Rorke's Drift By Those Who Were There: Volume I

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I have not got Sheldon Halls book, so I cannot read it for reference, however, I do note that you say that Sheldon said, "The film is faithful ONLY to the broad general outlines and BASIC sequence of events of the battle of Rorke's Dift. MANY details, including ALL the characterisations, were wholly INVENTED and MANY incidents EMBELLISHED and FICTIONALISED for dramitic effect. You also said that the draft script called for the men to sing an "old Welsh march", One could ask WHY???? Was this not to give the impression that the 24th regiment was Welsh? Those Zulus were an enemy that it was some credit to us to have defeated. Their bravery and courage could not have been excelled, and their military organisation and their discipline might have given a lesson to more civilised nations. Cruel and savage as they were, the Zulus were, however, a gallant enemy." What defines a nationality ? Is it where a person is born; is it where the person’s father was born ?; is it where he lives ?; is it where he works ?; is it where he “feels” he is from?; is it where the soldier enlists ?; etc, etc. To get a definitive answer you would have to apply the same criteria to EACH individual, and quite frankly the information to do that is just not available. So, just because a soldier says he’s from Merthyr Tydfil, is not proof that he was Welsh !! Nor because he’s called Jones, or Evans, etc. And how accurate are the enlistment records ? The documentation may well have been done by someone who was not a Welsh speaker, and it is much easier for a “Sais” (Englishman) to write down and spell, for example, “Monmouth” rather than “Pontllanfraith”

On 22 January 1879, as one of the greatest disasters to befall British troops of the Victorian era was nearing its conclusion at Isandlwana, a very different story was about to unfold a few miles away at the mission station of Rorke’s Drift. In the aftermath of the battle, modesty and graciousness were two other attributes displayed by both officers, as demonstrated in this quote from Chard: The events surrounding the assault on Rorke's Drift were first dramatised by military painters, notably Elizabeth Butler (in The Defence of Rorke's Drift (1880)) and Alphonse de Neuville (also titled The Defence of Rorke's Drift (1880)). Their work was vastly popular in their day among the citizens of the British empire. I would question this as a fact. In 1870 the Army Enlistment Act reduced the amount of time spent with the colours from 12 to 6 years. Let’s say there were 1700 men serving with the two battalions of the 24th in 1870. On average, one twelfth of these men would leave (being time served) each year from 1870. So by 1879, over a period of 9 years, some 1270 “long service” men would have been replaced by 1270 “short service” men. Thus in 1879, 74% of both battalions would in fact be “short service” men and nearly 850 of these (that is, about 50% of the men serving in 1879) would have done their training at Brecon !!!! These are of course mathematical average figures – the actual figures could be gleaned by going through the enlistment details of each of the men who served in the 24th from 1870 to 1879, but they are not going to produce substantially different figures. Join Zulu War expert Ian Knight as he draws on first-hand accounts from the Battle of Rorke’s Drift to offer fresh insights into the experiences of those involved.

David, Dr. Saul. Zulu: The True Story. BBC . Retrieved 29 September 2011. {{ cite book}}: |work= ignored ( help) At the end of the fighting, 400 Zulus lay dead on the battlefield. Only 17 British were killed, but almost every man in the garrison had sustained some kind of wound. [16] hours prior to Rorke's Drift, the Zulus had massacred 1300 British soldiers at iSandlwana, about 6 miles away. Survivors from this massacre passed by Rorke's Drift as they were fleeing, telling the men there what was coming their way. There are many details missing from the film, well there is only so much you can fit in, and some things were outright untrue. Hook wasn't a criminal and drunk, he was a teetotaller and his reason for being in the hospital to defend it so gallantly? He was the hospital cook, and not a malingerer. C/Sgt Bourne was in his 20's and known as 'the kid' being the youngest man of that rank in the entire army.

At about 4:00p.m., Surgeon James Reynolds, Otto Witt – the Swedish missionary who ran the mission at Rorke's Drift – and army chaplain Reverend George Smith came down from the Oscarberg hillside with the news that a body of Zulus was fording the river to the southeast and was "no more than five minutes away". At this point, Witt decided to depart the station, as his family lived in an isolated farmhouse about 30 kilometres (19mi) away, and he wanted to be with them. Witt's native servant, Umkwelnantaba, left with him; so too did one of the hospital patients, Lieutenant Thomas Purvis of the 1st/3rd NNC. His main "revision" is to promote the idea that the Hosvalpital was evacuated in two seperate groups one by Hook and Williams and earlier by R.Jones and W.Jones, all of whom earned teh V.C for their efforts All his claims are supported with quotes from survivor accounts and are credible.

The defence begins

It isn't 'just' their stories, it's Dispatches, newspaper articles, obituaries, casualty lists, honours and awards, court circulars, photos, drawings, letters and don't think the Zulus are left out, oh no they have included statements from some of the Zulu too. By the time the Undi Corps reached Rorke's Drift at 4:30p.m., they had fast-marched some 20 miles (32km) from the morning encampment they had left at around 8 a.m., then to spend some 11.5 hours continuously storming the British fortifications at Rorke's Drift.

It was the thought of that implacable church and its obvious disgust for me … I had learnt this day that God was…a cut above the class to which we belonged. That day, I think, the painter was loosed from its mooring and my faith began a slow drift into non-belief (Prebble 1993: 96). Porter 1889, p. 33, "17 killed and 10 wounded" (including one killed by 'friendly fire' while fleeing the garrison at start of the battle)In regards to RD and iSandlwana, the nationalities of the men of the 24th involved, really is irrelevent. Yes, the 24th's depot had been moved to Brecon by the government in 1873, but both battalions of the regiment had never been there when the Zulu war started in 1879, and both battalions consisted of long term service men, meaning that it would have been well after Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift before newly trained recruits would have started to filter through to the ranks.

The title of the regiment would have been a trivial irrelevence to the men in it, who served the Queen in it both before and after 1879. Whatever their nationality, they would have lived, laughed, ate, slept, fought and died with each other and for each other. This small outpost was defended by a garrison of around 150 British and Imperial troops. So, when a Zulu force of more than 3,000 warriors turned their attention to it, the odds of the British surviving were staggeringly low. Let us just take a look at just one of a multitude of online biographies that anyone can find just by googling "robert jones vc." Wood, M.J. (2009). Leaders and Battles: The Art of Military Leadership. Random House Digital, Inc. p.138. ISBN 9780307537034. Kearney, L. H. (16 March 1940). "40,000 Cheered When Wagstaff's 1914 Team Beat Australians With Eleven Men". Sunday Mail (Brisbane).Henderson then followed his departing men. Upon witnessing the withdrawal of Henderson's NNH troop, Captain Stevenson's NNC company abandoned the cattle kraal and fled, greatly reducing the strength of the defending garrison. [28] Outraged that Stevenson and some of his colonial NCOs [29] had also fled from the barricades, a few British soldiers fired after them, killing Corporal William Anderson. A more uninteresting or more stupid-looking fellow I never saw. Wood (a subordinate of Wolseley) tells me he is a most useless officer, fit for nothing." I think all we can say for certainty is that, because the 24th’s Regimental Depot had been in Brecon since 1873,.and the fact that the Regiment had been given the counties of Cardigan, Radnor, Brecon, and Monmouth for recruiting, then the 24th Regiment would have contained a higher proportion of Welshmen than most other British Regiments (excepting of course the 23rd and 41st Regiments). Sir Garnet Wolseley, taking over as commander-in-chief from Lord Chelmsford later that year, was unimpressed with the awards made to the defenders of Rorke's Drift, saying "it is monstrous making heroes of those who, shut up in buildings at Rorke's Drift, could not bolt and fought like rats for their lives, which they could not otherwise save". [49] Featuring a wide range of first-hand accounts and testimonies from those present during the Battle of Rorke's Drift, Rorke's Drift By Those Who Were There is a remarkable work of Anglo-Zulu military history by those who know the topic best, Lee Stevenson and Ian Knight. This updated edition of the classic work of the same name includes even more first-person accounts from the combatants on both the British and Zulu sides.