally supposed that Metemmeh would be reached without fighting, all the spies agreeing in saying that there was no force of the enemy near the line of march. In a moment fatigue and thirst were forgotten, and the quiet was exchanged for bustle and animation. Men laughed and joked with each other in the highest spirits, and all prepared for the fray with the most absolute confidence as to the result. As the troops fell in the general with his staff galloped ahead to some rising ground, and with their field-glasses reconnoitred the hills surrounding the pass, upon which numbers of white-robed Arabs could be made out.

The Hussars speedily reported that there was a considerable force in the pass below. With the fighting men in front and the baggage behind, the troops moved slowly forward up the hill in front, and finally took up their position on a piece of flat ground whence they could see down the pass by which the Arabs expected the advance would be made. On the side of the hills commanding it they had thrown up small stone walls from which to fire. On the hilltops out of range large numbers of Arabs could be seen in constant motion, gesticulating and waving their arms. It was now four o'clock in the afternoon, and the general decided that as the real force of the enemy was unknown it would be imprudent to attempt to force the passage with only an hour and a half of daylight before him, consequently a halt for the night was ordered.

A strong detachment of Mounted Infantry and sailors with their Gardner ascended a hill on the other side of the pass and set to work to build a small fort and mount the gun there. A company from each of the camel regiments extended to cover the front. The camels were all made to kneel, their legs being lashed at the knee so that they could not rise. This done, the whole of the troops were set to work to build a wall. There were, however, but few loose stones lying about, and though officers and men alike worked hard the wall in front was but two feet high when the sun went down. A hedge of thorny bushes and wire was raised to protect the flanks as much as possible.

As twilight fell a number of the enemy took possession of the top of a hill some twelve hundred yards away on the right and opened fire, to which the three guns of the artillery replied with shrapnel-shell. The guns ceased firing when darkness came on, but the enemy kept up an occasional fire all night. A drink of lime-juice and water was served out to all the men, who then lay down, with their arms in readiness to repel an attack, by the little wall. All night the enemy kept on beating tom-toms and occasionally yelling, approaching at times comparatively close to the position. Knowing, however, that the sentries were out in front, the men for the most part slept quietly in spite of the noise and firing. As the Arabs could fire only at random but two men were hit during the night.

In the morning it was found that the number of the enemy on the hilltops had largely increased during the night, and the bullets now flew incessantly round and over the inclosure. Lying under such shelter as the wall afforded, the men ate their breakfast of the tinned meat and biscuits they carried in their haversacks.

"I must admit, Skinner," Easton said to his comrade, who had come across from his own company to have a chat with him, "that this is more unpleasant than I had expected. This lying here listening to the angry hiss of the bullets is certainly trying; at least I own that I feel it so."

"It is nasty," Skinner agreed. "I sha'n't mind it as soon as we go at the beggars, but this doing nothing is, as you say, trying. I wish they would make up their minds and come out to us, or if they cannot get up their pluck enough to do it, that we should sally out and attack them."

"You may be sure we shall before long, Skinner. They know well enough that we cannot stop here, but must move on to the water sooner or later; and knowing that, they would be fools if they were to give up their strong position to attack us here. At any rate I would rather be lying behind this wall than moving about as the general and his staff are doing. Major Dickson has just been shot through the knee, I hear. There! Look! there is another officer down. I wonder who he is. I do hope they won't pot Clinton."

A few minutes later an officer passing by told them that Major Gough of the Mounted Infantry had been knocked senseless by a bullet which had grazed his forehead, and that an officer of the artillery had been hit in the back.

"What do you think of it, sergeant?" Edgar asked, as he and Sergeant Bowen were eating their breakfast together under shelter of the wall.

"I think that it is going to be a hot job, lad. If they had attacked us out in the plain we should have made short work of them, but it is a different thing altogether among these hills. The beggars can run three feet to our one, and if we were to climb one of these hills to attack them, they would be on the top of the next before we got there. I see nothing for it but to move straight for the wells, and let them do their worst as we go. It would be all right if we hadn't this tremendous train of camels; but if they come pouring down while we are on the march we shall have difficulty in protecting them all."

"I wish Rupert were lying here with us," Edgar said, looking anxiously at his brother, whose figure he could perceive among those near the general. "It is horrid lying here in safety while he is exposed to their bullets."

"We must all take our chances," the sergeant said. "Maybe presently you will be in more danger than he is."

Half an hour later orders were issued that the men were to prepare for action, and it became known among the officers that the general had determined to leave a small garrison to protect the baggage and camels in the zareba, and to push forward with the rest of the force and capture the wells, and then send back and fetch in the camels and baggage. But the movement was delayed until ten o'clock in hopes that the enemy would attack. As they did not do so, orders were given, and the square formed up. The Guards' Camel Corps formed half the front of the square, and the right flank. The Mounted Infantry filled up the other half of the front, and half the left flank. The rest of the left flank and the rear were formed by the Heavy Camel Corps and the Naval Brigade; the hundred men of the Sussex taking the right rear corner between them and the Guards, while the Naval Brigade with their Gardner gun were in the centre of the rear line, between the troop of the 4th and 5th Dragoon Guards and that of the 1st and 2d Life Guards and Blues.

In the centre behind the fighting line were two guns of the Royal Artillery, the other having been left in the zareba, while the centre of the square was filled with camels carrying water, ammunition, and cacolets or swinging beds for the carriage of the wounded.

The instant the square was formed and moved out the fire of the enemy redoubled. Swarms of natives appeared on the top of the hills, moving parallel with the advance of the square. The march was taken in slow time to allow the guns and camels to keep up. The ground was extremely difficult and broken, deep water-ruts and rocky hillocks having to be crossed, and the whole very undulating and broken.

Men fell fast, and frequent halts had to be made to enable the doctors to attend to the wounded, and place them in the cacolets. The front face and sides of the square advanced in fair order, but there was much confusion in the rear face, caused by the lagging camels. Skirmishers were thrown out on either side, and these did their best to keep down the fire of the enemy. For an hour the square proceeded, and had nearly emerged from the pass on to the plain beyond, when a number of green and white flags were seen at some distance on the left front. As the firing had principally come from the right, and as it was from that side that an attack was expected, there was considerable curiosity as to the meaning of these seemingly deserted flags; and a small party were about to go out to investigate them, when a great number of other flags suddenly appeared at the same spot, and a moment later a vast mass of Arabs who had been concealed in a gulley sprang to their feet. (See plan on page 138.)

They were about five hundred yards distant from the square, which was at the moment halted at the foot of a stony knoll. It was moved at once on to the rising ground, and the skirmishers were called in. The Arabs with wild yells moved across the left front, disappeared for a minute behind some rocks and high grass, and then reappeared close to the left rear, when they wheeled into line, and with wild yells charged down upon the square. So quick were their movements that the skirmishers had hardly time to reach the square, and one man was overtaken and speared before he reached it.

Several of the exhausted camels with their loads of wounded had been left outside, lying down at the foot of the slope when the square moved up it. Their native drivers rushed into shelter, and the wounded would have fallen into the hands of the enemy had not an officer of the Guards' Camel Corps and several privates of the Heavies rushed out, seized the camels, and by main force dragged them into the square. In the square itself there was a din of voices, the officers shouting to the men to stand steady and reserve their fire until the skirmishers, who were between them and the enemy, had run in. The instant they had done this a roar of musketry broke out from the left and rear faces of the square, at first in volleys, then in independent fire as fast as the men could load; but though scores of the enemy fell, their rush was not checked for a moment, and with wild yells they fell upon the left corner of the square.

The men were but two deep, and were unable to stand the pressure of the mass of the enemy, and in a moment the rear face of the square was driven in, and a hand-to-hand fight was going on between the soldiers, mixed up with the struggling camels and the Arabs. All order was for a time lost; the voices of the officers were drowned by the din of musketry, the yells of the Arabs, and the shouts of the men. Each man fought for himself; but their bayonets were no match for the long spears of the Arabs, and they were pressed back until the throng of camels pushed hard against the Guards in front of the square.

The rear ranks of the Mounted Infantry on the left and the Marines on the right were faced round, and opened a terrible fire into the crowded mass of natives, while the Heavies with bayonets and clubbed muskets fought singly, man to man, with their foes. The combat did not last long. Mowed down by the fire on both flanks the assailants withered away, and it was not long before silence succeeded the terrible din of battle. In the interior of the square the last Arab of those who had pierced the square had fallen, and the fire of the outside faces of the square had prevented them from receiving any reinforcement from their friends, and these now fell back sullenly before the leaden hail. As soon as they had done so there was time to investigate what had taken place in the centre of the square.

A terrible sight presented itself. The ground was strewn with bodies of the natives, mingled with those of men of the corps that had formed the rear face of the square, the 4th and 5th Dragoon Guards, Naval Brigade, 1st and 2d Life Guards, and the Sussex. Among them lay camels which had been hamstrung or speared by the natives, broken cacolets, and water tanks and skins, medical stores, and a confusion of articles of all kinds.

Although forced back by the sheer weight of the native attack, the Heavies had never been completely broken up. They maintained their resistance to the end, jammed up as they were against and among the camels, and thus enabled the men on the two sides of the square to concentrate their fire on the Arabs.

A loud cheer had broken from the square as the enemy retreated, and they were prepared to resist another onslaught; for only a portion of their foes had yet been engaged with them. However, the enemy contented themselves with keeping up a distant fire from the hills, and then, doubtless as the news spread how terrible had been the loss of those who had charged the square, they gradually drew off and all became quiet. The square now moved off from the rocky knoll upon which they were crowded, and the work of seeing who had fallen and of assisting the wounded began. No less than nine officers had been killed and nine wounded, the greater portion of them belonging to the Heavy Camel Regiment. Two officers of the Naval Brigade were also among the killed. Eighty of the rank and file were killed, and upwards of a hundred wounded. Among the whites lay hundreds of dead Arabs, while arms of all sorts—spears, javelins, muskets, clubs, hatchets, swords, and knives, banners and banner-staffs—were everywhere scattered thickly.

Among the killed were Colonel Burnaby, Majors Gough, Carmichael, and Atherton, Captain Darley, and Lieutenants Law and Wolfe—all belonging to the Heavies.

To the survivors of those corps who had formed the rear face of the square, the scene they had gone through seemed a wild and confused dream. Sergeant Bowen and Edgar had been among those who rushed out and hauled in the camels with the wounded just before the Arabs came up. As they got them inside the ranks the roar of fire broke out and they fell into their places. "Independent firing!" the officer shouted as the first volley had been discharged, but scarcely had the roll of musketry begun than through the smoke a dense mass of black figures appeared. A storm of spears and javelins were poured in upon them, and in an instant there was a crash as club, spear, and sword struck the muskets, and then the Heavies were hurled back.

Edgar scarce knew what had happened, but the instant the square was broken Sergeant Bowen threw himself beside him.

"Steady, lad, steady," he said, "don't throw away a shot; load and stand ready to shoot the first man who falls on you. That is good!" he said as Edgar shot a tall Arab who was rushing at him with uplifted spear; "load again. Now it is my turn," and he brought down a man; and so firing alternately, sometimes defending themselves with their bayonets, but always keeping together, they fell back. Once Edgar stumbled and fell over the body of one of his comrades, but the sergeant seized him by the shoulder and jerked him on to his feet again, and the next moment ran an Arab through who was rushing at them with uplifted hatchet. When they were back among the crowd of camels the fighting became more even. Stubbornly the men made a stand here, for the natives could no longer attack them except in front, while the roar of fire from the troops on the flanks told with terrible effect upon the Arabs.

"Thank God that is over!" the sergeant said as the fight ended. "Are you badly hurt, lad?"

"I am not hurt at all," Edgar said.

The sergeant pointed to Edgar's left arm. The latter uttered an exclamation of surprise. He had bayoneted an Arab in the act of striking at him, and in the wild excitement had for the moment been unconscious that the blow of the native had taken effect. It had missed his shoulder, but had cut a deep gash in the arm, almost severing a strip of flesh down to the elbow.

"I had not the least idea I had been touched," he said. "I don't think there is any great harm done; the principal arteries are on the other side of the arm."

"We must stop the bleeding, anyhow," the sergeant said. "I will soon find a bandage. There are sure to be plenty about, for the surgeons were at work when they broke in."

He was not long in finding one, and then assisting Edgar off with his coat he bandaged up his arm.

"You have got a wound on the side, sergeant!" Edgar exclaimed suddenly.

"It is of no consequence, lad. A fellow threw a spear at me. I tried to dodge it, but was not quite quick enough, and it has grazed my side."

"It is more than a graze—it looks like a deep cut. Just undo your belt."

"Well, give me your handkerchief. I will roll that and mine into a pad and shove it in, and put a bandage tightly round my waist to keep it there. That will do for the present.

"That will do nicely," he said as Edgar fastened the bandage round him. "Now we shall both do very well until the surgeons have time to tie us up properly. I am afraid they will have serious cases enough to last them all night. Now, what is the next move, I wonder? I am horribly thirsty."

"So am I," Edgar agreed.

"Are you both wounded?" an officer asked, coming up with two men carrying a water-skin.

"Yes, sir, but not seriously; but we are awfully thirsty."

"Then you can have a drink of water," the officer said. "There is little enough of it, and it is kept strictly for the wounded."

Many of the men standing near looked on with envious eyes, for all were suffering horribly from thirst. Several fainted, and the men's lips were black and swollen, and in some cases the tongue swelled so that the mouth could not be closed. The 19th were out searching for the wells, but for a long while their search was in vain. The general was about to give the word to retire to the zareba where there was a little water still left, when the Hussars fortunately hit upon the wells. The wounded who were unable to walk were at once carried there, and the troops followed and halted near them, and in a short time the thirst of all was satisfied. Although the water was not to be compared with that at Gakdul, being found in shallow pools one or two feet deep, and stirred up by the Arabs till it was almost of the consistency of thin cream, nevertheless it was water, and was enjoyable indeed.

CHAPTER XII.

METEMMEH

As soon as the thirst of the men was satisfied the troops formed up for the night on some rising ground near the wells, where it was probable that the natives might renew their attack. Volunteers were called for, and three hundred men from the various corps started to march back to the zareba to bring in the baggage before daylight. It was a heavy duty after such a day's work, but those who remained behind had reason almost to envy those engaged in active work, for the night was terribly cold. The men had left everything behind as they advanced prepared for action, and had no blankets, and nothing but their shirts and their suits of thin serge to protect them from the cold.

The surgeons were at work all night attending to the wounded. No alarm was given by the outposts during the night, and as when morning broke there were no signs of the enemy, the men were allowed to fall out. A herd of lean cattle left by the Arabs was discovered not far off, and the Hussars went out in pursuit of them; the tired horses were, however, no match in point of speed for the cattle, but a few of them were shot, cut up, and a supply of fresh meat for the day secured. At seven o'clock the baggage train came up. The camels were quickly unloaded, and the men set to work to prepare breakfast, having had nothing to eat since the meal they had taken the previous morning under fire in the zareba.

During the day the dead were buried, the arms left by the natives collected and destroyed, and a stone inclosure commenced near the wells, for here the wounded were to remain under the protection of a small force of the Sussex. Both Edgar and the sergeant protested that they were perfectly capable of continuing the march, and were permitted to take their place in the ranks again. At four o'clock the force formed up, and half an hour later set out. It was given out that the march would be a short one and they would presently halt for the night, but as the hours went on it became evident that the general had determined to keep straight on for the river, a distance of twenty-six miles from the wells.

It was known that there was a considerable force of the enemy at Metemmeh, and as this would be augmented by the addition of the thousands of Arabs who had been engaged on the previous day, it was probable that, were the enemy aware of the advance of the force, a battle even more serious and desperate than the first would have to be fought before reaching the Nile. The object of the night march, then, was to reach the river before they were aware that the column had started from the wells. The Nile once gained, and a supply of water ensured, the force would be able to withstand any attack made on it. Nevertheless it would have been far better to have risked another battle in the open than to have made a night march across an unknown country.

The guides differed among themselves as to the route to be pursued, and more than once the column marched in a complete circle, the advance guard coming up to the rear. Thick groves of mimosa were passed through, causing the greatest confusion among the baggage animals. Great numbers of these lay down to die, unable to proceed a step further, and the transport of all kinds got mixed up together in the most utter confusion. The men, who had had but little sleep for two nights, were unable to keep awake on their camels, and in their passage through the bushes many of the animals straggled away from the main body.

Sergeant Bowen had managed to place Edgar next to himself upon the plea that being wounded he wanted to keep his eye upon him. Being both weakened by loss of blood, they were less able to resist the pressure of sleep than the others, and when their animals got separated in the passage through the mimosa grove from the main body, and stopped to crop the leaves, they were unconscious of what had happened until Edgar woke with a start as one of the boughs his camel had pushed aside struck him smartly in the face. His exclamation roused the sergeant. "Hullo! what has happened?"