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The Cemetery was passed, the gorge of Bell's Spruit, the series of impregnable defences built by the Liverpools and Devons along the Helpmakaar road. At the end of those low hills the Devons were found drawn up in support, or to cover retreat. General Hunter then took command of the whole movement, and the march went on.
He did not know that the Liverpool Company had left a hole in the line by finding a trail to the rear after their second gallant but fruitless assault, and he went forward of his own initiative, with a Russian Lewis gun squad to find position where he could plant one of his machine guns to help the S. B. A. L. platoons and Liverpools whom old Donoghue was coming up to lead in another charge on the Bolo position.
On the day appointed the garrison turned out to receive the general and the troops who had struggled so long and gallantly to effect their rescue, and the Devons, Gloucesters, Rifles, Leicesters, Manchesters, Liverpools, sappers, artillerymen, and the Naval Brigade marched out from their camps and lined the road as far as the railway-station, where the remnant of the cavalry brigade were drawn up.
The main permanent camp is built of corrugated iron, practically the sole building material in South Africa, and quite universal for roofs, so that the country has few "architectural features" to boast of. The cavalry are quartered in the tin huts, but the Liverpools, Devons, Gordons, and Volunteers have pitched their own tents, and a terrible time they are having of it.
The Boers were firing at them with awful precision, and when the Liverpools all unconscious that a handful of English were seeking cover in the donga commenced to fire at the Boers, it made retreat for the dauntless fifteen impossible. They had unwillingly to remain where they were until the Boers were put out of action by the Liverpools.
It was White's intention to prevent them from crossing the Newcastle Road, and for this purpose he sallied out of Ladysmith on Tuesday the 24th, having with him two regiments of cavalry, the 5th Lancers and the 19th Hussars, the 42nd and 53rd field batteries with the 10th mountain battery, four infantry regiments, the Devons, Liverpools, Gloucesters, and 2nd King's Royal Rifles, the Imperial Light Horse, and the Natal Volunteers some four thousand men in all.
I had been sitting with Colonel Mellor and the other officers of the Liverpools, who live among the rocks close to my cottage, and they had been congratulating themselves on only losing two men by shell and one by enteric since Black Monday, when they helped to cover the retirement with such gallantry and composure.
Dysentery and enteric are as bad as ever, but do not increase in proportion to the length of siege. There are 1,700 soldiers at Intombi sick camp now. A great many horses die every day, but not of the "horse-sickness." Their bodies are thrown on waste ground along the Helpmakaar road, and poison the air for the Liverpools and Rifles there.
It was an enemy searching through the mist down below him for any movement of troops or trains. It was the 76th Brigade of the 3d Division which attacked at four thirty-two that morning, and they were the Suffolks, Gordons, and King's Own Liverpools who led the assault, commanded by General Pratt.
Late at night scouts brought news of masses of Boers crossing the Tintwa Pass, and going into laager with their waggons only fifteen miles away to the west. The men stood to their arms, and long before light we were marching steadily forward along the Van Reenen road. First came the Liverpools, then the three batteries of Field Artillery with a mountain battery, then the Devons and the Gordons.
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