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Updated: June 4, 2025
He is thought to have been one of the old man's field cornets, and had fought up to the sangar at his side till a bullet pierced his eye and brain. Turning back from the extremity of our position, I went along the whole ridge. The ground told one as much as men could tell.
The fire from the sangar had recommenced, as Stewart's attention had been turned towards others, so Colonel Kelly sent orders to Stewart to send in one or two more shells, which had the desired effect. I now sent Gammer Sing to get a fresh supply of ammunition for the Levies, which he brought, and I then followed Colonel Kelly down the line to the Pioneers.
They rushed sangar after sangar, taking them in rear and driving out the enemy pell mell, killing many and capturing a large number of prisoners. At last the passage of the great ravine was gained, and the British force enabled to move forward again.
We now saw the Pioneers moving down the nullah towards the river, while at the same time the Levies showed on the ridge and took possession of the sangar. We were all right, I saw, so I gave the order to advance keeping along the edge of the nullah so as to get at the sangars.
Upon the word the fireball was lit and thrown far out. It circled through the air, dropped, and lay blazing upon the ground. By its light under the branches of the garden trees could be seen the Pathans building a stone sangar, within thirty yards of the fort's walls. "Fire!" cried Luffe. "Choose your men and fire."
The men in No. 16 sangar had evidently had enough of it, their sangar having been pretty well knocked about their ears, and when any of the survivors tried a shot, it called down a volley on him. Presently they began to bolt, and then the laugh was on our side.
Concealed in the hollow of a hill, they are invisible to the enemy, and after many trials have now exactly got the range of the great 6 in. gun on Middle Hill. At any moment they can plump their shells right into his sangar, and the Boer gunners are frightened to work there. In fact, they have as effectually silenced that gun as if they had smashed it to pieces.
The Levies, however, were not keeping close enough to the hillside, and were gradually pushing Peterson's company off to the left, where they would have been exposed to the fire of the big sangar plus the flanking fire from the sangars up the spur on the left bank of the river.
There was a new sangar to-night, close to the North Tower, which had not existed yesterday. Moreover, the almond trees in the garden just outside the western wall were in blossom, and the leaves upon the branches were as a screen, where only the bare trunks showed a fortnight ago. But with these matters Luffe was not at this moment concerned.
But only one man was killed. A Natal policeman was cooking his dinner in a cellar when "Silent Susan's" shot fell upon him and he died. For myself, I spent most of the day on Waggon Hill west of the town, where the 1st K.R. Rifles have three companies and a strong sangar, very close to the enemy. I found that, as became Britons, their chief interest lay in sport.
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