9814358851 by Tim Hannigan

Author:Tim Hannigan [Hannigan, Tim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

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While Arya Panular had been leading frightened princesses through the falling shells, Rollo Gillespie’s men had been charging – with their heads down and their eyes screwed up – for a victory destined to ‘ever shine conspicuous in the Annals of Java.’ The main column of the attack had snuck out across the Alun-Alun at first light. One party headed due south for the central gateway, passing between the twin Banyan trees in the middle of the grassy square. Anyone who can pass blindfolded in a straight line between these trees with their dreadlocked mass of trailing roots is destined for success, they say. The soldiers and sepoys were not blindfolded, but they bore as straight as an arrow for their destination.

The rest of the group cut away towards the Northeast Bastion, behind which lay the Crown Prince’s quarters. This was the place that had been chosen for the focal point of the attack; it was here that the British would hurl themselves with all their strength at the Javanese fastness. They had crept right to the marshy ditch below the walls before the dozing defenders above realised what was happening. As the Javanese fumbled for their guns the first of the bamboo ladders were raised against the walls and the first sepoys went scuttling up them like spiders. Snipers back across the ditch picked off the enemy soldiers through the gaps and loopholes of the bastion. The defence of this northeast corner of the Kraton lasted mere minutes as more and more redcoats swarmed over the ramparts. The bayoneted Javanese bodies were tossed down into the ditch below.

At the head of this first assault party was a lieutenant-colonel called Watson. With the bastion fallen Watson now turned his back to the sunrise and charged along the inner ledge of the walls towards the gate that led directly into the Crown Prince’s quarters, 300 yards to the west. A party of sepoys had waded across the ditch and were scurrying along the slope immediately below the ramparts in the same direction. The Javanese had already gone spilling off the fortifications above the gate like lemmings and vanished into the interior of the Kraton, but the gate itself was strongly barricaded. While sappers laid charges to blow it open, the sepoys scrambled up on each other’s shoulders to join Watson on the ramparts. As soon as the explosives went off and the gate fell they doubled back at a jog and went running along the ledge to the corner bastion where they lugged the Javanese guns around to fire them back into the Crown Prince’s residence and the buildings beyond. If the British had had more men they would have left soldiers in possession of these captured guns, but their force was far too small to take a place with three miles of ramparts by conventional means. After a few inward shots they tossed the guns over the walls and bore south en masse.

The Kraton walls here formed a

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