Pub Date : 2018-07-30DOI: 10.7765/9781526137913.00010
E. Spiers
Eyewitness accounts are among the many sources used in the voluminous literature on the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879, a major test of British command, transport arrangements, and the fighting qualities of the short-service soldier. Quite apart from the writings of the late Frank Emery, who refers to eighty-five correspondents in The Red Soldier and another twenty-four in his chapter on that campaign in Marching Over Africa, there are invaluable edited collections of letters from individual officers by Sonia Clark and Daphne Child, and by Adrian Greaves and Brian Best. While the papers and journals of the British commanding officers have been splendidly edited, some perspectives of officers and other ranks appear in testimony before official inquiries (into the disasters at Isandlwana and Ntombe, and the death of the Prince Imperial) and among the sources used by F. W. D. Jackson and Ian Knight, and by Donald Morris in his classic volume The Washing of the Spears. Yet the letters found by Emery – the core of the material used for the views of regimental officers and other ranks – represent only a fraction of the material written during the Anglo-Zulu War. Many more officers and men kept diaries or wrote to friends and family, chronicling their exploits in that war and its immediate predecessors, the Ninth Cape Frontier War (1877–78) and the campaign against the Pedi chief, Sekhukhune (1878). While several soldiers complained about the postal arrangements or the scarcity of stamps and paper, they still wrote letters, even improvising, as Corporal Thomas Davies (2/24th) did, by using gunpowder as ink. Their correspondence forms the core of this Chapter’s review of campaigning in southern Africa. Several of the regiments who fought the Zulus had already served in southern Africa. The 1/24th (of the 2nd Warwickshires, later South Wales Borderers) and the 1/13th (Somerset Light Infantry) had served in southern Africa since 1875; the 2/Buffs, the 80th (2/South Staffordshires) and the 88th (1/Connaught Rangers) had joined them in 1877, C H A P T E R T W O
1879年的盎格鲁-祖鲁战争是对英国指挥、运输安排和短期服役士兵战斗素质的重大考验，目击者的描述是大量文献中使用的众多来源之一。已故的弗兰克·埃默里(Frank Emery)在《红色战士》一书中提到了85位通讯员，在《向非洲挺进》一书中提到了另外24位通讯员。除此之外，还有索尼娅·克拉克(Sonia Clark)和达芙妮·查尔德(Daphne Child)、阿德里安·格里夫斯(Adrian Greaves)和布莱恩·贝斯特(Brian Best)撰写的宝贵的军官信件编辑集。虽然英国指挥官的论文和期刊被精心编辑，但官方调查前的证词(关于Isandlwana和Ntombe的灾难，以及帝国王子的死亡)中出现了一些军官和其他级别的观点，也出现在F. W. D.杰克逊和伊恩·奈特使用的资料中，以及唐纳德·莫里斯在他的经典著作《洗枪》中。然而，埃默里发现的信件——军团军官和其他级别的意见的核心材料——只代表了盎格鲁-祖鲁战争期间所写材料的一小部分。更多的军官和士兵写日记或写信给朋友和家人，记录他们在那场战争及其前奏——第九次开普边境战争(1877-78)和反对佩迪酋长塞库库恩(1878)的战役中的功绩。虽然一些士兵抱怨邮政安排或邮票和纸张的缺乏，但他们仍然写信，甚至像下士托马斯·戴维斯(2/24)那样，用火药作墨水即兴创作。他们的通信构成了本章回顾南部非洲运动的核心。与祖鲁人作战的几个团已经在非洲南部服役过。1/24(第二沃里克郡，后来的南威尔士边境)和1/13(萨默塞特轻步兵团)自1875年以来一直在非洲南部服役;第2支Buffs，第80支(南斯塔福德郡队)和第88支(康诺特游骑兵队)于1877年加入他们
{"title":"Campaigning in southern Africa","authors":"E. Spiers","doi":"10.7765/9781526137913.00010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526137913.00010","url":null,"abstract":"Eyewitness accounts are among the many sources used in the voluminous literature on the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879, a major test of British command, transport arrangements, and the fighting qualities of the short-service soldier. Quite apart from the writings of the late Frank Emery, who refers to eighty-five correspondents in The Red Soldier and another twenty-four in his chapter on that campaign in Marching Over Africa, there are invaluable edited collections of letters from individual officers by Sonia Clark and Daphne Child, and by Adrian Greaves and Brian Best. While the papers and journals of the British commanding officers have been splendidly edited, some perspectives of officers and other ranks appear in testimony before official inquiries (into the disasters at Isandlwana and Ntombe, and the death of the Prince Imperial) and among the sources used by F. W. D. Jackson and Ian Knight, and by Donald Morris in his classic volume The Washing of the Spears. Yet the letters found by Emery – the core of the material used for the views of regimental officers and other ranks – represent only a fraction of the material written during the Anglo-Zulu War. Many more officers and men kept diaries or wrote to friends and family, chronicling their exploits in that war and its immediate predecessors, the Ninth Cape Frontier War (1877–78) and the campaign against the Pedi chief, Sekhukhune (1878). While several soldiers complained about the postal arrangements or the scarcity of stamps and paper, they still wrote letters, even improvising, as Corporal Thomas Davies (2/24th) did, by using gunpowder as ink. Their correspondence forms the core of this Chapter’s review of campaigning in southern Africa. Several of the regiments who fought the Zulus had already served in southern Africa. The 1/24th (of the 2nd Warwickshires, later South Wales Borderers) and the 1/13th (Somerset Light Infantry) had served in southern Africa since 1875; the 2/Buffs, the 80th (2/South Staffordshires) and the 88th (1/Connaught Rangers) had joined them in 1877, C H A P T E R T W O","PeriodicalId":125869,"journal":{"name":"The Victorian soldier in Africa","volume":"33 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121123512","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-07-30DOI: 10.7765/9781526137913.00018
Edward M. Spiers
{"title":"Epilogue","authors":"Edward M. Spiers","doi":"10.7765/9781526137913.00018","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526137913.00018","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":125869,"journal":{"name":"The Victorian soldier in Africa","volume":"21 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134140092","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-07-30DOI: 10.7765/9781526137913.00016
E. Spiers
After the costly failure of the Gordon relief expedition, successive British governments retained only a small army of occupation in Egypt and withdrew forces from the southern frontier, the defence of which was left increasingly to the Egyptian Army. The latter was reformed and trained by a cadre of British officers and NCOs and was periodically supported by British units, notably a squadron of the 20th Hussars at the battle of Toski (13 August 1889) and in engagements with Osman Digna’s forces near Suakin. British units were even more prominent in the Sudanese campaigns of the late 1890s; the 1/North Staffordshires served in the Dongola campaign of 1896 and another eight battalions, supported by the 21st Lancers, two batteries of artillery, a machine-gun battery and a flotilla of gunboats served in the Anglo-Egyptian army at Omdurman (2 September 1898). As all these campaigns involved protracted journeys and tedious days spent in barracks or under canvas, soldiers kept diaries, drew sketches, and took numerous photographs. They were also prolific correspondents, and, in some cases, wrote campaign histories based partially on their firsthand experience. They explained how the logistic problems of operating in the Sudan were overcome and how an Anglo-Egyptian army defeated the forces of the Khalifa. Some of these letters have been reproduced, others have embellished well-known accounts of the campaign, particularly those commemorating the centenary of the battle of Omdurman; but the surviving correspondence is even more voluminous than these sources suggest. Although most material derives from the 1898 campaign, the earlier letters and diaries provide a comparative context, indicating how the experience of soldiering in the Sudan evolved over a decade. As most of the Gordon relief expedition began to depart, Private Francis Ferguson (20th Hussars) reconciled himself to a long tour of duty in Egypt. He anticipated another twelve months but would ultiC H A P T E R E I G H T
{"title":"Reconquering the Sudan","authors":"E. Spiers","doi":"10.7765/9781526137913.00016","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526137913.00016","url":null,"abstract":"After the costly failure of the Gordon relief expedition, successive British governments retained only a small army of occupation in Egypt and withdrew forces from the southern frontier, the defence of which was left increasingly to the Egyptian Army. The latter was reformed and trained by a cadre of British officers and NCOs and was periodically supported by British units, notably a squadron of the 20th Hussars at the battle of Toski (13 August 1889) and in engagements with Osman Digna’s forces near Suakin. British units were even more prominent in the Sudanese campaigns of the late 1890s; the 1/North Staffordshires served in the Dongola campaign of 1896 and another eight battalions, supported by the 21st Lancers, two batteries of artillery, a machine-gun battery and a flotilla of gunboats served in the Anglo-Egyptian army at Omdurman (2 September 1898). As all these campaigns involved protracted journeys and tedious days spent in barracks or under canvas, soldiers kept diaries, drew sketches, and took numerous photographs. They were also prolific correspondents, and, in some cases, wrote campaign histories based partially on their firsthand experience. They explained how the logistic problems of operating in the Sudan were overcome and how an Anglo-Egyptian army defeated the forces of the Khalifa. Some of these letters have been reproduced, others have embellished well-known accounts of the campaign, particularly those commemorating the centenary of the battle of Omdurman; but the surviving correspondence is even more voluminous than these sources suggest. Although most material derives from the 1898 campaign, the earlier letters and diaries provide a comparative context, indicating how the experience of soldiering in the Sudan evolved over a decade. As most of the Gordon relief expedition began to depart, Private Francis Ferguson (20th Hussars) reconciled himself to a long tour of duty in Egypt. He anticipated another twelve months but would ultiC H A P T E R E I G H T","PeriodicalId":125869,"journal":{"name":"The Victorian soldier in Africa","volume":"76 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123046114","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-07-30DOI: 10.7765/9781526137913.00009
E. Spiers
‘Wolseley’s march to Kumasi’ has been described as ‘one of the military dramas of the Victorian age’. Britain exercised an informal protectorate over parts of the Gold Coast from the early 1830s, the feverridden region traditionally known as ‘a white man’s grave’. As two previous British expeditions in 1823 and 1863–64 had suffered serious losses, the Colonial Office resolved not to send another British force to the Gold Coast, even after the Asante (pronounced Ashanti) invaded the protectorate in 1873. Although a composite force headed by a detachment of Marines under Colonel Festing thwarted the invasion at Elmina (13 June 1873), panic gripped the authorities at Cape Coast Castle. On 13 August the British Government appointed Sir Garnet Wolseley as administrator and commander-in-chief on the Gold Coast and despatched him, with twenty-seven special-service officers, to work with the local Fante tribesmen to resist the Asante. Following his arrival in September, Wolseley promptly requested British reinforcements, planned a short campaign over the less hazardous months of December, January and February, and then decisively defeated the Asante in battle before sacking their capital, Kumase (6 February 1874). He earned enormous plaudits for this campaign, which cost under £800,000 and involved minimal casualties. Yet the campaign aroused its share of controversy, both at the time and subsequently. While special correspondents, such as Henry M. Stanley and Winwoode Reade, berated the failure of his transport arrangements and the risks involved in a prompt evacuation of Kumase, some modern commentators argue that Wolseley discounted the military worth of the Fante precipitately. Few deny that Wolseley and his forces conducted a remarkable campaign, overcoming formidable natural obstacles while incurring relatively few casualties, and several commentators, taking their cue from Cardwell, regard this campaign as a vindication of his reforms. In reviewing the experiences of some thirty-five officers and men from all C H A P T E R O N E
{"title":"Fighting the Asante","authors":"E. Spiers","doi":"10.7765/9781526137913.00009","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526137913.00009","url":null,"abstract":"‘Wolseley’s march to Kumasi’ has been described as ‘one of the military dramas of the Victorian age’. Britain exercised an informal protectorate over parts of the Gold Coast from the early 1830s, the feverridden region traditionally known as ‘a white man’s grave’. As two previous British expeditions in 1823 and 1863–64 had suffered serious losses, the Colonial Office resolved not to send another British force to the Gold Coast, even after the Asante (pronounced Ashanti) invaded the protectorate in 1873. Although a composite force headed by a detachment of Marines under Colonel Festing thwarted the invasion at Elmina (13 June 1873), panic gripped the authorities at Cape Coast Castle. On 13 August the British Government appointed Sir Garnet Wolseley as administrator and commander-in-chief on the Gold Coast and despatched him, with twenty-seven special-service officers, to work with the local Fante tribesmen to resist the Asante. Following his arrival in September, Wolseley promptly requested British reinforcements, planned a short campaign over the less hazardous months of December, January and February, and then decisively defeated the Asante in battle before sacking their capital, Kumase (6 February 1874). He earned enormous plaudits for this campaign, which cost under £800,000 and involved minimal casualties. Yet the campaign aroused its share of controversy, both at the time and subsequently. While special correspondents, such as Henry M. Stanley and Winwoode Reade, berated the failure of his transport arrangements and the risks involved in a prompt evacuation of Kumase, some modern commentators argue that Wolseley discounted the military worth of the Fante precipitately. Few deny that Wolseley and his forces conducted a remarkable campaign, overcoming formidable natural obstacles while incurring relatively few casualties, and several commentators, taking their cue from Cardwell, regard this campaign as a vindication of his reforms. In reviewing the experiences of some thirty-five officers and men from all C H A P T E R O N E","PeriodicalId":125869,"journal":{"name":"The Victorian soldier in Africa","volume":"85 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-07-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124134293","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2017-03-01DOI: 10.7765/9781526137913.00013
E. Spiers
Gladstone’s Government consolidated victory at Tel-el-Kebir by establishing a temporary military occupation of Egypt (both to protect the Suez Canal and to preserve internal order in Egypt). Given the minimal size of the army of occupation, the arrangement worked conveniently within Egypt but difficulties soon arose when Egypt, on behalf of the Porte, sought to crush the rebellion launched by Mohammad Ahmed – the Mahdi, or ‘Expected One’, in the Sudan. Egypt employed a retired British officer, Lieutenant-General William Hicks, to lead an army of 11,000 men against the Mahdists, an offensive that ended in spectacular failure on the plain of Shaykan, near El Obeid (5 November 1883), where his army was annihilated with only a few hundred survivors. As the rebels threatened further towns, including Khartoum, Gladstone’s cabinet wanted to evacuate the remaining Egyptian garrisons from the Sudan. Confronting a popular outcry fanned by the influential Pall Mall Gazette, it responded by sending Major-General Charles ‘Chinese’ Gordon (18 January 1884) up the Nile to ‘consider and report’ on the situation. In eastern Sudan, however, where the British wished to retain the Red Sea ports round Suakin (both for their commercial value and to prevent them becoming outlets for the slave trade), the Beja tribes (including the Hadendowa, Amarar, Bisharin and others) under Osman Digna commanded the trade route to Berber and besieged the garrisons of Sinkat and Tokar. The Mahdists destroyed another Egyptian relief force under Major-General Valentine Baker at El Teb (4 February 1884) and overwhelmed the garrison of Sinkat four days later as it tried to march to the coast. The slaughter of Egyptian soldiers and civilians from Sinkat, with the capture of their women and children, aroused fervent demands for intervention, not least from Queen Victoria. Gladstone, according to his private secretary, reluctantly agreed to send a British relief force to Tokar; ‘It is’, added Edward Hamilton, ‘in a small way a response to the unreasonable cries of public feeling.’ C H A P T E R F I V E
{"title":"Engaging the Mahdists","authors":"E. Spiers","doi":"10.7765/9781526137913.00013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526137913.00013","url":null,"abstract":"Gladstone’s Government consolidated victory at Tel-el-Kebir by establishing a temporary military occupation of Egypt (both to protect the Suez Canal and to preserve internal order in Egypt). Given the minimal size of the army of occupation, the arrangement worked conveniently within Egypt but difficulties soon arose when Egypt, on behalf of the Porte, sought to crush the rebellion launched by Mohammad Ahmed – the Mahdi, or ‘Expected One’, in the Sudan. Egypt employed a retired British officer, Lieutenant-General William Hicks, to lead an army of 11,000 men against the Mahdists, an offensive that ended in spectacular failure on the plain of Shaykan, near El Obeid (5 November 1883), where his army was annihilated with only a few hundred survivors. As the rebels threatened further towns, including Khartoum, Gladstone’s cabinet wanted to evacuate the remaining Egyptian garrisons from the Sudan. Confronting a popular outcry fanned by the influential Pall Mall Gazette, it responded by sending Major-General Charles ‘Chinese’ Gordon (18 January 1884) up the Nile to ‘consider and report’ on the situation. In eastern Sudan, however, where the British wished to retain the Red Sea ports round Suakin (both for their commercial value and to prevent them becoming outlets for the slave trade), the Beja tribes (including the Hadendowa, Amarar, Bisharin and others) under Osman Digna commanded the trade route to Berber and besieged the garrisons of Sinkat and Tokar. The Mahdists destroyed another Egyptian relief force under Major-General Valentine Baker at El Teb (4 February 1884) and overwhelmed the garrison of Sinkat four days later as it tried to march to the coast. The slaughter of Egyptian soldiers and civilians from Sinkat, with the capture of their women and children, aroused fervent demands for intervention, not least from Queen Victoria. Gladstone, according to his private secretary, reluctantly agreed to send a British relief force to Tokar; ‘It is’, added Edward Hamilton, ‘in a small way a response to the unreasonable cries of public feeling.’ C H A P T E R F I V E","PeriodicalId":125869,"journal":{"name":"The Victorian soldier in Africa","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2017-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116242807","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：