G Company 2/24th ??

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

According to Mike Snook G Company was basicly overwhelmed near the firing line.

But in the best account of the Battle by David Jaskcon it has G company in the Saddle.

Which one is correct ?

Cheers

Subject: G Company 2 /24th Sun Feb 05, 2012 4:52 am

Hi DB.
I think it was between the firing line and the saddle ? .
cheers 90th.

Guest

Hi

Because of the tactical withdrawal of Durnford, G Company, is the first company from 24 th to fall back ... and back in the camp ...

Attention is repelled by the regiment umBonambi (the first Zulu regiment which comes within the camp) so I think that G Company was butchered in the camp ...

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

He says given the distence they would have to go and the amount of Zulus attacking them it
would be impossible for them to get back to the camp.

Seems like a good theory but i always trust what Jackson writes scratch

Cheers

Guest

Hi DB14

Sorry,sorry,sorry....

As usual I have not invented anything ...

In his book ,Isandhlwana 1879 The great Zulu Victory...Page n°77:

"Most of Pope company wer overun as they reached the tents,thought some fought on to join a determined stand that was made above the 1/24 th camp."

You dare to contradict the gods IK? Suspect

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Note book of Corpral Bassage 2/24th

G Company of the 2/24th with the exepection of a few men where found lying where we had left them

G Company where on picket duty away from thecamp when the rest of the 2/24th left, so thats evidence.

There are a number of cairns near Pope's posistion on the firing line, mostly likly his men's graves.

Cheers

Guest

Incedible,you dare again to contradict the gods IK? Suspect

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Was he there ?

Posts : 36 Join date : 2009-09-29

I have always wondered why C/Sgt Ross the SNCO of G Coy and a number of soldiers
went out of the camp with the main body of 2/24 and missed the battle

Guest

DB14

Contradict IK !?

This is sacrilege !!!!!!!

It becomes a serious ...

IK is IK... Salute

Cheers

Pascal

Guest

Me too

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Pope was exposed to the whole of the left horn by Durnfords retreat, that around 4500 warriors attacking around 140 soliders of G Company.

They where well over a mile from the Camp and would have been the target.

You do the math, its impossile for them to get back that far.

It doesn't add up with the reprots from the Burial parties also.

Cheers

Guest

Will say that to Ian Knight, he will be happy ... Salute

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Pascal

Ian Knight is a great man and one of the best on the Zulu War, but everyone make mistakes.

G Company was Big, if it got to the camp there bodies would have been recorded, there not, ergo they didn't
make it back to the camp.

Cheers

Guest

Should ask JW Salute

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Mon Feb 06, 2012 6:21 am

DB 14
Good comments. But how would you account for the reports of the two officers with eye glasses being killed back to back on the neck?
The only two officers wearing eye glasses where Pope and Godwin Austen.
Snook rubishes that and says it was made up by Morris but in actuallity there was a zulu statement of fact? As a sop Snook again tries to justify that rejection by saying "the neck goes a long way". It surely does but not down to the marshes.

I would not discount the possibility of Pope fighting his way back towards the neck. We know as fact that various groups, Anstey?, fought even longer retreats. So as a theory Popes command was split in the retreat and Bassage quite correctly reported what he saw, the major loss being above the marsh.

Just thoughts.

Guest

Hi Springbok 9

I am preferre to rely at the publications of IK

or JW ...

Cheers

Pascal

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Mon Feb 06, 2012 7:56 pm

Is it not conceivable that G Coy made a fighting retreat back towards the camp?
The shoot and scoot tactic is nothing new.
What distance would they have had to cover between their original position and the camp?

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Tue Feb 07, 2012 5:48 am

Tasker
Around a mile from the saddle.

Guest

Hi all

This is the regiment uMbonambi who followed the folds of 2/24 th and also menaced the left flank of Durnford, and the majority of soldiers 2/24 th could thus enter the camp through their folds tactics, left horn has never been in contact with the 2/24 th at this stage of the battle ...

The 2/24 th is the first to enter the camp ...

Cheers

Pascal

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Tue Feb 07, 2012 7:24 pm

Thanks for that Springbok.
My visualisation of the battle is not good as I have not been to the field yet, but weren't Pope's G Coy on the saddle? Isn't it thought that they abandoned this position once Durnford was out of the picture?
One can imagine that they would have been surrounded fairly quickly once exposed to the Zulu onslaught and neither standing and fighting, nor retreat back to the camp would have been very attractive or viable options.

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Snook says that the slopes infront of Pope would have been alive with over 2,000 Zulus charging down to
attack him from all directions. They were isolated and had no surport from the other elements on the field.

Bassage saw most of G company in June.

Cheers

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Tue Feb 07, 2012 7:47 pm

Thanks DB14, this is how I imagine it panning out. They had not a hope, must have had no idea about the size of the army that was bearing down on them. They must have perished on the saddle. If they had tried to make it back to camp, they'd have been cut down before making it halfway?

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Tasker

The saddle is at the rear of the camp Salute

They died near the Mpofane Donga

Cheers

Guest

Hi all

Sorry Tasker, but the 2/24 th is the first to have folded for reasons I explained above.

As the 2/24 th is the first imperial unity to have folded, she was able to do and has done annihilate the camp.

The regiment uMbonambi has only follow the 2/24 th, it is also for this reason that thIS Zulu regiment is also the first to be in the camp ...

Chees

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Pascal

Most of G company were found dead in June near the Mpofane Donga around a mile from the camp.

Source - Corpral Bassage notebook, he helped bury them.

Cheers

Guest

Bonsoir DB14

I do not mind but you'll have to explain this to IK ...

Want to do enlighten me, where and with whom fought in the British Imperial Mounted Infantry at Isandhlwana?

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

In the Donga with the rest of the mounted men

Cheers

Guest

We rarely speak of them to Isandhlwana ...

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Wed Feb 08, 2012 6:32 pm

Drummer Boy 14 wrote:: Tasker

The saddle is at the rear of the camp

They died near the Mpofane Donga

Cheers

Thanks DB14. As you can tell, the picture in my mind's eye is all over the place! I am going to have to go there to sort out the features and geography in my head!
Did you not say in your original question that David Jackson had placed G Coy in the saddle and you wer minded to rely on this?

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Yes Jackson has them all in the Saddle, but i am now serioulsly douting that !

It seems the men in the Saddle were most likley E company men ?

Cheers

Posts : 2308 Join date : 2010-07-02 Age : 44

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Guest

Hi all

Ways of all, the company "G" was able to fold correctly in the camp because she still had ammunition, his left flank was still safe and that the left horn was not concerned with it (too busy to pursue Durnford)

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Pascal MAHE wrote:: Hi all

Ways of all, the company "G" was able to fold correctly in the camp because she still had ammunition, his left flank was still safe and that the left horn was not concerned with it (too busy to pursue Durnford)

Pascal

Please explain if this is true, how there bodies ended up around a mile from the camp ?

Guest

DB14

When I say the whole company, I mean what could be folded without too much loss and that it necessarily has left his killed on his original position and has also left his killed throughout his retirement, soldiers shot and killed or overtaken stragglers,ect...

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

G company of the 2/24th with the execption of a few men were found lying were we had left them.

This means that almost all of G company were found outside the camp.

Note he say - A few men

Cheers

Guest

DB14

Most of Isandhlwana killed were not killed on their initial positions.

Units that are folded those killed were left throughout their folds, necessarily, then they were killed in the camp and after some between the camp and Natal ...

No unit was crushed in one place ... Salute

Cheers

Pascal

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 10:00 am

DB 14
Considering the decomposition, the long grass, possibly Bassage's claim is not 100 % accurate. Even giving him the benefit of the doubt, he did say 'with the exception of a few' therefore would you not concede that those few could have linked with another company ( Possibly A or H company) and got back to the saddle?

I keep getting that Zulu quote niggling at me concerning the 2 men with eyeglasses. Its not something that you would expect to be fabricated.
And that definite statement, "no man from G company made it back to the saddle" from Snook just doesnt do it for me. Far to authoritarian.

Regards

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 2:00 pm

G coy fell back, fighting, from its forward position facing east half way between the two dongas. Bassage recorded most of G coy was found in the same place as they had been left on the previous night’s picquet. That position was roughly north of the Little Donga, i.e. closer to the camp, not out by the Big Donga. That is in accordance with a fighting retreat. Some men got back further to the camp/saddle and made a last stand, as Jackson says, there. Pope and G-A died on the slope of the saddle – Pope’s grave was so marked by an iron cross. A very few redcoats (10-15?) were found among Durnford’s last stand. It is difficult to conceive how these few could be anything other than the last survivors from G coy’s extreme right from its position near the Little Donga as it was overwhelmed.

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 2:54 pm

Julian
Ive replied to this under a seperate topic. However as far as Im aware the iron cross you refer to actually marks the H company cairns, its around 8-9 metres away from the H company memorial. The C company cairns are lower on the slope, well below the tent lines.
Im open to correction but I dont believe Popes grave is marked.

Regards

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 3:26 pm

Springbok
I should have been clearer - apologies - the 'iron cross' marking Pope's grave was actually an iron meat scale placed on the slope of the saddle by a 2/24th sergeant (Tigar probably) on 14th March. This was subsequently to be replaced by an iron cross. The site of the grave was lost before it could be placed and the cross found a home in St. Vincent's Church instead. This doesn't alter the fact that Pope was identified as far back as the camp side of the saddle and G coy was spread all the way from the Little Donga to the Saddle. In your other posting I agree that those redcoats who ended up with Durnford COULD possibly have come from H coy as well as from G coy.

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 7:35 pm

In answer to DB14's original question, is it yes to both then?
I am picturing G Coy fast retreating in vain, back westwards towards the camp, in the face of an overwhelming wave of warriors and hopeless odds.
Still confused over the geography, particularly by comments such as "the saddle was behind the mountain."
Couple of Qs:
1. Am I right in thinking that the "saddle" is in fact, on the Eastern side of the mountain, in a line between where G coy were originally positioned and the mountain itself?
2. How far is it from the original position of G Coy, to where Pope and the last remnants made their last stand with Durnford in the donga?
3. And how far would this be from the camp itself?
Many thanks
Tasker

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 9:28 pm

Tasker. Click on link. Jamie's website showing the last stands.

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Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 9:55 pm

Just doing it now Sir- many thanks Salute

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Thu Feb 09, 2012 10:09 pm

Excellent photos of the battlefield there - really help to make sense of the battlefield features and dispositions, thnx for the link admin, well done Jamie. Just confirms my desire to go there one day.

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

The Saddle is the low ground between the Mount of Isandlwana and the Stonny Koppie hill.
Nowhere near Pope's poisition.

Cheerss

Guest

Hello all

You see DB14 it was me who was right for the company "g" ...

Being less threatened than the 1/24 th, it was more likely to survive, I tested this by wargame ...

Cheers

Pascal

Posts : 2008 Join date : 2011-08-01 Age : 27

Pascal

G company was around 130 or so strong,(?) Bassage saw most of them in June.

A few prehaps around 20 mangaged to get back to camp.

Cheers

Guest

Bonjour jeune homme

That's what I said, they are dead throughout their retirement fighting, but not on their initial position, far from the camp, as you said ... Salute

And I bet the majority were killed by cartridges or isijula, but not in melee ... Salute

Note that they were accompanied by a section of the company "A" 2/24 th, because the company "G" did not exceed 95 men Salute

Cheers

Pascal

Subject: Re: G Company 2/24th ?? Fri Feb 10, 2012 9:18 am

Pascal and Drummer Boy
G coy once they had moved to their new position facing east would have moved away from Dyer's composite company 2/24th. None of the other 2/24th men should have made it across to join Pope's company at any stage of its retreat. Without starting up a different topic, I do believe there's evidence to show that Dyer/Griffith formed an ad hoc company.
Pascal, out of interest, do you know of anything to suggest A coy 2/24th men were found alongside G coy's?

» Corporal Bassage - Company Clerk/Storeman C Company 2-24th
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» D Company 2/24th