In the Ranks of the C.I.V. Erskine Childers
as a great relief to hear that we were at last close to the Cape.
From my diary:—
"February 26.—Heavy day at stables. Land reported at eleven; saw through forage-port a distant line of mountains on port beam, edged by a dazzling line of what looked like chalk cliffs, but I suppose is sand. I am on stable-guard for the night (writing this in the guard-room), so when stables were over at four I had to pack hard, and only got up for a glimpse of things at five, then approaching Table Bay, guarded by the splendid Table Mountain, with the tablecloth of white clouds spread on it in the otherwise cloudless sky. I always imagined it a smooth, dull mountain, but in fact it rises in precipitous crags and ravines. A lovely scene as we steamed up through a crowd of shipping—transports, I suppose—and anchored some way from shore. Blowing hard to-night. I have been on deck for a few minutes. The sea is like molten silver with phosphorescence under the lash of the wind.
"February 27.—Tiresome day of waiting. Gradually got known that we shan't land to-day, though it is possible still we may to-night. Torrid, windless day, and very hot work 'mucking out' and tramping round with the horses, which we did all the morning, and some of the afternoon. News sent round that we had captured Cronje and 5000 prisoners; all the ships dressed with flags, and whistles blowing; rockets in evening, banging off over my head now, and horses jumping in unison. Shall we be wanted? is the great question. We are packed ready to land any minute."
CHAPTER II.
CAPETOWN AND STELLENBOSCH.
Landing—Green Point Camp—Getting into trim—My horses—Interlude—Orders to march—Sorrows of a spare driver—March to Stellenbosch—First bivouac—A week of dust and drill—The road to water—Off again.
"March 4.—Sunday.—Green Point Camp.—This is the first moment I have had to write in since last Tuesday. I am on picket, and writing in the guard-tent by a guttery lantern.
"To go back:—On Wednesday morning, the 28th of February, we steamed slowly up to a great deserted quay. The silence struck me curiously. I had imagined a scene of tumult and bustle on the spot where troops in thousands had been landing continuously for so long. We soon realized that we were to supply all the bustle, and that practical work had at last begun, civilian assistance dispensed with, and the Battery a self-sufficient unit. There was not even a crane to help us, and we spent the day in shoving, levering, and lifting on to trucks and waggons our guns, carriages, limbers, ammunition, and other stores, all packed as they were in huge wooden cases. It was splendid exercise as a change from stable-work. Weather melting hot; but every one was in the highest spirits; though we blundered tediously through the job, for we had no experience in the fine art of moving heavy weights by hand. I forgot to take note of my sensations on first setting foot on African soil, as I was groaning under a case of something terribly heavy at the time.
"We worked till long after dark, slept like logs in the dismantled troop-deck, rose early, and went on until the afternoon of the next day, when we landed the horses—of which, by the way, we had only lost four on the voyage—harnessed up some waggons to carry stores, and were ready. While waiting to start, some charming damsels in white muslin brought us grapes. At about four we started for Green Point Camp, which is on a big plain, between the sea and Table Mountain, and is composed of soft white sand, from which the grass has long disappeared.
"Directly we reached it, the horses all flung themselves down, and rolled in it. We passed through several camps, and halted at our allotted site, where we formed our lines and picketed our horses heel and head. Then the fun began, as they went wild, and tied themselves in strangulation knots, and kept it up all night, as the sleepless pickets reported.
"After feeding and watering, we unloaded the trucks which had begun to come in, ate some bully-beef and bread, and then fell asleep anyhow, in a confused heap in our tents. Mine had thirteen in it, and once we were packed no movement was possible."
For two more days we were busily employed in unpacking stores, and putting the materiel of battery into shape, while, at the same time, we were receiving our complement of mules and Kaffir drivers for our transport waggons. Then came our first parades and drills. Rough we were no doubt at first. The mobilization of a volunteer battery cannot be carried out in an instant, and presents numberless difficulties from which infantry are free. Our horses were new to the work, and a few of us men, including my humble self, were only recent recruits.
The guns, too, were of a new pattern. The H.A.C. at home is armed with the 15-pounder guns in use in the Regular Field Artillery. But for the campaign, as the C.I.V. Battery, we had taken out new weapons (presented by the City of London), in the shape of four 12½-pounder Vickers-Maxim field guns, taking fixed ammunition, having practically no recoil, and with a much improved breech-mechanism. They turned out very good, but of course, being experimental, required practice in handling, which could not have been obtained in the few weeks in the London barracks.
On the other hand, the large majority of us were old hands, our senior officers and N.C.O.'s were from the Regular Horse Artillery, and all ranks were animated by an intense desire to reach the utmost efficiency at the earliest possible moment.
My impressions of the next ten days are of grooming, feeding, and exercising in the cool twilight of dawn, sweltering dusty drills, often in sand-storms, under a blazing mid-day sun, of "fatigues" of all sorts, when we harnessed ourselves in teams to things, or made and un-made mountains of ammunition boxes—a constant round of sultry work, tempered by cool bathes on white sand, grapes from peripatetic baskets, and brief intervals of languid leisure, with al fresco meals of bully-beef and dry bread outside our tents.
Time was marked by the three daily stable hours, each with their triple duty of grooming, feeding, and watering, the "trivial round" which makes up so much of the life of a driver. As a very humble representative of that class, my horses were two "spares," that is, not allotted to any team. Much to my disgust, I was not even provided with a saddle, and had to do my work bareback, which filled me with indignation at the time, but only makes me smile now. My roan was always a sort of a pariah among the sub-division horses, an incorrigible kicker and outcast, having to be picketed on a peg outside the lines for his misdeeds. Many a kick did I get from him; and yet I always had a certain affection for him in all his troubled, unloved life, till the day when, nine months later, he trotted off to the re-mount depot at Pretoria, to vex some strange driver in a strange battery. My other horse, a dun, was soon taken as a sergeant's mount, and I had to take on an Argentine re-mount, a rough, stupid little mare, with kicking and biting propensities which quite threw the roan's into the shade. She also had a peg of ignominy, and three times a day I had to dance perilously round my precious pair with a tentative body-brush and hoof-pick. The scene generally ended in the pegs coming away from the loose sand, and a perspiring chase through the lines. I had some practice, too, in driving in a team, for one of our drivers "went sick," and I took his place in the team of an ammunition-waggon for several days.
Abrupt contrasts to the rough camp life were some evenings spent with Williams in Capetown, where it already felt very strange to be dining at a table, and sitting on a chair, and using more than one plate. Once it was at the invitation of Amery of the Times, in the palatial splendour of the Mount Nelson Hotel, where I felt strangely incongruous in my by no means immaculate driver's uniform. But how I enjoyed that dinner! Had there been many drivers present, the management would have been seriously embarrassed that evening.
Wildly varying rumours of our future used to abound, but on March 14, a sudden order came to raise camp, and march to Stellenbosch. Teams were harnessed and hooked in, stores packed in the buck waggons, tents struck, and at twelve we were ready. Before starting Major McMicking addressed us, and said we were going to a disaffected district,