Death on a Pale Horse - By Donald Thomas Page 0,29

preoccupied by my onward journey and my passage through the mountain passes to Kandahar. How trivial was the legend of “Colonel” Moran when compared with the scenes I was soon to witness in that fateful battle of Maiwand!

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I need not dwell on that infamous encounter of two armies, except in so far as it affected my own future. Sufficient to say that after the death of the latest Amir of Afghanistan, his son Ayub Khan rose up against his brother, the lawful successor. His first target was the old capital, Kandahar, where our regiment had been cooling its heels. Ayub was still forty miles off, but with a growing army and a detachment of artillery. He far outnumbered us. Our own “loyal” Afghan troops were deserting to him by battalions at a time. Even so, in July we were part of a brigade ten thousand strong under Brigadier George Burrows, ordered forward to cut off our enemy’s advance. And so I came to the Helmand, the desert and scrub that lie west of Kandahar.

Two mornings later, we woke to find that our remaining Afghans had deserted, down to the last man. Our flank on the Helmand River was open to attack. General Burrows must confront Ayub that morning, before matters grew worse. So our column turned towards Maiwand, eleven miles off, rough hills on one side and the Registan desert on the other.

There were no fortifications at this site. We should have to fight in the open wherever the two sides met. And so it was. The battle lasted from just after eleven o’clock in the morning, when the artillery on both sides opened fire, until about three o’clock in the afternoon. By then, Ayub’s followers had increased to some 25,000 men, against our 10,000, and his reserves were easily able to outflank us.

General Burrows had got us into this fix, but the folly of the British Army in the east was to rely on mercenaries. Three quarters of our infantry that day were still Afghan or Indian troops. They had no taste for fighting their own people. Turning tail almost at once, they caused fearful disorder as they fell back through the ranks of the British infantry.

On every horizon, Ayub Khan’s banners flew above dark masses of his riflemen. He had lured us into terrain where there was little cover from enemy fire except among the desert thorn-bushes. The 66th Foot took shelter as best it could along the river water-courses, which were bone-dry in the summer heat. The Grenadiers crouched or lay in the open.

In my own case, our regimental field hospital was under canvas and sheltered in a shallow ravine. Two medical orderlies were my only assistants. There were so many casualties in the first hour that the best I could do in most cases was to apply temporary dressings, leaving surgery to be carried out when the firing stopped.

My own wound came towards the end of the conflict. The last time I had looked at my watch, it was half-past two. I had been on my feet for more than three hours. By this time, the jezailchees had outflanked our position. No part of the camp was now beyond the range of their rifles. Half a dozen times, a bullet entered our tent with a zippp! as it punctured the canvas. I had been advised not to flinch from this sound. At such speed, the bullet that you hear is never the one that hits you.

I was stooping over poor Major Vandeleur of the 7th Fusiliers, whose chest wound extended into his lung. Before I could do more for him, I felt as if someone had punched me hard enough in the back of the right shoulder to knock me off balance. I was about to twist round and give the offender a piece of my mind when I saw splashes of blood on my overall and collecting on the ground. What I had felt was a bullet that pierced the green canvas of the tent, smashed my shoulder bone, and grazed the sub-clavial artery.

With my right arm done for, all hope of treating my patients was gone. There were three casualties in the dressing station at the time. Two were walking wounded, and the major was stretched before me. I made arrangements for one stretcher and two pairs of sticks. Then I allowed the orderly to dress my own wound as well as time allowed. To my great sorrow, Vandeleur died of his wounds soon