Eureka - The Unfinished Revolution (68 page)

‘I had no opportunity of calling upon the people to disperse as the first certainty we had of their exact position was by a volley of musketry being poured in upon us,’ Hackett would later report.

———

Back in the Camp, a small knot of men has gathered at a high spot, gazing earnestly towards the gloomy Eureka – still fully immersed in the black background of Mount Warrenheip. They try in vain to work out just what the flashes in the semi-darkness, the booms of gunfire rolling up to them a few seconds later, can possibly mean.
Just what is happening down there?
All they know for certain from the constant rattling gunfire is that the battle proper has begun.

———

The soldiers keep coming, Captain Pasley on horseback still right in their midst, urging them forward. Highly trained, they are generally capable of getting off three volleys in a minute, though the best of them can fire five shots in that time, their hands a blur of movement as they
load-cap-cock-kneel-and-fire. Load-cap-cock-kneel-and-fire. Load-cap-cock-kneel-and-fire.

All over the diggings the sound of shots, screams and yelling has awoken many. In his own tent, some 150 yards from the Stockade, Raffaello Carboni comes to with a start as the bullets begin to fly past. Then he hears the ‘discharge of musketry – then a round from a bugle – the command “forward!”’, followed by another discharge of musketry. His first reaction is to take shelter by putting the chimney at the end of his tent between himself and the direction of the shooting, but soon enough his passion gets the better of him. At least by his later account – though others would dispute it – he races towards the men and the flag he has sworn to defend.

In their store, Mrs Bridget Shanahan is also awoken by the firing and immediately jostles her husband, yelling, ‘Take out your gun.’ Shanahan does just that and heads out.

Though they are still firing furiously, the soldiers’ advance remains militarily precise. As the skirmishers slowly advance up the hill, the growing light reveals to them the rough contours of the Stockade only – here an upright slab, there the top of the wheel of an upturned dray, beside it a broken Californian cradle – and from its base comes the heavy flashing and powerful roar of shotguns, rifles and pistols. But beyond that there is little detail. However, while the first flush of the still faraway dawn behind the trees at the back of the Stockade to the east keeps the rebels in strong shadows, it places the soldiers in fairly strong light and makes them good targets. And there is firing aplenty, particularly from the 20 or so remaining brave Americans of the Independent California Rangers’ Revolver Brigade, secreted in their shepherds’ holes. They have not flinched at the attack and are proving that the words of Charles Ferguson – ‘If you make a stand, you will not find us wanting’ – were not uttered in vain.

For now these Americans, together with the men of Ross and Thonen particularly, train down fire so ‘sharp and sustained’ that Pasley’s advance is momentarily checked and appears to ‘swerve from its ground’.

The British soldiers, trained from their first days in the army for precisely this situation, give at least as good as they receive, notwithstanding that some of the rebels’ fire – including shots that come from the tents outside the Stockade – are hitting their marks and there is the frequent groan or scream from falling soldiers as they advance.

‘The fire had terrible effect, but we returned it with like effect, as deadly as theirs,’ Ferguson of the Rangers would later write.

Both sides are taking punishment and yet, at this point, it is those in the Stockade who momentarily have the advantage as at least they have partial shelter. The Redcoats and the police on the flanks are exposed, coming up a slope in very good light. And the closer the skirmishers get to the Stockade – now just 50 yards away ten minutes after the battle has begun – the easier they are to hit.

What makes matters even worse for the Redcoats is that they are also taking fire from their flanks, as diggers in tents outside the Stockade draw a bead on them. In fact, to the joy of the diggers, it now becomes apparent that the soldiers’ relentless advance is
not
as relentless as they had feared. Their line is seen to falter and, finally, is ‘arrested for a moment’.

It is the troops of the 40th Regiment who have taken the most punishment, and Captain Henry Wise realises that their situation has become perilous. It is obvious that the longer they take to reach the top of the slope, the more men they will lose. The urgency now is to breach the barricades of the Stockade as soon as possible and fight the rebels at close quarters. Yet his men have wavered and even begun to
back up
as the barrage of bullets start to take its toll, prompting him to cry: ‘Fortieth! Are you going to retreat?’

The gnarled and experienced Sergeant Edward Harris is certainly with Wise and has in fact preceded him in his call of ‘Forward!’ And the youngest of them all, the boy bugler by Wise’s side, ‘took up boldly his stand to the left of the gully’, awaiting further commands. And now even the overall leader of the attack, Captain Thomas, has dismounted and joined Wise’s men – a jolt for the soldiers, as a commanding officer would only so expose himself if the battle hangs in the balance, and even then it is rare. Under those circumstances, how could the veterans of the 40th not form up and rally once more? And rally they do, with Wise taking the lead. Crying out ‘Charge!’, he foregoes firing and with his sword forward – for gentlemen officers do not carry dirty muskets – starts to run straight up the slope, the men under his command following hard.

Behind the Americans in the Stockade, other diggers have now gathered themselves to come forward and fire down the hill, adding to the barrage, before . . .

Before suddenly some of them cry out and fall with splotches of red on their
backs.
In an instant the survivors are aware that shots are now coming from
behind
them! It proves to be Sub-Inspector Samuel Furnell’s mounted police troopers attacking the thinly defended southern end of the Stockade’s western wall, at the spot where Commissioner Amos has led them to, and doing it at a time when they are most needed by the troops who are hopefully about to breach the diggers’ defences. Suddenly some of the fire trained down the gully has to divert to deal with this new threat, allowing Wise and his men a proper chance to attack without being cut to pieces. It is also the moment when many of soldiers who have been held back in reserve now rush forward to replace the fallen. In fact, it is a half dozen of those eager reserves who end up leading the charge towards the Stockade walls, running ‘pell-mell’ into hell.

The air is now filled with the acrid smoke from the muskets, the endless thunder of so many guns firing at once, the whine of outgoing lead balls and the hiss of incoming bullets, the screams of dying and fearfully wounded men, shouts of aggression and fear, and the unearthly shriek of terrified horses.

And there is the wall! Up and over, the half-dozen reserves are the first to breach the defences and enter the Stockade while the diggers under the command of Captain Ross and Captain Thonen are mostly distracted with Furnell’s mounted police attacking their flank.

Alas, once the reserves do get inside the Stockade, they are confronted by diggers only too eager to get at them. What to do now? The obvious . . .

For there is the wall! Up and over, the half-dozen reserves are also the first to now smartly get back over it. By this time, however, the main body of the soldiers has arrived, under the leadership of Captain Wise. These men, too, scramble over the barricade en masse. While some diggers begin to flee for their lives, it is here that the Californians truly come into their own, rushing forward with their Colt revolvers in hand, sometimes firing from the hip, sometimes firing with their arm and hand stretched horizontally before them. True, this daring prevents ‘the riflemen and other comrades from supporting them’, but they do it anyway.

Whatever else, they know they must get close to the soldiers to be any chance of hitting them with these guns, even if it means they take a terrible toll in turn as the soldiers fire their muskets at near point-blank range.

Carnage and confusion now join the battle, sometimes side by side, sometimes clashing fiercely – no-one quite knows. Each blast of the muskets and revolvers from both sides creates so much smoke that a fog of spent ordnance has now enveloped the Stockade.

In the thick of it all, Captain Wise is just shaping to climb up and over the Stockade wall, choosing which spoke of a dray wheel to put his right foot on and . . .

And it is a strange thing to be shot. Not nearly as agonising as one might imagine in the first instance, particularly when, like this bullet, it does not take Wise in one of his vital organs. Rather, a bullet fired from an unknown rebel hits Wise high in the right thigh and is more like a very hard kick that brings him down than anything else. Still, it is not enough to stop him outright and, after quaveringly quipping that forevermore ‘my dancing is spoiled’, he is soon enough up and staggering forward once more. Now that his men are on the rebel wall, with an entirely different kind of battle beckoning, it is obvious what needs to be done. Captain Wise is quick to give the order: ‘Fix bayonets!’

The Redcoats continue to move with superbly trained precision and, with a whip from their hip, take the 22-inch pieces of cruel steel from their scabbards and fit them to the muzzles of their muskets. And then they renew their scramble up and over the Stockade wall.

It is at close quarters that the soldiers are at their most devastating. Having been exposed in the open as they made their way to the Stockade, they are now ready to even accounts. After marching here expecting an easy victory, the infamy of their own men being shot by the rebels – 12 men of the 12th and four of the 40th have fallen in the opening exchanges – fuels the soldiers’ rage. They are intent on revenge from the first.

Suddenly, Private John Sullivan of the 12th Regiment sees a flitting figure ahead – a digger running from tent to tent, trying to keep under cover. Even though the fellow does not appear to be carrying a weapon, Sullivan brings his musket to his shoulder and fires . . . only to hear a throaty cry of agony from beside him.

It is Captain Wise! One of the diggers has just shot him!

Wise had just brought himself to a head-on confrontation with the California Rifle Brigade’s Robert Burnette, who remained right in the thick of it, but the digger had managed to fire first at his opposite number with his Colt revolver. Or was it, in fact, the black American rebel John Joseph with a double-barrelled shotgun? Amidst the chaos, Sullivan is far from sure. Whoever it is, his aim is good, for now a second bullet hits Captain Wise, this one passing through both his legs around the knees. The English officer goes down, crippled.

Beside Wise, two other Redcoats fall grievously wounded as the rebels’ vicious volley hits them, while another two also suffer bloody wounds. Charles Hackett, who is right in the thick of the action despite not bearing a weapon, races to Wise’s aid but is roughly pushed aside by Sergeant Daniel Hegarty of the 40th, who drags Wise to some cover, where he tries in vain to stem the good Captain’s copious bleeding.

If the soldiers hesitate momentarily at this point after taking such punishment, that hesitation is soon dispelled as Captain Thomas again shows daring in the midst of doubt. With his yell of ‘Come on 40th!’, the men sally forth with at least this part of the battle in the balance, for the diggers are at their best in hand-to-hand fighting and using their pistols at close quarters. The pikemen are also holding their own, their weapons far outreaching the soldiers’ bayonets.

Overall, however, the number of firearms levelled against the diggers is devastating. As described by Lynch, ‘Our left being unprotected, the troopers seized the advantage, wheeled round, and took us in the rear. We were then placed between two fires, and further resistance was useless.’

That is certainly the view of many a digger who, in the face of flying bullets and flashing bayonets, finds that his bravado of the last week has completely deserted him. Dropping their weapons, they surge over the south-eastern barricades themselves in the rough direction of Warrenheip Gully. With the enemy coming at them from all angles, it is time to get out and save their lives at least.

From a distance, Raffaello Carboni sees the vision of ‘long-legged Vern’ – he who seemed to talk with such knowledge about military tactics and stratagems – floundering ‘across the stockade eastward’. It seems the German has decided that the best tactic on this occasion is to head for the hills just as fast as those legs can carry him, also in the direction of Warrenheip.

When Californian Charles Ferguson calls out after the Hanoverian for him to stop and fight, Vern yells back over his shoulder that he is running ‘to stop the others’. Ferguson is not convinced.

Captain John Lynch would write of Vern’s action at this point: ‘How he escaped from the enclosure is indeed a mystery; but not so his action outside. Those who saw him run averred that his performance was such as to suggest a past-mastership in the art of desertion.’

So much for the man who wanted to be the Commander-in-Chief. Carboni and Ferguson are not the only ones appalled, as one Patrick Curtain orders a rebel rifleman to shoot him, but on the instant it is too late – Vern has disappeared and the battle is soon raging all around. Those who don’t flee at least have plenty of fight left in them. (To be fair to Vern, at least he had been present and done his best. The same could not be said of Tom Kennedy. Despite his magnificent oratory, the lugs of the Redcoats will go entirely unlicked by him, and again it is John Lynch who would later assert, ‘When the time came to put his principles into action he was absent from his post; and the story ran that he prudently withdrew from the scene of danger to seek safety in the seclusion of a pipe-clay cross-drive in a blind shaft.’)