CHAPTER IX

THE ADVANCE TO MBOMBOMYA AND BEKA

On the morning of Wednesday, the 19th September, the Gold Coast Regiment quitted its camp at Liwinda Ravine. At 6 a.m. A Company and half the Pioneer Company, with which was the 27th Mountain Battery, set out for Kitiia, under the command of Major Shaw. Kitiia, as has been mentioned, lies five miles to the east of the camp at Liwinda Ravine, and three miles to the west of Mihambia, and is connected with both by a footpath leading through the grass, tree-set scrub, and occasional bush. It was the function of this little force, as soon as it had obtained touch with the 2nd Battalion of the 2nd Regiment of the King’s African Rifles, which was advancing upon Mihambia along the main road from Gregg’s Post, to move off the footpath into the high grass and bush, and to endeavour to fall upon the left flank and rear of the enemy’s position. Major Shaw also had instructions to send sixty rifles from Kitiia to act independently, with the German porters’ camp, which was situated to the south of their fortified position at Mihambia, as its objective.

Major Shaw’s force reached Kitiia without incident, and shortly afterwards got into touch with the right of the King’s African Rifles. It then quitted the track, and working its way through the grass and scrub and between the trees on a compass bearing, advanced toward Mihambia. In traversing country of this description, where no extended view in any direction is obtainable, it is always a matter of great difficulty to strike the exact objective aimed at; and on this occasion, when Major Shaw arrived in the vicinity of Mihambia, it was to find himself in front of the enemy’s left, instead of on his flank or to his rear. A Company and half the Pioneers, however, forthwith attacked, and the 27th Mountain Battery came into action. Simultaneously, the King’s African Rifles joined in the attack.

The enemy’s position at Mihambia very generally resembled that which he had taken up two months earlier at Narungombe. Here, however, the water-holes were in the valley, and the enemy’s fortifications were drawn along the crest of the hill which sloped up from them, and lay astride the main road leading from Narungombe. On his left there rose an isolated hill which did not appear at this time to be occupied.

The attack was delivered with vigour, and the water-holes passed at once into the hands of the British. The enemy, moreover, did not make a very stout resistance; and as he began to fall back, Major Shaw sought permission to occupy the isolated hill on the right of the attack, of which mention has already been paid, which commanded the main road. Some delay occurred before leave to execute this movement could be obtained, and when at last the occupation of this eminence was attempted, the enemy was found to be holding it in great strength, and the whole of the rest of the day was spent in vain attempts to dislodge him. So stout a resistance did he offer, indeed, that the British advance was definitely arrested, the troops being forced to dig themselves in, and it was not until an hour or two before dawn on the 20th September that the enemy eventually retreated down the main road in a southerly direction.

Meanwhile Colonel Rose, with the remainder of the Gold Coast Regiment, had marched from the camp in the Liwinda Ravine in a southerly direction, and had occupied Nambunjo Hill, overlooking the main road between Mpingo and Mnitshi, and situated some two and a half miles to the west of it. An hour after the Regiment left Liwinda Ravine telegraphic communication with Gregg’s Post, and consequently with Colonel Orr, who was commanding No. 1 Column, was interrupted.

At 8.30 a.m. B Company, which was acting as advance guard, reached a path leading to Mbombomya, and an officer’s patrol, under Lieutenant Woods, was sent down this track with orders to lay an ambush, and to protect the flank and right rear of the Regiment. A second officer’s patrol, under Lieutenant S. B. Smith, was sent forward with orders to attempt to surprise the enemy’s signal-station on the hill near Mpingo, and then to push on south to Mnitshi, five miles further down the main road. Lieutenant Woods’ patrol came into touch with the enemy within three-quarters of an hour from the time when he left the main body of the Regiment. He shortly afterwards reported that the enemy in front of him were few in numbers, but that they were resisting his advance and were fighting a series of small rear-guard actions. He was instructed that his chief duty was to guard the track from Mbombomya, and that he should dig himself in and endeavour to protect the flank and right rear of the Regiment.

Meanwhile, at 11 a.m. Major Shaw reported by telegraph that he had got into touch with the King’s African Rifles at 9.45 a.m., but shortly afterwards telegraphic communication ceased, and it was subsequently discovered that the line had been cut and that about a mile of wire had been removed. The Regiment was now cut off from all communication with the forces with which it was co-operating. This, however, did not long continue, and by midday the telegraphic connection with No. 1 Column was restored.

Nambunjo Hill was reached at 2.45 p.m., and a perimeter camp was established there.

At 5.15 p.m. word was received from Lieutenant Smith that his attempt to surprise the signal-station at Mpingo Hill had failed, and that as the position was too strongly held for his small force to attempt an attack upon it, he had withdrawn, and was lying up in the bush at a spot overlooking the main road in the neighbourhood of Mpingo. Already at 2.30 p.m. ninety rifles of B Company, under Captain Methven, had been sent forward to pick up Lieutenant Smith’s patrol, and to try to get astride the main road; and at 5 p.m. his party became heavily engaged with the enemy. Instructions were sent to him to attempt to advance toward Mihambia, as No. 1 Column reported that they had been held up by the enemy, posted on the hill already mentioned, and had been compelled to dig themselves in. Meanwhile, however, Lieutenant Smith’s patrol had been having a very hot time of it. His position was located by the enemy, his patrol was almost completely surrounded, and he only succeeded in extricating it with great difficulty, and joined Captain Methven, who was then at a spot about a mile and a half south of Mihambia, at about 5.30 p.m. Any further advance in the direction of Mihambia was rendered impossible owing to the thickness of the bush and the rapid approach of darkness. Moreover, like the whole of Colonel Rose’s command, this detachment had long ago exhausted its supply of water, and the men were suffering acutely from thirst.

At 6.15 p.m. Lieutenant Woods’ patrol on the Mbombomya road was strongly attacked by one full company of the enemy with two machine-guns, and was compelled to fall back, his men, who had been fighting all day, being also much exhausted for want of water. Captain McElligott, with a section of I Company, was sent out at once with orders to entrench themselves astride the track from Mbombomya, and to hold on at all costs, so as to protect the flank and right rear of the Regiment on Nambunjo Hill.

The whole of Colonel Rose’s command was now very hard up for rations, but above all for water, and though supplies of both had been wired for to No. 1 Column, nothing reached them that night.

At 3 a.m., on the 20th September, Lieutenant Parker left for the camp at Liwinda Ravine with all the available carriers to fetch rations and water, which No. 1 Column reported it was dispatching from Mihambia at 5 o’clock that morning. At dawn, too, Captain McElligott sent forward a patrol from his entrenched position on the track leading to Mbombomya; an officer’s patrol under Lieutenant Baillie was dispatched to the main road, with orders to remain under cover, and to watch the movements of the enemy; and a third patrol was sent out towards Kitiia to try and establish touch with Major Shaw’s detachment.

Soon after 8 a.m. it was learned that the enemy had evacuated his trenches at Mihambia, and Colonel Rose was instructed to occupy Mbombomya as soon as water and rations had reached him, and his force was once more in a position to advance.

At 8 a.m. also Captain Wray, with a second section of I Company, was sent to reinforce Captain McElligott and to take over the command of the post, and at about 9.30 a.m. he became engaged with the enemy. Shortly before, word was received that No. 1 Column would advance down the main road from Mihambia at noon for the purpose of occupying Mnitshi; and Lieutenant Baillie, who had crept to the edge of the road at a point distant some two miles east of that place, reported that the enemy and his porters in large numbers were streaming past him from the direction of Mihambia towards Mpingo. The enemy south of Mihambia, however, was covering his retreat by fighting a rear-guard action with his machine-guns.

At 11.20 a.m. rations and water at last reached the Gold Coast Regiment, but the 350 _chaquals_ sent were only half-full, and this was all the water available for a force of 1400 men, who had not had a drop beyond the issue made to them on the night of September 18th before they left the camp at Liwinda Ravine. The rations supplied contained provisions for the fighting men only, and left out of the count gun-carriers, stretcher-bearers and the ammunition column. However, rations were pooled, a portion of the emergency rations of the Regiment was thrown into the common stock, and all the men had something to eat and a few gulps of water to drink, though the ration served out was only half a pint per man. The thirst from which one and all were suffering was very acute, and though the men were chewing bits of bark and roots to try to relieve the dryness that was parching mouths and throats and swollen tongues, numbers of them fell exhausted on the ground during the skirmishes fought on this day, and had to be carried in a semi-unconscious condition out of the firing-line.

As soon as the troops in the camp on Nambunjo Hill had been watered and fed, three sections of B Company, under Captain Methven, were sent to reinforce Captain Wray, who was being heavily attacked. His men had been without water for more than twenty-four hours and were terribly exhausted, but they none the less put up a stout fight, in the course of which Captain Wray was severely wounded, and Corporal Issaka Kipalsi showed great pluck and coolness while in command of a party of bombers. On the arrival of Captain Methven’s reinforcements the enemy withdrew.

Meanwhile, the advance of No. 1 Column, with which was Major Shaw and his detachment, had met with considerable resistance, and the position was reported to be “very serious all round.” A telegram was also received from the column stating that though rations were being sent out, it was not possible to dispatch any more water to the camp at Liwinda Ravine. Later in the day it was learned that No. 1 Column had succeeded in advancing as far along the road as Mpingo, but that there was no chance of the water-holes at Mnitshi being captured that day; and Captain Methven also found it impossible to seize the water-holes near Mbombomya before dark. No. 1 Column could supply itself with water from the captured holes at Mihambia, but the position of the Gold Coast Regiment was rapidly becoming desperate. Officers and men alike were agonized by thirst, which was intensified by the heat in this dried-up, arid waste of dust-smothered vegetation, and those of them who had been fighting and patrolling all day were reduced to a state of pitiable exhaustion. If a supply of water could not be obtained early on the morrow a considerable portion of the force would almost inevitably perish of drought in that weary wilderness.

At 6 a.m. on the 21st September, the Pioneer Company with a supply of rations and of water left Mpingo and reached the camp at Nambunjo Hill at 11 a.m., the Battery having simultaneously been sent back to join up with No. 1 Column. Of the 15 _pakhals_ which the Pioneers had brought with them six were one-third full only and eight were only half full. The ration did not amount to half the supply of one hundred and sixty gallons which had been promised, and though it relieved the immediate distress in some slight extent, the whole force was still in a pitiable state of thirst.

As soon as the men had been watered, the Gold Coast Regiment quitted its camp, and moved out to join Captain Methven’s force on some high ground north of Mbombomya village; and Captain Methven with B Company then moved south, cleared the village, and reached the water-holes which lay one and a half miles to the west of it, occupying both places. The water-holes at the village itself were all dry, and those beyond were found, to the intense disappointment of the men, only to contain sufficient water to supply the needs of one company. Fresh holes were dug, but the evening of the 21st September found the Regiment almost as severely racked by thirst as ever, and during the day numbers of the men had completely collapsed. During the night the Mbombomya water-holes only yielded a pitiful supply of ten gallons.

The Regiment on the 22nd September had no alternative but to remain inactive at Mbombomya awaiting water which No. 1 Column reported it had forwarded to it; but B Company sent out patrols towards Kihindo Juu and Ndessa, and to the main road between Mnitshi and Marenjende, some ten miles south of Mihambia. Information was also sent to Colonel Rose that the Nigerian Brigade had been at a point four and a half miles west-south-west of Mawerenye—a place some seven miles down the road from Marenjende—at 9.30 that morning; and that No. 2 Column was at Kitandi to the east of them, based upon Ndessa Juu for its water supply, The Gold Coast Regiment was ordered to move upon Ndessa Chini as soon as possible after it had received the supply of water which had been dispatched to it, and to reach that place by travelling _viâ_ Marenjende on the main road.

During the afternoon two officers’ patrols from No. 2 Column came into the camp of the Gold Coast Regiment at Mbombomya.

Before nightfall some 800 to 1000 gallons of water reached the Gold Coast Regiment from Mihambia, and the long agony which the men had so patiently endured was at last sensibly relieved. There is no physical privation which human beings in the tropics can experience that is in any way comparable in the intensity of suffering which it occasions to lack of water. Such a shortage can only occur in the hot weather, at a season when the atmosphere is so abnormally dry that a man may feel his very eyebrows lift and stiffen as the last, least drop of moisture is sucked from out of them. All about lies a parched and arid wilderness, here and there blackened by bush-fires, where the leafless trees provide no shade, an environment the very dustiness of which alone occasions an abnormal sensation of thirst; and the air is charged with ashes and with minute particles of dust, that seem to penetrate and dry up every pore of the skin. Perspiration evaporates almost before it has time to form upon your rough and cracking skin; and your whole body is subjected to a desiccative process that sets nature clamouring for constant artificial irrigation. If water be available men swill it in unimaginable quantities, and repeat the operation at frequent intervals; but if there be no water, the thought of it—the dream and vision of it—presently absorb the whole of your mental faculties. You may nail your attention to other things, may be deeply occupied by work that ordinarily would engross your whole mind, but throughout, at the back of it all, you are conscious of an insistent need that dwarfs all other things, and for the moment is the one agonizing reality. For you now thirst no longer only with parched mouth, swollen tongue, cracking lips and throat that is dry as a lime-kiln, for each individual pore is gaping and aching with drought which every passing minute renders more acute and unendurable. Such trifles as the discomfort of accumulating dirt which cannot be washed away hardly affect you; the craving to drink has blotted out all other physical sensations. You realize that you are treading a road along which, perilously close ahead, madness lies in ambush.

It says much for the discipline of the men, and for the trust which they repose in their officers that, during those appalling days between the morning of the 19th and the afternoon of the 22nd September, none deserted, straying away from the force on an insane quest for water.

On the 23rd September the Regiment left Mbombomya, and on its arrival at Ndessa Juu, which place was reached without incident, it learned that the Nigerian Brigade, which was working its way southward cutting a path through the bush by means of which its mechanical transport could follow it, had on the preceding day been very heavily engaged with the enemy at a place called Bweho Chini, which lies ten miles away from Riale and to the west of the main road. The Nigerians, it was subsequently ascertained, had here come into collision with the main German forces, under von Lettow-Vorbeck, which had attacked their camp in great strength at about 4.30 p.m., and had continued the assault upon it at intervals until midnight. The enemy suffered very heavy losses and drew off just as the Nigerians’ supply of ammunition threatened to give out. His defeat did much to shatter his _morale_, and though he subsequently put up some good fights before he crossed the Rovuma River into Portuguese territory, the severe handling which he received at Bweho Chini may be said to have definitely started him “on the run.”

At Ndessa Juu large water-holes were found, and the men of the Regiment were able properly to satisfy their thirst at last. Here also some Indian troops belonging to “Hanforce” were met, and touch was resumed with the mechanical transport, which meant that the men and the carriers, who had been on very short commons ever since the 19th September, once more received full rations.

On the 24th September, the Regiment left Ndessa at 2 p.m. and reached Kitandi, where it camped for the night after a three hours’ march. No trace of the enemy was seen during the day.

On the morrow the Regiment marched to Bweho Chini—the scene of the big fight which the Nigerians had had with von Lettow-Vorbeck’s main force on the 22nd September—where junction was effected with No. 1 Column. The rest of the Regiment, under Major Shaw, however, was not in camp, as it was holding an outpost some five miles away from Bweho on a track leading to Beka.

During these two days Lieutenants Bussell and Shaw, Sergeants Campbell and Payne and 71 rank and file joined the Regiment from the Depôt Company at Mpara, and Captain Benham, 14 rank and file, and 5 carriers were evacuated sick.

On the 26th September No. 1 Column marched at dawn, the Gold Coast Regiment acting as the advanced guard, with Major Shaw’s detachment, which consisted of A Company, working independently in advance of the column. The immediate objective was Nahungu, a place which lies on the main road and on the left bank of the Mbemkuru River, ten miles south-south-west of Bweho Chini. The enemy were known to have a prepared position of great strength at this place, which is a point where several tracks meet and where the main road on both sides is overlooked by hills.

Major Shaw gained touch with the enemy at 7.30 a.m., and from that time onward the Germans fought a series of rear-guard actions, their whole object on this day and during the operations which immediately followed being, as was afterwards made clear, to cover the retreat of their main body with their baggage, train of porters, and the numerous wounded whom they had borne away from the hard-fought field of Bweho Chini.

At 10.30 a.m., B Company, under Captain Methven, was sent to join up with A Company under Major Shaw, and the latter was instructed to try to push the enemy rear-guard back upon Nahungu. It was expected that the Nigerian Brigade would be at Naiku River, some six or seven miles north of Nahungu.

It presently became evident, however, that Nahungu was too far off for the column to be able to deliver an attack upon it that day; and the advance guard received instructions to select a site for a camp early in the afternoon. Accordingly, No. 1 Column camped at Beka, and the night passed without incident.

Since the 19th September the Gold Coast Regiment had sustained the following casualties: Captain Wray severely wounded, Lieutenant Percy wounded, 8 soldiers killed, 22 wounded, and 1 carrier killed and 3 wounded.

With the arrival at Beka the first phase of the push south which had been begun on the 19th September may be said to have come to an end, a new one opening on the 27th September with the projected attack upon the enemy stronghold at Nahungu. So far, the enemy’s right, against which No. 1 Column had been operating, had been driven from Mihambia, some thirteen miles south to the banks of the Mbemkuru River, a few miles north-west of which his main body had come into such disastrous collision with the Nigerian Brigade. He had now fallen back up the valley of the Mbemkuru for a further distance of fourteen miles to Nahungu, the general line of his retreat being in a south-westerly direction. Sixty miles to the east of Nahungu was the port of Lindi, whence a large force under General Beves was fighting its way, through very hilly and difficult country, along the road leading to von Lettow-Vorbeck’s headquarters at Massassi, the general line of this advance being parallel to the enemy’s line of retreat up the valley of the Mbemkuru River. Massassi itself lay only some five and sixty miles south of Nahungu, and if it could be captured before the end of the dry season, the expulsion of the Germans from their East African possessions would have been practically effected.