up in front, sometimes not
reaching it. There was very little shooting, as nothing could be seen
to aim at. The enemy's fire was too heavy to allow of any combined
command of the movement. Nevertheless, there was little or no
confusion, and the advance continued with the steady progress of an
incoming tide. Eventually a detachment of the Dublin Fusiliers, under
Lieut. T. B. Ely, and Major M. G. Moore's company of the Connaught,
mingled with men of other regiments, reached the kraal, about two
hundred yards from the head of the loop; others of the Inniskilling,
and Dublin, Fusiliers and of the Connaught Rangers pushed on to the
river bank; there these handfuls of men remained for several hours,
little more than one hundred yards from the Boer trenches on the far
bank, but in face of the storm of bullets it was impossible to cross
the river, nor were either officers or men aware that they were near a
ford. The rest of the brigade, except the left half-battalion of the
Inniskilling Fusiliers and one or two companies of the Border regiment
who lined the river bank west of the loop, were on, or in rear of, the
knoll, the cohesion of units being now almost entirely lost. The
artillery and rifle fire, concentrated on the British troops from the
far bank, was too continuous and accurate to permit of any further
advance being attempted for the moment. The shrapnel of the two field
guns, posted in emplacements on the lower ridge to the north-west, was
particularly effective, and the Boer riflemen did not disclose whence
their deadly shots came. Volleys were fired from time to time by the
British infantry, but comparatively little ammunition was expended.
Yet, notwithstanding these trying conditions, the men clung on
steadfastly, each group being well under the control of the officer
nearest to them, whether of their own corps or of another.[230]
Meantime, Parsons' batteries, the 64th and 73rd, had come into action
on the right bank of the Doornkop Spruit, and were busily engaged in
shelling a kraal immediately in front of the loop, and in endeavouring
to silence the Boer guns. These somewhat outranged the Field
artillery, and an attempt to cross over the spruit so as to come into
closer action on its left bank was for the moment frustrated by a Boer
shell bursting on the team of the leading gun, killing two horses,
upsetting the gun, and thereby blocking the ford of this stream. On
this the two batteries re-opened fire from the ri