THE DISASTER TO THE HIGHLAND BRIGADE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2401, 8 March 1900, Page 21

THE DISASTER TO THE HIGHLAND BRIGADE.

The special correspondent of the London Daily News sends a graphic and admirably written account of the disaster to the Highland Brigade at the Modeler River. ' He says: —

It was considered expedient that the Highland Brigade, a boul 4000 strong, under General Wauchope, should get close enough to the lines of the foe to make it poosiblo lo charge the heights. At midnight the gallant but illfated general moved cautiously through the darkness towards the kopje where the Boers were most strongly entrenched. They were led by a guide, who was supposed lo know every inch of the country, out into the darkness of an African night. The brigade marched in line of quarter-column, each man stepping cautiously and slowly, for they knew that any sound meant death. Every order was given in a hoarse whisper, and in whispers it was passed along the ranks from man to man ; nothing was heard as they moved towards the gloomy, steeifronled heights but the brushing of their feet in the veldt grass and the deep-drawn breaths of the marching men.

A HERALD OF DISASTER,

So, onward, until 3 of the clock on the morning of Monday. Then out of the darkness a rifle rang, sharp, and clear, a herald of disaster — a soldier had tripped in the dark over the hidden wires laid clown by the enemy. In a second, in the twinkling of an" eye, the searchlights of the Boers fell broad and clear as the noonday sun on the ranks of the doomed Highlanders, though it left_ the enemy concealed in the shadows of the" frowning mass of hills behind them. For one brief moment the Scots seemed paialysed by the suddenness of their discovery, for they knew that they were huddled together like sheep within 50 yards of the trenches of the foe. Then, clear above the confusion, rolled the voice cf the general : " Steady, men ; steady!" and, like an echo to the veterans, out came the crash of nearly a thousand rifles not 50 paces from them. The Highlanders reeled before the shock like trees before the tempest. Their best, their bravest fell in that wild hail of lead. General Wauchope was clown, riddled with bullets ; yet, gasping, dying, bleeding from every vein, the Highland chieftain raised himself on his hands and knees, and cheered his men forward. Men and officers fell in heap? together.

ONWARD TO DEATH.

j The Black Wntch charged, and the Gordons and the Seaforfchs, with a yell that stirred the British camp below, rushed onward — onward to death or disaster. The accursed wires caught them round the legs until they floundered, like trapped wolves, and all the time the rifles of the., foe sang the song of , death in their ears. Then they fell back, ! broken and beaten, leaving nearly 1300 dead and wounded just where the broad breast of ! the grassy veldt melts into the embrace of. I the rugged African hills, and an hour later the dawning came of the dreariest clay that Scotland hat? known for- to- generation- past. • Of her officers, the flower of her chivnlr-y, the pride of her breeding, but few remained" to. tell the tale — a, sad trtle surely, but ona untainted with dishonour ay -smirched with' disgrace, for up those heights under similar, circiimstances even a brigade of devils could scarce ~ha.ve hoped to pass. All that mortal men could do the Soots- did ; they tried,- they failed, they fell, and there is nothing left us now but to mourn for them, and avenge them, and I am' no prophet if the day- is distant when the Highland bayonet will write the name of Wauchope large and deep in the best blood of the Boers. THROUGH BRISKET AND BREASTBONE. All that fateful day our wounded men lay close to the Boer lines under a blazing sun ; over their heads the shots of fi'iends and foes passed, without ceasing. Many a gal- ] lant deed was done by comrades helping comrades ; men w"ho were shot through the body lay without water, enduring all the agony of thirst engendered by their wounds and the blistering heat of the day ; to them crawled Scots with shattered limbs, sharing the last drop of water in their bottles, and taking messages to be delivered to moiirning women in the cottage home of far off Scotland. Many a last farewell was whispered by pain-drawn lips in between the ringing of the rifles ; many a rough soldier with tenderest care closed the eyes of a brother in arms amidst the tempest and the stir of battle, and above it all, Oronje, the Boer general, must have smiled grimly, for well he knew that -where the. Highland Brigade had failed, all the world might falter. All 'clay long" the battle raged ; ' scarcely could we see the foe — all that met oiir eyes I was - the rocky" heights that spoke with 1 tongues of flame whenever our troops drew .near." We could not reach their lines; it I was murder, grim and ghastly, to send the ' infantry forward lo fight 'a foe Ihey could ' not see and could not reach. OnGe our Guards made a brilliant dash at the trenches, and, like a torrent, their resistless valour , bore all before them, and for a few brief moments they got within hitting distance of the foe. Well did they avenge the slaughter of the Scots ; the bayonets, like tongues of flame, passed above or below the rifles' guard, and swept through brisket and breastbone. Out of their trenches the Guardsmen tossed the Boers, as men in English harvest fields toss the hay when the reapers' scythes have whitened the cornfields ; and the human streams were plentiful where the British Guardsmen stood. Then they fell back, for the fire from the heights above them fell thick as the spume of the surf on an Australian rock-ribbed coast. But the Guards had proved to the Boer that, man to man, the Briton was his master.

A BLOOD FEUD

i*he same correspondent, in his account of the burial of General Wauchope, says after the body was placed in the grave once ■again the pipes pealed -out, and " Lochaber no more" cut through the stillness like a cry of pain, until one could almost hear the widow in her Highland home moaning for the soldier she would welcome back no more. Then, as if touched by the magic of one thought, the soldiers turned their tear-damp eyes from the still form in the shallow grave towards the heights where Cronje, the "lion of Africa," and his soldiers stood. Then every cheek flushed crimson, and. the strong jaws set like steel, and the veins on the hands that -clasped^ the rifle handles, swelled almost to bursting' with the fervour of the grip, and that look from those silent, armed men spoke more eloquently than ever spoke the tongues "of orators. For 'on each frowning face the spirit of vengeance sat, and each sparkling eye asked silently for blood. God help the Boers when next the Highland pibroch sounds ! God rest the Boers' souls wlieu the Highland bayonets charge, for

nejther death, nor hell, nor things aoove. nothings below wilL hold the Scots back from their blood feud. At the head of the grave, at the point nearest the enemy, the general was laid to sleep, his officers grouped around him, whilst iD line behind him his soldiers were laid in a double row, wrapped ' % their blankets. No shots were fired over the dead' men resting so' peacefully, only the salute was given, and then the men marched campwords as the darkness of an African night rolled over the far-stretching breadth of the veldt. To the gentlewoman who bears their general's name the Highland Brigade sends its deepest sympathy. To the mothers and the wives, the sisters and the sweethearts in cottage home by hillside and glen they send tlto'i 1 love and good wishes — sad will their Christmas be ; sadder the New Year. Yet enshrined in every womanly heart, from Queen Empress to cottage girl, let their memory lip. the memory of the men of the Highland Brigade who died at Magersfontern.