A British Lion in Zululand: Sir Garnet Wolseley in South Africa by William Wright

Author:William Wright
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Amberley Publishing
Published: 2017-01-15T16:00:00+00:00

PART TWO

THE BAPEDI

6

TROUBLE IN THE TRANSVAAL

I say the land belongs to us …

Chief Johannes Dinkwanyane

‘The Zulu War is ended,’ wrote a jubilant Wolseley to the Duke of Cambridge on 2 September 1879. The day was going to turn into a hot one as the spring sun rose quickly in the sky, and after breakfast Sir Garnet held a review of his troops before breaking up the units. Mansfield Clarke’s column commenced its journey back to Natal, the 80th Regiment was sent north towards Utrecht and the general and his staff prepared to make their way to Pretoria, capital of the Transvaal, via Evelyn Wood’s old camp on the Blood River. That night a ‘highly pleased’ John Dunn dined one last time with his mentor before turning homeward.

On the next morning Wolseley attended to his despatches, planning to set off on the 4th, but the heat in the tents was ‘very unpleasant’, while the flies in their thousands were ‘maddening’, drawn by the carcasses of many unburied bullocks and general camp detritus. Fed up with the sickening smells and keen to get going, Sir Garnet gave the order to start the march that night at 10 p.m. under ‘a very good bright moon’.

In fact, Zulu campaigning was not quite over; Manyonyoba, an inkosi of the Khubeka people in the Ntombe Valley, had still not surrendered, though he sent word that at sunset on 4 September he was prepared to lay down his weapons. The Zulu War, which might have ended without further loss of life, was now destined for a last blood-letting; on the morning of the 4th Baker Russell received orders from Wolseley to ‘clear Manyonyoba out’. Sceptical of his opponent’s intentions, Russell duly ordered Major Wilsone Black, a peppery Glaswegian from 2/24th, to take a force consisting of Teteluku’s Mounted Natives and some mounted infantry and march on the chief’s stronghold near the banks of the Ntombe. Force was to be used only as a last resort and seven Zulus found hiding in a cave were allowed to surrender with the promise that their lives would be spared. Climbing up a steep hillside where other Zulu men, women and children, along with their livestock, were all sheltering in other caves, Black’s force was fired upon by one of Manyonyoba’s people. This lone shot by a nervous warrior was enough for Teteluku’s men, whose white officers were absent, to assegai the unarmed prisoners and butcher them all. Manyonyoba’s Zulus, naturally enough, got wind of this killing and refused to leave the caves shouting out that they no longer believed the words of the white men. Teteluku’s warriors, much to Black’s fury, were completely unrepentant and marched to their bivouac singing victory songs.

Next day, 5 September, Russell sent a large patrol to take Manyonyoba’s main cave on the left bank of the Ntombe. The events were described by Captain W. E. Montague:

It was a stiff climb, pretty enough to watch – the red coats dodging in and out, half hidden by

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