The Ganthoran Gambit (The First Admiral Series)

THE GANTHORAN GAMBIT

Part Four of the First Admiral Series

Copyright © 2013 by William J. Benning

Edited by Ivan Ciano

Cover Copyright © 2013 by Andrae Harrison

ISBN-13: 
978-1623750572

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Discipline averts disasters
, knew Billy Caudwell, or, rather, the part of his mind that was the long-dead Garmaurian First Admiral; Teg Skarral Portan.

The south wall was on the point of collapse, and Billy knew that if it fell, the Zulus could roll up the entire British position. What had been a stalwart defensive position would become a rat trap, with the British and Native soldiers being hunted down and butchered like fugitives.

“Major Pulleine!” Billy called for his second-in-command.

“Sir!” Pulleine fired his pistol into the body of a Zulu, who had just broken through the barricade.

“Hold on here! When you hear the bugle play a long note, withdraw everyone twenty yards, then get the riflemen into two ranks!” Billy ordered.

“Sir!” Pulleine leapt back into the battle at the south wall.

“Bugler, with me!” Billy ordered the tall, skinny, dark-haired boy who was no older than he was.

Running back to the lines where the Natal Infantry stood in reserve, Billy could see that the soldiers, on all four walls, were heavily engaged in the hand-to-hand. The tactic of setting rifles next to spear men was paying off. The Natal Infantry were fighting like demons. Their long spears and shields were holding the Zulus at bay for the riflemen to load and fire, or to add weight with their bayonets. But, already, the area behind the fighting line was littered with dead and injured. The north wall was holding as were the upper parts of the eastern and western walls. With the south wall in dire threat, the lower parts of the eastern and western walls were also coming under increasing pressure.

“Bring your men forward, into a horse-shoe line,” Billy indicated to the officers of the two waiting Spear Companies.

This was the last throw. The three hundred men he had not yet committed to the battle. All around him: rifles banged, metal clanged against metal, and men screamed in pain or shouted in defiance as they struggled hand-to-hand in the life or death battle. The reserve of Natal Infantry was brought forward and shaken into a rough semblance of a line. Stepping forward, Billy took the dark brown shield from one Infantryman and buried the butt into the ground.

This was it.

There would be no retreat from this point. If it came to the worst, then they could form a final, last stand, rally square around this shield.

“Thirty men, reinforce and hold those corners, and the wall!” Billy ordered the Spear Company commanders, “Hold those corners at all costs!”

“Yes, sir,” an officer said.

“Major Pulleine!” Billy called, trying to make his voice heard above the clang of metal the crash of shots and the screams of the wounded.

“Sir!” emerging from the press of struggling and fighting bodies, Major Pulleine trotted over to Billy’s position.

“We need to get this lot sorted out quickly!” Billy said.

“Yes sir!”

“Get thirty good bayonet men together, when we go in, you and me are going to cut a path through to that breach in the wall!”

“Yes sir!”

Watching the battle at the south wall, Billy could see that the redcoats and the Natal Infantry were holding doggedly on to their ground. It was a bitter, brutal fight, with no love lost between the Natal Infantry and the Zulu warriors. The Natal Infantrymen were pushing their spear points forward, into the press of Zulus just beyond the barricade wall. Again and again, they thrust their spears forward and found targets amongst the bodies of the attackers. But, many of them had already fallen to the spears and clubs of the Zulus. As he watched, a Natal Infantryman, with a red bandana around his forehead, reeled backwards from the barricade with a spear pushed all the way through his body. He staggered back a couple of steps, and then fell over onto his side.

A few feet to the right of the fallen Natal Infantryman, a British corporal was pulling a dead rifleman back from the barricade. The corporal, dragging the body backwards by the webbing, grabbed the Martini-Henry rifle from the fallen man’s lifeless hand and, with the speed and skill of a professional pickpocket, cleared out the dead man’s ammunition pouches. Casting the body aside, the corporal handed out the bullets to three other riflemen, before handing the rifle, and more bullets, to a Natal cavalryman.

With the thirty Natal Infantrymen now sent to each corner of the new line, and engaging with the Zulus at the barricade wall, it was almost time for Billy to play his gamble.

“Sir!” Major Pulleine called out. “I’ve got thirty bayonet men!”

“Well done, Major!” Billy praised his second-in-command, as the group of thirty redcoats formed a rough semi-circle in front of Billy.

The bayonet party was the worst looking bunch of miscreants and rogues Billy had ever seen. Most of them were wounded, but as he looked into the eyes of many of them, Billy could see that they would relish a fight. Many of them were men that enjoyed killing simply for the sake of it, and, for a moment, Billy shuddered. But, then again, this was what he needed. This was going to be a nasty close-quarter fight; a fight that these men would revel in.

“Right lads! We’re going to blast a path open to that breach, and then we’re going to seal it!” Billy began, “When we charge, you ignore everything else and you follow me and Major Pulleine! We go for that breach!” Billy’s voice was filled with anticipation. “Any way you can, you get to that breach in the south wall! There’s no room for Marquis of Queensberry rules here!”

From where he was standing, Billy could see the wicked smiles crossing the smeared and dirty faces of the chosen redcoats. This was what they wanted to hear. For many, the Army had been rules and regulations, drills and marching, even the fighting had been done in ranks and files, volleys and routines. Now they were about to be let loose in a no-holds-barred brawl.

“Any way you can,” Billy repeated, “do you understand me!?”

“Sir,” came a few muttered responses.

“I said, do you understand me!?” Billy shouted.

“YES, SIR!!” The bayonet men chorused happily.

“Very good, now make sure the rifles are loaded!”

“Right then, wait for the command, and, good luck everyone!” Billy said.

With the Natal Infantry and the Bayonet Group in place, Billy was now ready.

“Bugler, one long note, now!” Billy ordered.

The bugler, with regimentally correct flourish, set the instrument to his lips and began to blow.

“COME ON, LADS, FALL BACK!!” An officer’s voice filled the air, as the soldiers started to dash back to Billy’s new position.

“MOVE YOURSELVES!!” The NCO watched as the redcoats and Native troops scampered back.

It took only four seconds for the first of the soldiers to reach Billy’s new line.

“Right! Two ranks of rifles, front rank kneel...! Two ranks of rifles, front rank kneel...! Make sure you’re loaded...! Two ranks of rifles, front rank kneel...!” Billy began the orders, which were quickly taken up by the other officers and NCOs, who quickly began to shake a new position from the confusion.

Men with rifles were sorted and barged into two new firing lines, whilst the spear carrying Natal Infantrymen were pushed and shoved into the spear line behind the rifles. The Zulus, stunned by the disappearance of the defenders in front of them, took a few seconds to realise that part of the barricade was now un-manned. With a choice of clambering over the barricade to get at the defenders, or trying to tear it down; which would allow others access to the interior, the Zulus attempted both at the same time. Some started to climb over the collection of wagons, boxes, furniture, sacks, and equipment, whilst some tried to drag the materials down. In the press of bodies close to the barricade, and encumbered with shields, spears and clubs, the Zulus took no more than a few seconds to get the first man onto the barricade.

When the first man clambered up onto the east wall, a young redcoat lieutenant, who was moving back; the last man to leave the barricade, shot the invader down with his pistol. The Zulu, dropping his shield and weapons, clutched his chest and fell backwards into the press of bodies behind him. And, as the lieutenant sprinted for the new line, Billy saw several wounded men trying to crawl back to the new position. But, it was already too late for them.

That is the price of command
, Billy thought to himself as one injured Natal Infantryman stretched out his hand to his comrades.

The scampering soldiers had no time to lift the wounded. That was just the way it was. The lines had to be formed quickly, or the Zulus would overwhelm the whole position. The two lines of riflemen stretched in an outward curve from the east to the west wall of the barricade. The horse-shoe shape that Billy had ordered for the Natal Infantrymen was being mirrored by the line of riflemen. Billy knew that he could not use a straight line, because he needed to scour Zulus from the lower parts of the abandoned east and west walls. A straight line would have had the tendency to fire straight ahead; ignoring the flanks. Glancing at the riflemen in the firing lines, Billy could see quite a mixed bag of units.

There were redcoats and various mounted volunteer units, some of Durnford’s Natal cavalry, with tan uniforms, who had acquired Martini-Henry rifles. Some of the cavalrymen still had their rifled carbines in their hands, with a few precious cartridges still left in their ammunition pouches. As Billy glanced, a redcoat with a blond moustache was passing a handful of cartridges to a Natal Infantryman with a Martini-Henry.

Every bullet is going to count here
, Billy thought as he turned back to the barricade.

All of the riflemen were filthy. The smoke and powder residue had laid down a carpet of soot and grime onto their face and hands. The sweat from the constant exertions of fighting had carved channels through the dirt, and more than one forehead was smeared from the rubbing of stinging eyes. Some of them were injured. More than one uniform was torn or ripped. Bandages adorned faces, heads, arms hands, and, in some cases, legs. One man in the front rank was unable to stand or kneel, owing to a wound to his leg, yet he was still able to fire his rifle from the seated position.

The Native troops had fared no better, with an equally impressive collection of injuries and battle scars.

One of the Natal Infantryman was leaning heavily against his spear, whilst a comrade wound a dressing around his chest that was already starting to soak through with blood. The Infantryman winced with the pain, but refused to leave his post. If he was going to die, then he would die standing up with his comrades.

Looking at the barricade, the Zulus were starting to scramble onto the south and east walls, whilst some of their comrades were already starting to pull or push material down to allow passage.

“Front rank!...Aim!” Billy watched as the rifles were raised to their shoulders, “FIRE!” Billy bellowed.

In a great plume of rifle smoke, the front rank disappeared.

On the barricade, many of the Zulus that had managed to climb onto the wall were scythed down. The handful that had survived the first volley were jumping down onto the British side, when Billy let loose the volley from the second rank. The Zulus on the British side of the barricade were cut down mercilessly, as were many of their comrades who had just climbed onto the walls. But regardless of their losses, the Zulu warriors were clambering up onto the barricade.

“Rear rank!...Aim!...FIRE!!” Billy shouted as the volley roared again. “Pulleine, take over!”

“Sir!”

“Front rank!...Aim!...FIRE!!” Major Pulleine bellowed as another volley hurtled downrange to smash into the Zulu ranks.

“Rear rank!...Aim!...FIRE!!” Pulleine continued the litany of death; the relentless volleys that were chopping the Zulu intruders to ruins.

Billy waited, watching the situation closely, the inside part of the wall was now littered with dead and injured Zulus. Feverishly, he strapped a Zulu shield with a broken shaft to his left arm. Zulu bodies were strewn over the top of the barricade. On one wagon, a dead Zulu lay, his head and left arm hanging down beside the wheel. A wounded Zulu was trying to clamber back over the barricade to safety, away from the relentless hail of lead and destruction. Crawling slowly over the top of the barricade, he was hit by another bullet, which flung him back onto the British side of the wall. With a great roar, a section of the south wall, about two metres wide, collapsed outwards.

This is it
, Billy thought to himself, and lifted up a short-stabbing assegai from a dead Zulu just behind him.

“Both ranks!” Billy took over from Pulleine’s litany. “Aim!” The Zulus started to swarm into the position. “FIRE !” he bellowed one last time.

The final volley shattered through the sound of fighting that was going on at the walls still held by the British. The “zulu-zulu-zulu-zulu” chant was drowned out by the massive volley, which chopped down almost every Zulu within the position.

“CHARGE!!” Billy raised the stabbing assegai above his head and started running towards the south wall.

Behind him, he heard the screams and war cries of the Natal Infantry; who, fleeter of foot than the red-coats and other Europeans, surged forward behind their red-haired colonel.

The Zulus who had survived the volley, and were already shocked and stunned from the ferocity of the rifle fire, suddenly found themselves faced with almost four hundred screaming and charging Natal Infantrymen, followed by the riflemen and their viciously sharp bayonets. For some of the Zulu survivors, it was too much to ask of them to stand and fight this onslaught, and they began to turn and run. For some, the great swarm that had just broken into the position, their fighting spirit was still intact.