Battle of Rorke's Drift

Background

In January 1879 a British army under Lord Chelmsford invaded the Zulu Kingdom from the colony of Natal. The center column crossed the Buffalo River at Rorke's Drift, a ford named after the trader James Rorke, whose old homestead on the Natal bank had become a Swedish mission run by Otto Witt. The British took over the two thatched buildings, using the church as a storehouse and the house as a hospital. The post was held by B Company of the 2nd Battalion, 24th Regiment of Foot, under Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead, together with a company of the Natal Native Contingent. Lieutenant John Chard of the Royal Engineers, who was working on the river ponts, was the senior officer on the spot on 22 January.

That day the main Zulu army overran Chelmsford's camp at the Battle of Isandlwana, about ten miles away. The Zulu reserve, perhaps 3,000 to 4,000 men of the uThulwana, iNdlondlo, uDloko and iNdluyengwe regiments, had taken little part in that fight. Led by Prince Dabulamanzi kaMpande, a half-brother of King Cetshwayo, it crossed the river into Natal. This went against the king's instructions that his armies should not invade the colony.

The Battle

Survivors from Isandlwana brought the news in mid-afternoon. Chard, Bromhead and Acting Assistant Commissary James Dalton decided that a slow retreat with wagons of sick men would be caught in the open. Instead they linked the two buildings with walls of heavy mealie bags, with a rocky ledge strengthening the front. A party of mounted African troops that had come in from Isandlwana rode off as the Zulu came into sight, and the Native Contingent company fled after them. That left about 150 men, some thirty of them patients, to hold a perimeter built for many more. Chard had a line of biscuit boxes laid across the yard as a second position.

The first Zulu attack came at about half past four against the south wall and was stopped by rifle fire at close range. The attackers then spread round to the front of the hospital and the ledge, and assault followed assault at the barricades. Zulu marksmen on the terraces of the Shiyane hill behind the post fired into the yard and caused several of the British casualties. Around six o'clock Chard pulled his men back behind the biscuit boxes. This left the hospital cut off. Its thatch was set on fire, and a handful of soldiers, among them Privates Henry Hook, John Williams, Robert Jones and William Jones, defended it room by room, cutting holes through the inner walls to drag the patients out. Most of the patients were saved.

After dark the burning roof lit up the attackers. The defenders held the storehouse, the cattle kraal for a time, and a last redoubt made of piled mealie bags. Attacks went on until about midnight and firing until around four in the morning. At dawn on 23 January the Zulu had gone. A large body appeared briefly on a nearby hill and then moved off, and Chelmsford's column reached the post at about eight.

Weapons

The defenders were armed with the Martini-Henry Rifle, a single-shot breech-loader firing a heavy .45 caliber bullet, and its long Socket Bayonet. They are usually said to have fired about 20,000 rounds. The Zulu fought with the Zulu Iklwa, throwing spears, the Knobkerrie and the hide war shield, the Zulu Isihlangu. They also had firearms, mostly old muskets and rifles of poor quality with bad powder. At Isandlwana the Zulu Impi had caught the British in the open. Here the barricades kept the warriors at the end of a bayonet, and that made the difference.

Aftermath

The garrison lost 17 dead and about 15 wounded. Chard reported 351 Zulu bodies around the post, and the real total was certainly higher, perhaps 500 or more. Many wounded Zulu were killed by British troops after the battle. Eleven Victoria Crosses were awarded, seven of them to men of the 24th. The recipients included Chard, Bromhead, Hook, Dalton and Surgeon James Reynolds. Some historians have argued that the government was glad to celebrate the defense because it drew attention away from Isandlwana. Chelmsford invaded again later in the year, and the Anglo-Zulu War ended with the Zulu defeat at Ulundi on 4 July.

On Screen

Zulu (1964), directed by Cy Endfield, covers the whole defense, with Stanley Baker as Chard and Michael Caine as Bromhead. The setting, the barricades, the fight for the burning hospital and the final redoubt follow the record in outline. Several things do not. Private Henry Hook, played by James Booth, is shown as a drunken malingerer, but the real Hook was a teetotaler of good character. The company is presented as a Welsh regiment and sings "Men of Harlech" in answer to a Zulu war chant. In 1879 the 24th was the 2nd Warwickshire Regiment, with a depot at Brecon and a minority of Welshmen, and there is no evidence of the singing. The closing scene, in which the Zulu salute the defenders before leaving, is invented. Otto Witt is also heavily fictionalized.