Sickness among Crealock's men

Posts : 42 Join date : 2024-01-28 Location : Baja, Hungary

So I've read how many oxen and other animals died during the advance of the first division towards Ulundi, and that they were simply left to rot on the countryside, and this quickly began to affect the soldiers. One of Ian Knight's most excellent papers says: "A stone monument near the site of Fort Chelmsford bears testimony, however, to the number of Crealock’s men who succumbed to disease."
So from that I can deduce that there must have been quite a few deaths. Do we have even a somewhat close estimate regading those losses? There were fairly detailed casualty lists for Eshowe, which also mentioned those that died from sickness, so maybe there exists a similar one for Crealock's division.
Thanks in advance!

Posts : 363 Join date : 2017-02-05 Location : Texas, U.S.A.

Hobbes,

The “Army Medical Department Report For The Year 1879”, pages 30 through 312, contains information on casualties in the second phase of the Zulu War. The casualties are from all the divisions of the army.

I looked for the regiments that were part of Crealock’s Column and came up with the following that died from disease. This list does not include Naval Brigade, Royal Artillery, Royal Engineers, Army Service Corps and Army Hospital Corps.

The men on this list could have died at Fort Chelmsford, Fort Crealock, the hospital at the Lower Tugela, Herwin Hospital or the military hospital at Durban.

Officers
2nd/3rd -----3
57th -------- 0
60th ---------2
88th ---------1
91st ---------0
99th ---------2
Total ---------8

N.C.O.s and Men
2nd/3rd -----24
57th ---------16
60th ---------44
88th ---------- 5
91st ----------17
99th ----------36
Total --------142

Tom

Posts : 42 Join date : 2024-01-28 Location : Baja, Hungary

Thank you very much!

» Colonel Crealocks letter
» Did Edward Durnford see Crealocks book??