Bassage Diary

Trying to be very diplomatic Gary.

90th

I'll email you some pics of the proposed site , not sure how many I have , I'll send all of them .

Thanks Gary, Ive just had a look. That's right over the firing line that the 'dig' ascertained. Its not on. JY needs to get onto the royal family and create some noise. Bloody nonsensical and downright disrespectful to those thousands of Zulu that died just there.

Hi Frank
I,Knight voiced the exact same concerns in a letter of protest months ago , his answer was basically ....'' Thanks , but no thanks ' ! .
I agree it's very disrespectful to those brave Zulu warriors who perished on the 22/ 1 / 79.
90th

I can't see the photo's for some reason

Does Bassage mention Lt. Dyer at all ? I swear I've read somewhere he does.


Cheers
Sam

Sam

I quote Bassage.....................

Second visit 23rd June 1879 bodies found in heaps as if great resistance was shown Lieut. & Acting Adjutant Dyer’s body was found surrounded by about eleven men. Sixty four were found in a square. Four companies found. Lying as they fell fighting back to back. G Company 2/24th Regiment with the exception of a few men was found lying in the place where they were posted the previous night as an outlying piquet. In fact the whole sight was of a most horrible nature.

Hi Kenny

Many thanks for the quote
It is interesting Bassage says Dyer was found surrounded by 11 men when Wilson Black puts him among the dead with Captain Wardell

Cheers
Sam

All
I have quoted from Bassage's notebook in my works. He was the coy clerk for C coy, NOT G coy, and the notebook does contain a roll for C coy which is useful as are some of his other remarks.
I have considered publishing the notebook's contents in a 'Studies in the Zulu War' volume but I have been in a quandary about doing so.
The notebook contains a code and when you crack the code you find that Bassage was NOT a very savoury character.
That side of the notebook reveals nothing about Isandhlwana and can easily receive more attention for its infamy than for the other information it contains (and, in my humble opinion, is best left well alone).
"Hell is empty, and all the devils are here."

Bonjour Mr Whybra,
You wrote:"The notebook contains a code and when you crack the code you find that Bassage was NOT a very savoury character".
Please, can you say more?
You also wrote "That side of the notebook reveals nothing about Isandhlwana and can easily receive more attention for its infamy than for the other information it contains".
To my knowledge, the notebook contains important informations about the position on the battlefied of G coy 2/24th...
Cheers.
Frédéric

Ah Julian, the Bakers dozen of PMB

Incidentally, as I did not understand the meaning of Frank's message:
"In the Medieval Ages there was a period when bakers began cheating the public at such a rate that public outcry reached the ears of several kings. As bread was a daily staple of Medieval life, the bakers knew that they could charge a lot of money for minimal portions of their products. As such, kings levied laws against bakers stating that they were to lower their pricesand keep honest. In fact the common term "A Baker's Dozen" (meaning 13 instead of 12) came from this time period. Any baker caught selling less than an even dozen was strictly and harshly punished. As a result bakers began adding one extra loaf to be certain their count would be correct or even over the amount decreed by law".
Cheers
Frédéric

Fred
In reply to your query, Bassage wrote comments about certain members of the coy in code and made marks against their names. He also wrote about certain ladies. Bassage appears to have been bisexual but his coded comments are lewd and his conduct might be called into question.
The code is not difficult to break.
I'm all for drawing attention to Isandhlwana for positive reasons hence my comment about infamy. And of course, Bassage's comments about G coy's location are very important indeed. I am always happy to quote from his notebook, just not to put it into print because of the can of worms it would open.

I totally ignored these "scabrous specificities" relating to the Bassage's notebook.
Thank you very much for the information.
Cheers
Fred

The French have a wonderful term for it!
'Scabrous specificities'! I must remember that!

Strangly enough in my naivety I miss read two of those comments to read Bugler and was taken to task by 90th and Steve.
"le mal soit à celui qui mal interprète"

Frank, there's a lot more to Bassage's entries than a simple misreading of 'bugler'! Look deeper!
Honi soit qui mal y pense.

Frank Allewell wrote:

Here is the famous Bassage notebook recovered from the battlefield.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]
After being recovered Bassage used it to record various issues so it saw a very active life. Privileged to have held it, very carefully, and read it.

Frank the original photos are on photobucket, are you able to email the photos again, so I can repost.

On their way Pete

Wow, this is intriguing.....the Da Vinci Code of the 24th.......

I've got to get my hands on the diary and see if I can break it....

Sime Ive just e mailed it to Pete, should be on the forum over the weekend.

Frank

Technically you are infringing copyright law.  Your images were for your personal use and not for general public consumption.  There is nothing wrong in displaying just an extract to explain your thoughts/research etc.  The museum in Brecon does need to survive and this can only happen if visitors and researchers actually make the trip.

If I am I would apologize, however when I was at Brecon I made no secret of my affiliation to the forum and my intention to use what I had photographed. Permission to photograph was asked for and given for all the documents I studied, some 123 pages in all.
Again I have no wish to damage the Museum in any way.
I might add that Ive been in possession of a transcript of the diary for around twenty years and have never used its contents. Just as much as I have copies of other unseen documents that will one day be donated to the museum.

Regards

Frank/Martin
I did wonder about this when the post appeared saying that the Bassage notebook might appear en masse here.
I also have a photocopy of the notebook and received it yonks ago under the same conditions.  Whilst it is fine to reproduce bits of it to illustrate a point in a work, it does technically break the agreement if the whole thing is published in one go (unless one has permission to do so).  And, technically, there would be an infringement of UK law.
The moral side of it can be argued from now till doomsday but the legal side of it cannot.
I'm not taking sides here but I am giving you the benefit of my having published a number of things over the years and having had to take advice from university legal departments and publishers as to what is and isn't permissible.  As I have said before on the forum, whole documents should not be posted for general consumption and I would not want to see you, Frank, or the Forum land itself in hot water.

I have every sympathy with the need for the museum to derive an income from its holdings. But I fear the reality is that, for the vast majority of those with an interest, it is simply impractical to get to Brecon. I would venture a guess that the museum has never derived any income from its guardianship of Bassage's diary and if it maintained the kind of restrictions implied, it never will. In the absence of any plans to digitise the collection and make it available to subscribers at cost (as the NA do with their soldiers records and censuses) such documents will remain entirely theoretical as sources of income. At the same time, it will deprive those who have a genuine interest in the subject (and who tend to be extremely supportive of the museum) of vital public sources. In the absence of a 21st century solution, it does not seem to me unreasonable to make such a document available to the very restricted membership of this forum. It would be very short sighted for the museum to do otherwise. The legal position is one thing, knowing who your friends are is another.

Steve

It is indeed an inextricable situation.
The legal situation is incontrournable but on the other hand, it is impossible for many of us to obtain documents that contains as many pages from the Brecon museum.
I encounter the same problem with South Africa; It is extremely difficult to obtain documents, without forgetting that the French banks refuse to send money to this country!
Finally, these institutions in S.A. do not have often a payment platform...
Again, an inextricable situation.
Cheers.
Frédéric

I have bought from RSA many items over the year's. and payment used
to be a real problem.. i have even converted stirling into rand's and sent
that through the mail, i have never had a serious problem. then some
year's ago i signed up to paypal.. what an amazing service and it's free
to set up, instantaneous and secure.. the way forward for electronic
banking worldwide. xhosa

Up to Pete, Post or Not. I don't believe I have done anything wrong or anything that would be injurious to the museum.
The contentious issues raised by Julian need to be explored not hidden under the carpet as the PS report has been for many many years. The pages Pete has been sent are the areas I believe Julian has refered to, the C company listings. Not the whole Diary, not the iSandlwana areas, not the lists of bakery clients etc.
"Neque delicto neque consilium a aliquando conscientiae se mutare"

Frank Allewell wrote:

Up to Pete, Post or Not. I don't believe I have done anything wrong or anything that would be injurious to the museum.
The contentious issues raised by Julian need to be explored not hidden under the carpet as the PS report has been for many many years. The pages Pete has been sent are the areas I believe Julian has refered to, the C company listings. Not the whole Diary, not the iSandlwana areas, not the lists of bakery clients etc.
"Neque delicto neque consilium a aliquando conscientiae se mutare"

Frank you have done nothing wrong, you never posted them on the forum I did. We have a Fair use notice in place.

Thank Frank and Admin i remember first reading the Bassage quote about 5 years ago its great to see the real Diary and quote from it.

Sam

Does anyone know / think if the 50 men Forbes records as being seen out on the right when they returned to bury the dead are the same as those recorded by Bassage ? If not it would suggest heavy casualties by those on the right as they retreated.

Cheers
Sam

The McAlister and Bassage Family Medals

Pair: Sergeant-Major J. Bassage, Melmoth Reserves, late 2/24th Foot

South Africa 1877-79, 1 clasp, 1877-8-9 (2452 Corpl. J. Bassage. 2.24th Foot.); Natal 1906, 1 clasp, 1906 (Sgt. Maj: J. Bassage, Melmoth Reserves) the first lightly polished, very fine, otherwise nearly extremely fine (3) £800-1000

Footnote
John Thomas Bassage was born in Maidstone, Kent, on 25 July 1855. He served with the 2/24th Foot in South Africa 1877-79 and was discharged in Natal as a Corporal. He married Fanny Hendrietta Starkey in Pietermaritzburg on 10 March 1881, and had two sons, John James and Walter Frederick (See Lots 250 and 251). In 1903 the family moved to Melmoth, where a daughter, Isabella Edith, was born but she died in infancy. During the Natal Rebellion of 1906, Bassage was Sergeant-Major in the Melmoth Reserves, then aged 51. He moved back to Pietermaritzburg in 1911 and died in Durban at the age of 78. Sold with a photocopied photograph of the recipient in uniform wearing his Zulu War medal, with his wife and two young sons.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]
[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Thanks again for posting, I had a copy of these from the museum a couple of years ago. At least its confirmed my suspicion that I was missing a few pages! (Connell to Jordan)

With the extra 34 names this appears to be a very large company, 8 Snco, 5 Jnco 2 Dmr & 112 Ptes. Well above S.A. Regulations or are they trying to reach full War Establishment strength?

Being a statistics freak, I've compared the list with Holmes Noble 24th, and there seems to be a significant number where Bassage's Regt numbers do not match. Oddly virtually all are where the soldier has the S.A. medal without clasp with one or two having 1879 clasp only. Anyone have any ideas why this is so?

Obviously a couple have a numeral out or an initial, but the above suggests something to do with the new replacements?
Any thoughts from those more in the know?

Bill

The Bassage Campaign Medal Pair sold for 2,400 GBP's .
90th

This thread has been a fascinating read!

I was the lucky bidder for John Bassage's medal pair, plus 2 single QSAs to his two sons.

They were sold with a copied photo taken around 1893 of John Bassage in the uniform of the Natal Carbineers wearing his Zulu War medal, with his wife and two young sons.  As the photo was low resolution, I chanced my arm and asked the auction house to put me in touch with the vendor for a better scan.  John Bassage's great-grandaughter replied.  She still lives on the family land in KwaZulu-Natal.  As well as re-scanning the photo, she mentioned that after the auction she had found an additional QSA to John Bassage himself. After a generous offer and shipping to the UK, the QSA is now reunited with the group and I have a good digital image of all the recipients.

By the time the 2/24th Battalion medal roll was being written in India in 1881, Bassage had already purchased his discharge and settled in Natal.  He married and his sons were born in 1881 and 1882. He also joined the Natal Carbineers as a trooper.  By the outbreak of the Boer War in Oct 1899, his two sons joined him in the Natal Carbineers and all 3 Bassages mustered at Ladysmith.

From 2 Nov 1899 until 28 Feb 1900, the bulk of the Natal Carbineers was besieged in Ladysmith, and played a prominent part in the engagement. The Regiment lost heavily from the diseases that ravaged the garrison. Sadly Bassage's younger son Walter Frederick was one of them; he died of enteric fever on 24 Dec 1899, aged 17. The siege must also have taken its toll on 44 year old John Bassage; the QSA medal roll records that he was discharged as medically unfit in Apr 1900. His surviving son John James went on to take part on in the Natal Field Force's mopping up operations in northern Natal after the relief of Ladysmith.

After the Boer War, Bassage and his family moved to Melmoth in Zululand, which was in the heart of the area where the second phase of the 1906 Natal Rebellion took place. Now aged 50, Bassage was the unit Sergeant-Major in the Melmoth Reserves, no doubt by dint of his extensive military experience. The unit would have been backing for the Zululand Mounted Rifles, which was one of the Reserve Regiments most heavily engaged in putting down the Rebellion.

John Bassage moved back to Pietermaritzburg in 1911, then eventually died in Durban in 1933 at the age of 78.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Bill,

The roll of C Coy 2/24th contained in the Bassage diary contains some entries where soldiers were drafted into 24th from other regiments to fill the gaps after the losses at Isandlwana - some came out to South Africa on the transport Clyde.  The personal numbers shown in some cases are those of their parent regiment/regimental district and not their later allocated 25th brigade personal number.

At the time Norman Holme compiled ‘The Noble 24th’, he was unaware of the content of the Bassage diary as this document was still in private hands in South Africa.

Thanks for sharing Peachy , much appreciated .
90th

I have the medals (QSA to the Melmoth Rifle Association) and Bambatha 1906 to the Zululand Mounted Rifles to Robert Henry Macalister. I believe other medals to his father were sold along with the Bassage medals

Regards

Rory

The roll seems to have been composed AFTER 31.1.1879 when G coy was reconstituted since those who were transferred out and those kia at Isandhlwana are not included.