The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-01-08
A WOUNDED OFFICERS S STORY.

| A wounded officer sends a long let | ter to his mother iron Pietermaritz-
 burg hospital describing his experiences at the battle of Elandslaagte. Tt was, '
 he says "a splendid feat of arms, and
 I am most awfully proud of my regi- ment, for we bore the brunt of the day.
 We had tremendous hard time of it.,
 and were under fire for two and a half
 hours Considerably longer than any
 other corns). But the cost was awful
 We had only ten officers in action, and
 five of them were wounded, and of 329 | men we had eleven killed and thirty three wounded; two have since died of | their wounds. The Gordons lost even
 more severely. The reasons for this ] were in my opinion, as follows: First, | their dark kits were much more visible | than our khakis, and consequently | formed a better target; second, there
 were more of them. The Gordons all
 say that Dargal was the merest child 5 play compared to this
 "To return to my own doings, l lay where l fell for about quarters of an hour, when a doctor came and put field dressing on my wound, gave
 me some brandy, put my helmet under my head as a pillow, covered me with a Boer blanket which he had taken from dead man, and then went to look af- ter some other poor beggar. l shall never forget the horrors of that night
 as long as I live. In addition to the
 agony which my wound gave me l had
 two sharp stones running into my back,
 I was naked to the skin and bitterly
 cold, but had an awful thirst; the tor
 rents of rain never stopped. On one side of me was Gordon Highlander in
 raving delirium and on the other
 Boer who had had his leg shattered by
 q shell. and who gave vent to the most
 heartrending cries and groans. War is a funny game, mother, and no one can
 realize what its grim horros are like till they see it in all it's barbarous real ity.
 q lay out in the rain the whole of the night, and at daybreak was put into dooie by a doctor, and some natives carried me down to the station. The ground was awfully rough and they dropped me twice; fainted both times. I was sent down to Ladysmith in the hospital train; from the station I was conveyed to the chapel (officers hospitaD in bullock cart, the joting of which made me faint again. l was the last officer taken in. l was then put to bed and my wound was dressed just seven teen hours after I was hit. Then they gave me beef tea, which was the first food I had had for twenty-seven hours. The doctors all said at ilrst that l had been hit by shell but that is impos- sible, for the enemy had only two guns. we had taken them both when I was hit So the doctors now say that it must have been q very heavy explosive 1 bullet, and, as an elephant gun was found close to where l was hit I expect they are right. It has made big jag ! ged hole in my shoulder which you | could put your hand into. It has blown | some of the muscles away, so I am afraid I shall always be a little stiff | They say it will take another ten weeks before I am fit for duty, and I am | very much afraid that most of the fighting will be over by that time. in spite of the present critical condition of affairs. .'-Birmingham Posts