The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-05-16
WILSON'S LAST STAND.


 not tell me quite the whole of that
 WILSON'S LAST STAND.
 A Matabele's Account of thesAttack of
 a Thousand Natives on Thirty-Four
 Englishmen.
 The heroic deeds of brave English men will always finger in the minds of their countrymen, and any additional particulars that can be obtained in connection with such deeds are always welcome. A representative of '"The Matabele Times" says a paper publish ed in Buluwayo, recently succeeded in obtaining narrative from MKotch- wana, one of the warriors of the h. guba Regiment which attacked and an- initiated Wilson's force. It took some time getting MKotchwana to speak of the affair. He was quite ready to talk about the crops, iocusts, etc., but it was not until he was twitted as to whether he had ever done anything but till the land like a woman that he spoke.
 "Yes, my father" he answered, "I have fought in battle," and then he re- lated the following account of that grand stand of thirty-four Englishmen against overwhelming hordes of an in- furiated savage enemy:
 When the white ineos Wilson came across the big river Shangani," said the native, i've watched him, and although he knew it not he was surrounded on all sides by the remnants of regiments which had fought at the Bembesi the Imbezu, the Insukameni the Nyama ll.l. xs..l,f fcsan missed the white majakas but toward the rising of the sum- Umjaan, the great chief, came to us and said l have heard the white warriors in the bush; come. let us go and kill them We were about one thousand in num- Der, and without noise we went and surrounded the place where the white men had their fire. Two of them were standing up looking into the bush. Some of us made little noise. One of the white men standing awake went and woke up another man. I think it was their incos He came and looked all round into the bush, and then aroused all the other amakiwa. They got up and I saw they were busy get ting their ammunition ready and sad- ding their horses. As it drew near the time for the sun to peep over the edge of the world, we started firing at the white men. They mounted their horses and tried to proceed in the direction of the great Shanghai But our men shot we'll and horses dropped dead. It was a cloudy morning, and the rain fell fine and swiftly. There were as many amakiwa' as three times the fingers on my two hands. Most of them had on black covers over their shoulders (capes).
 "Nhen the white warriors found they could not go on, they shot the living | horses and stood behind them waiting for us. We fired our guns at the white men, but at first they did not do us much harm, as we were well protected by the trees and bushes. As the sun rose we noticed several of the white warriors lying dead. Umjaan gave or ders to rush up to the enemy. We is- sued from behind the protecting trees and tried to run up to kill the incos Wilson and his party, but they killed many of us with the little guns in their l hands and wounded more.''
 "How many were killed and wounded | in that first rush. M'Kotchwana?" "As many as six times the fingers on my two hands-so many" and the old | warrior waved his hands six times.
 "But how many were killed out right?'
 "So many" and M'Kotchwana signi- 1 fled forty Then we went back be- | hind the trees and fired often, till many of the 'amakiwa' fell and few remained. II l that are left but some of them said: | No, they are brave warriors let us | leave the life in those who are not yet dead.' But the men of the Imbezu said, l No, let us kill all the white mem Again we rushed against the few who remained standing. When they saw us coming they made a big singing
 noise, and then shouted three times l They killed more of us. I was struck 1 near the temple, and remembered no
 more My brother told me afterward | that all the white men fell fighting till | the end. They were brave men, my | father. The next day at sunrise we took all their clothes and skinned the | face of the biggest white 'majaka and | took it to Lobengula, who was away one days journey. The Great Chief said that was not the skin of the lead er We returned, and took yet an- other skin off the face of white chief. When Lobengula saw it he was satis- | fled. He asked whether his Imbezu regiment had done all the killing. When he heard that they had not done more than others, he said: Have I then all this time put my trust in a lump of dirt?' I had two sons killed that day,