The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-03-05 00:00:00

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AFTER THE FIGHT.

The Daily Telegraph of Wednesday published the
following from their Special Correspondent :

MOUNT PROSPECT, Feb. 28 (7.20 p.m.)

All day long, throngh this sad and heavy Monday, sur-
vivors from the ill-fated detachments yesterday defeated and
driven oil the Spitzkop, have been struggling back into
camp. _

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Some are uninjured, having concealed themselves till
darkness fell; others have received hurts, more or less
severe; but the supposed number of casualties is happily
somewhat reduced by these men reappearing.
I am glad also to say that Stewart, llornby, and Fraser,
who were reported as among the slain, are alive and pri-
soners in the camp of the Boers, along with some other
officers of whose names I cannot make myself sure. Com-
mander Rornilly has been brought into Mount Prospect still
living, but very dangerously wounded by a bullet in the
lower part of the body.

Maude, of the 58th, and Trower, of the Naval Brigade, are
now known to have fallen in the terrible last melee on the
Spitzkop.

Owing to the character and surface of the ground where
this calamity befell it has been difficult even yet to estimate
finally the number of killed and severely wounded. Corpses
and sorely hurt men are still being discovered in hidden
nooks and hollows of the kop. Our troops have been engaged
all day long, under an armistice with the rebels, bringing in
the wounded to our hospital, burying the dead, and search-
ing for those who may be living but unable to call for
succour.

There are some very terrible hurts among those already
saved from the hillside -the shattering effects of rifle fire
at close quarters. The list of losses will be less than was
given out; the 60th seems to have only one man wounded.
I believe they were left upon the ridge when the others ad-
vanced to occupy the summit.
The Naval Brigade, which started about fifty strong,
sets its casualties at fourteen killed and eighteen wounded,
showing that the blue jackets did their duty well.
The unfortunate 58th Regiment has a heavy return of
killed and wounded. The exact number of each cannot yet
be transmitted, but it is hqped that they will fall below a
hundred hors de combat. The losses of the two companies
engaged of the 92nd are also grievously heavy. The final
figure is not yet named. I have been out myself with a
burying-party, and about the place where these gallant
fellows stood I saw forty-nine corpses collected and laid in
one hastily-dug funeral pit.
As I despatch this the mist blowing over the mountains
has thickened and melted into rain, which seems likely to
fall all night. This, it is feared, will put a stop to the burying-
parties, which would otherwise have worked through the
darkness: and, what Is worst, may prevent till too late the
bringing in of a few scattered and outlying wounded.
The Boers, after identifying General Colley's body, have
caused it to be carried into their laager at Laing's Nek.
They have sent word that they are ready to deliver over the
remains of the brave English commander as soon as it shall
be desired of them under the hand of the officer next in
authority at Mount Prospect. A party has been sent
accordingly, with the necessary letter of demand, to bring
the remains of General Colley back to the camp from which
he lately started with such gallant hopes. We expect to
see the arrival of the body early to-morrow morning.

The Boers have taken firm possession of that spur of the
Amajuba Mbuntain which has cost so much precious life.
This, and their repeated and desperate, charges to drive out
our men, prove that General Colley rightly attached great
strategical value to the position. They have now large
masses of men upon its sides and summit, securing their hold
of it.
Under the armistice which has been declared for the bury-
ing of the dead and the succeur of the wounded, much com-
munication has passed between the hostile camps. The
Boers bear themselves civilly enough towards their
British enemies, but are naturally boastful. They seem
to agree in giving ridiculously low estimates of their
own losses, whether to impress us or from vanity is not
clear. "About seven killed and wounded" is the num-
ber which most of them report, but this appears mani-
festly incorrect, even if what was meant is "seventy." At the
same time it is certainly remarkable that though I, with
many others have been from early morning all over the
scene of battle, none of us have come upon any dead or
wounded Boers lying upon that fatal hill-side. Yet it they
collected their own wounded first, they would hard*, pickup
all their dead till they had brought in the wounded English.
But while of these latter we found many, not a Boer corpse
was to be seen on the slope of Spitzkop. Meanwhile I fear
there are still Eaglish soldiers lying in their blood and pain
upon that steep hill-face this pouring wet night.
As to the disastrous engagement, the simple fact is, our
men were utterly outnumbered. On every side the Boers
were able to smother the defence with creeping assailants,
who, by-and-by, swarmed in together, and poured a raking
fire down the defending lines. This cost many lives, and so
did the fierce fusilade opened upon our broken and flying
forces, as they scrambled pell-mell for life down the rocky
and almost precipitous face of the Spitzkop. They were
shot like rabbits in a warren on these ledges.

The force led forth was utterly insufficient to seize and
occupy a place like that on the head of the Spitz. The three
or four hundred men with the General in the hollow on the
summit were doomed as soon as seen, certainly as soon as
the swarming Boers had resolved to purchase the hill at any
cost. Without supports and a combined movement the feat
attempted was impossible. There was no lack of manhood
anywhere—our soldiers were simply mobbed out of their
position by a crowd of marksmen not to be kept at bay.