OUR LAST GREAT WAR.

PERSONAL NOTES.

BY SIR HENRY LUCY.

SIR JOHN ARDAGH-LORD ROBERTS-REDVERS BULLER-LORD AVA— COLONEL CONGREVE, V.C. - A SEAFORTH HIGHLANDER

SIR

WILLIAM MAC CORMAC LORD EDWARD CECIL-LORD METHUEN—
THE LAST VICTIM OF THE WAR.

THE nomination of Sir John Ardagh as a member of the Royal Commission appointed in the autumn of 1902 for the revision of sentences by court-martial in South Africa was in military circles regarded with suspicion. Designedly or not, it had for the War Office the advantage of withdrawing the Director of Military Intelligence from this country at a time when he might throw valuable light on one of the most important phases of the inquiry into the Boer War. The gravamen of the charge against the Government of the day was that when the struggle commenced they were in a state of almost childish ignorance of the magnitude of the task before them. They cheerfully regarded the campaign as a promenade to Pretoria, where, starting in October, the British troops were, according to their calculation, due to arrive not later than Christmas Day.

The natural inference in view of the disasters that followed was that the Intelligence Department was wholly at fault. Was it? Sir John Ardagh could tell. Fortunately returning home before the Royal Commission had completed its work, he related a simple story incredible on less unquestionable authority.

Previous to his evidence given before the Commission Ardagh was by no means reticent on the subject. Some months after the war commenced, when the bubble of Boer incapacity in the field had been painfully pricked, I happened to sit next to him at dinner at Henry Primrose's. A chance remark about the Intelligence Department elicited an emphatic and startling statement. He assured me that the Department had never been deceived, either as to the strength of the Boers in the field or as to the character of their military equipment. They knew to a gun the measure of

the armament quietly accumulated by the Boers in anticipation of the inevitable struggle. This information was from time to time communicated to the Secretary of State for War whilst preparations for the expedition were going forward. It is not reasonable to suppose Lord Lansdowne, who occupied the post at the time, would hide this light under a bushel. It was his duty, and it would unquestionably be fulfilled, to inform his colleagues in the Cabinet of the actual state of affairs. Yet, as history records, preparations for the mighty task of conquering the Transvaal and the Orange Free State were commenced upon a scale of inadequacy that threatened the safety of the Empire, and led to enormous loss of life and treasure.

Lord Roberts' personal testimony, coming from a different point of observation, confirms this amazing lack of capacity in high places. It was the want of a properly organised transport department that, to the uneasy surprise of the public at home, so long delayed him in Cape Town. It appears, according to his testimony, that no transport scheme was recognised by the War Office for service away from the railways. The only transport provided for the army landed at Cape Town, with the foe beleaguering Kimberley and Ladysmith, was the regimental first and second line, one carrying ammunition and supplies for two days, the other being the water-carts.

We had nothing else,' said Lord Roberts, and it was, of course, impossible, lacking other means of transport, to carry on war in a country where there was no railway to speak of, where we must operate at a distance from the line, where we must have transport for a number of days' supply for men and horses, and carry a certain amount of kit for everybody.'

I remember how, after the real character of the task taken in hand with a light heart was realised, and General Buller was sent out to retrieve serious reverses, the nation, with calm assurance, awaited news of his arrival and subsequent movements.

Renewing an old acquaintance, he dined with us shortly after his return from the seat of war. Happening to speak of the hopes raised by his assumption of supreme command, and of the disappointment that settled down when the days passed and resembled each other inasmuch as there was no forward movement, he told me in full detail the same story Lord Roberts related as to the state of things existing when, months later, he succeeded to the command. As something had been done in the interval to remedy

the oversight of the War Office, Lord Roberts' plight was in degree less desperate than Buller's. For use of the latter there was practically no transport service, and precious months were lost whilst effort was made to patch one up.

Buller deeply felt the official snubbing that fell to his lot on his return from South Africa, a broken man. He was cheered by evidence not infrequently forthcoming that he had not lost the affection of the people of whom a brief twelvemonth earlier he had been the idol. This feeling is reflected in the following letter from Lady Audrey Buller:

'Downes, Crediton, Devonshire, Dec. 10, 1902. 'DEAR MR. LUCY,-I cannot refrain from writing you a linefirst to say how gratified I am by your word in season about Sir Redvers in the paper which has retained the respect of the public more than any now in circulation (Punch). Also I want to ask you if you are aware that wherever Sir Redvers goes at presentwhether in the North of England, the Midland, south, east, west, Scotland, Wales-he has the same enthusiastic reception as that with which his name was greeted in London when the relief of Ladysmith was announced. Instead of the feeling of the people and of the army having cooled with regard to him, it appears to be stronger and warmer than ever. I feel sure you would like to know this.

Believe me, yours very sincerely,

'AUDREY BULLER.'

Of the administration of the War Office in respect of minor details a Lancashire factory owner, the employer of 900 men, told me a little story that would have been incredible prior to the publication of the evidence given before the Royal Commission. When the campaign broke out, a considerable number of his hands volunteered for the front. A couple presented themselves at the recruiting office. One was a prized workman, sober, industrious, strong, and healthy; the other a comparative weakling, who stood low in the scale of workmen. To the delight of the millowner, who greatly grudged his prospective loss, the capable man returned with the news that his companion had been accepted, whilst he was rejected. The grounds for this action were based on the fact that he had lost one of his front teeth, and was therefore ineligible for service in the British Army.

Musing over the mystery, it was remembered that formerly the army was furnished with muzzle-loaders, necessitating the biting VOL. XXXVII.-NO. 220, N.S.

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off of the cartridge before inserting it. Lack of a front tooth prevented a man performing this action, and a decree was promulgated forbidding the enlistment of any man so incapacitated. More than twenty years previous to the outbreak of the Boer War muzzle-loaders were abolished in the army. Every regiment was supplied with breech-loaders, which do not require the biting-off process that incidentally led to the revolt of the Sepoys in India. Nevertheless the regulation, never having been withdrawn, was in force in 1900, and may be so to this day.

Writing after the battle of Elandslaagte, General Ian Hamilton told me something of Lord Ava, son and heir of the Marquis of Dufferin. Reaching the camp at Ladysmith, he found himself unattached. Determined to see some fighting, he besought his friend, Ian Hamilton, to take him on his staff as a galloper. The colonel (as he then ranked) consented, and immediately after General French led out the little force reconnoitring towards Elandslaagte. Here was a splendid opportunity for the young galloper. But a fundamental difficulty presented itself. Lord Ava had no horse, and Ian Hamilton had none to lend him. He was not going to be out of the fight for the matter of a horse. Rifle in hand, he did the 'galloping' on foot, carrying orders to and fro for hours through the hot day.

His last instruction was to convey to the Gordons, lying down on the veldt under a hail of shell and rifle fire, the order to advance. Lord Ava confessed that when he came up to them he was so out of breath that he could hardly pass the word. By way of rest after the morning's work, and as a nice quiet way of regaining his breath, he joined the Gordons in their dauntless attack on the rocky ridge, every line manned with death-dealing Boers. When one ridge was carried at the point of the bayonet, others loomed up behind it. Lord Ava came out of the hell-fire unsinged.

The tale of comrades shot on either side of him is one of the saddest catalogues of the war. He told Ian Hamilton that through it all nothing struck him so much as the grim imperturbability of the Highlanders fighting their way slowly up those terrible ridges. 'They knelt to fire,' he said, 'as coolly and deliberately as if they were on parade.'

I wrote something of the affair in a London letter I at that time contributed to a syndicate of provincial daily papers. I sent a copy to Lord Ava's father, who replied:

'Clandeboye, Co. Down, Dec. 13, '99.

'MY DEAR MR. LUCY,-The notice of Lord Ava has greatly gratified Lady Dufferin and myself and all his friends. It was only to-day that I had a letter from my daughter, Lady Helen (Munro-Ferguson), promising to send me an extract from your letter. I will not fail to tell her of your having so kindly thought of me in connection with the matter.

'We have three sons in Africa-one, a lieutenant in the 9th Lancers, is with Methuen; and, as you know, Ava is shut up in Ladysmith. A third has gone out, happily not to fight, but to write a book at the instance of a confiding and appreciative publisher.

'I only wish I could think he would refrain from poking his nose into danger. But that is a hopeless anticipation, for he will be sure to try to join one or other of his brothers. 'With renewed thanks, believe me,

Yours sincerely,

'DUFFERIN & AVA.'

One of the special correspondents invalided home from the war gave me a vivid account of the actual scene of the fight in which young Ava distinguished himself. Having been through many campaigns in the Soudan and in India, what struck him most was the uncanniness of the whole thing. There was no pomp of war, no stirring music, no gay uniforms, and, strangest thing of all, no visible enemy. What was seen from the standpoint of the British Staff was a number of men clad in khaki dodging their way up a hill, making for cover whenever possible.

Two or three suddenly dropped; perhaps one got up and pressed forward again. The others lay where they fell, dead or sorely wounded. As the Boers always fired from cover and used smokeless powder, there was nowhere sign of them. That he spoke of as a circumstance more than all others tending to demoralise the men. If they are to be shot, they at least like to see something of the enemy if only for the purpose of getting a shot at him. On the veldt there was nothing to be seen when in action save here and there a man falling by unseen agency.

Lord Ava lunched with us at Ashley Gardens on the eve of his departure for the war. He wrote his name on my wife's tablecloth, where it is embroidered among others of wider fame, but none renowned for greater gallantry. He died sword in hand in the desperate fight at Wagon Hill, when a night attack on Ladysmith was repulsed with heavy loss of officers and men, the former in exceptionally high numerical proportion.