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Updated: June 20, 2025


The 42nd Field Battery then came, and the 21st later; the 5th Lancers with a few 5th Dragoon Guards, and a large contingent of Natal mounted volunteers. That was our force. It took up a strong and fairly concealed position behind a rise in the road to the left of the railway and waited.

The East India Company were incorporated about the 42nd of Elizabeth, anno 1600, and empowered to trade to all countries to the eastward of the Cape of Good Hope, exclusive of all others.

On December 16th we moved forward to el Maadan, Kilo 128 on the railway, a march of twelve miles, which owing to the difficult country Colonel Morrison noted as "probably the most fatiguing the Battalion has yet undertaken." Here the outpost line was held by the 42nd Division and we were engaged on digging and road making.

I have already spoken of dogs which attach themselves to communities, and now I have a similar instance of a deer to offer, in combination, however, with a dog, who attached himself to the 42nd Highlanders, having been presented to that regiment by a friend of one of the officers.

About this time the Gordon Highlanders and Manchester battalion were drawn forward from Hamilton's Brigade to the green tree-fringed kopje, on the ridge of which our 42nd Battery still maintained its position, playing effectively upon "Long Tom."

They rushed on, and drove the French before them, till they were stopped by a wall. Sir John accompanied them in this charge. He now sent Captain Hardinge to order up a battalion of Guards to the left flank of the 42nd. The officer commanding the light infantry conceived at this that they were to be relieved by the Guards, because their ammunition was nearly expended, and he began to fall back.

After the Conquest of Canada, the Fraser Highlanders with the remains of the 42nd were offered grants of land if they chose to remain as settlers, a privilege which many of them accepted. Sixteen years afterward, when a foreign invasion threatened Canada, they loyally left the plough in the furrow and again sprang to arms, to protect their altars and firesides.

And for a battalion which had seen the hard service of the 7th N.F., the stock jests generally levelled at a pioneer battalion were a little out of place. The 42nd Division proved themselves a hard fighting division in 1918, and lived up to their motto 'Go one better.

In December the 42nd, a battalion of the Rifle Brigade, and the 23rd Fusiliers arrived. It was found, however, that it was impossible to provide transport for so large a force, and the 23rd were therefore re-embarked, together with a battery of Royal Artillery which had also come out. Two hundred of the Fusiliers, however, subsequently re-landed and marched to the front.

The Military Station of Dugshai is situated on the pinnacle of a mountain about 7,000 feet high. It looks bare and bleak, from the total absence of trees; but the 42nd Regiment, now quartered there, had all the appearance of health, and there were few men in the hospital.

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