Note 72 — Chapter XXIII · NATAL AGAIN.—COOLIE IMMIGRATION.—BISHOP COLENSO.—LAING’S NEK.—INGOGO.—MAJUBA.—INTERESTING INTERVIEW WITH GENERALS JOUBERT AND SMIT.—GRAVE-YARD AT MOUNT PROSPECT.—LADY FLORENCE DIXIE.—FIRST SESSION IN CAPE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY.
Reading edition
The official reasons, or rather the official excuses, for the loss of the day, are a transparent gloss, intended to hide gross mismanagement on the one hand and a panic-stricken retreat on the other. They are the following, extracted from the Gazette: (1) The slopes below the brow of the plateau were too steep to be searched by our fire, and cover existed up to the brow; (2) the rocky ridge we occupied in second line, though the best we had time to hold, did not cover more than fifty yards to its front, as the plateau rolled continuously to the brow; (2a) the men were too exhausted to intrench, and hardly fit to fight; (3) when the Boers gained the last ridge ours had to descend almost impassable slopes, and many were shot in doing so.