The Silent Trauma of War

By Adrian Musgrave

In writing of war, well-known episodes must take their place to complete the story; so must the personal observations of those who were there in the field, the bivouacs, the hospitals, and the prisoner convoys. The writer's eye must also be sharp enough to see through the fog that obscures every arena of conflict, grown thick from the ivory-tower diplomacy and simplistic, chess-board planning of war by ignorant politicians; the life and death decisions of generals walking tall on their given pedestals; the incompetence of officials that is evident at every level, and the foul stain of corruption that sucks the very lifeblood from the fighting man. This is the silent trauma of war
Those absent from the field know nothing of this, but we live in an age when interest is ephemeral and, unless one is content to write for reputation alone, a work must be published at the height of public interest to command success. The author who has gathered his material first-hand, at the risk of life and health, returns to find his work anticipated in books written by those who have never left the security of their own homes. Their works may be a comedy of errors but, issued when the popular feeling is inflamed with pride and victory, their accuracy is not questioned.
The dust and heat of the battlefield do not inspire literary style, and chapters written under fire lack the polish bestowed by wordsmiths reclining in comfort and clean linen. Thanks to electricity and newspaper enterprise, some authors are now able to construct very readable books around the slender fabric of cable despatches but this denies a true analysis and understanding of the war and shows contempt for those, on both sides, seeking to explain their conflicting views and aspirations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Adrian Musgrave
• Release date: Sep 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005692988

Adrian Musgrave

Following nine years service in the RAF, I qualified as a teacher and spent several years as a freelance teacher/trainer before setting up an internet service business. We sold this business in 2004 at which time me and my wife semi-retired, bought a property in Bulgaria and travelled around Europe, coming back to the UK in 2010. A year or so before we returned, my granddaughter had taken up an interest in genealogy and had constructed a family tree, revealing my great-uncle, George Clarke Musgrave. I worked with her on this and with relatively straightforward first stage research, we discovered that George Clarke was a war correspondent and journalist, seeing action with both British and American forces in West Africa, Cuba, South Africa, China, the Balkans and France. A further decade of more detailed research, including trips to most of the locations where he was an active correspondent, gave us entry to his entire library; press reports, essays, letters and diary notes. His articles from the conflicts that he experienced were published in many national and international journals such as: the Illustrated London News, the London Chronicle, the Daily Mail, Strand Magazine, Black and White Review and the New York Times. He also wrote a number of books which were readily published and well received by audiences on both sides of the Atlantic. Unfortunately, these are now out of print and first editions are rare and expensive. I believe, though, that his words should be read and, together with my granddaughter, I am now committed to bringing the library of George Clarke Musgrave back to life.

Book preview

THE SILENT TRAUMA OF WAR

Adrian Musgrave

From the book War with the Boer

and the original diaries, notes,

photographs and despatches

compiled during the

Boxer Rebellion

Peking - 1900

Book 7 of the Wars and Words series

Copyright 2021 : Wars and Words

Smashwords Edition

This ebook is licensed for your personal use only and may not be re-sold or transferred to others. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please obtain an alternative copy. Thanks for respecting the work of the author.

Table of Contents

Foreword

WAR WITH THE BOER

From Cuba to Campaigning for Roosevelt

An Ultimatum from the Transvaal

The Opening of Hostilities

Defeat at Dundee and the Siege of Ladysmith

General Buller Arrives at Cape Town

To Eastcourt with Winston Churchill

With General Buller at the Front

Downfall of a Commander

Arrival of the New Commander

The Battle for Spion Kop

Ladysmith and Kimberley Relieved

THE BOXER REBELLION

To New York

From Honeymoon to Hell in Tientsin

The Truth of Tientsin : Relief or Revenge?

The Life and Death Decisions of Generals

Life inside the Peking Legations

The Relief of Peking : Aftermath

The Relief of Peking : Atrocities

The Convoy : Escape from Peking

A Decade of Silence

Afterword

About the Author

Other titles in the Wars and Words Series

Connect with the Author

Sample from next Wars and Words book

FOREWORD

In writing of war, well-known episodes must take their place to complete the story; so must the personal observations of those who were there in the field, the bivouacs, the hospitals, and the prisoner convoys. The writer’s eye must also be sharp enough to see through the fog that obscures every arena of conflict grown thick from the ivory-tower diplomacy and simplistic, chess-board planning of war by ignorant politicians; the life and death decisions of generals walking tall on their given pedestals; the incompetence of officials that is evident at every level, and the foul stain of corruption that sucks the very lifeblood from the fighting man.

Those absent from the field know nothing of this but we live in an age when interest is ephemeral, and, unless one is content to write for reputation alone, a work must be published during the height of public interest to command success. The author who has gathered his material first-hand, at the risk of life and health, returns to find his work anticipated in books written by those who have never left the security of their own homes. Their works may be a comedy of errors but, issued when the popular feeling is inflamed with pride and victory, their accuracy is not questioned. The dust and heat of the battlefield do not inspire literary style, and chapters written under fire lack the polish bestowed by wordsmiths reclining in comfort and clean linen. Thanks to electricity and newspaper enterprise, some authors are now able to construct very readable books around the slender fabric of cable despatches but this denies a true analysis and understanding of the war and shows contempt for those, on both sides, seeking to explain their conflicting views and aspirations.

No one who has seen the horrors of war can pen words to glorify it. Neither can they minimise its deeply embedded lies, truths, prejudices or values. And this is the dilemma faced by every correspondent, journalist and author: how to portray a true and accurate account of war in the intimate detail that is the reality of individuals fighting, suffering and dying for their country, while remaining unaffected by the causal factors underlying the conflict.

This dilemma was abundantly exposed during the preliminary phases of the second Boer war, when the Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury, prevaricated in accepting that the Boers were preparing for war. He also believed that if Britain were to send large numbers of troops, it would strike too aggressive a posture and so prevent a negotiated settlement being reached. Yet, as hostilities broke out in October 1899, the largest force of British troops ever sent across the sea was racing towards Cape Town. Then, just eight weeks later, under the command of General Sir Redvers Buller, who naively believed that the Boer would be easily defeated, almost three thousand of our soldiers were killed or wounded in a series of devastating defeats at Stormberg, Magersfontein and Colenso over a period of just seven days that has become known as Black Week.

An even deeper disconnect between political strategy and military action was laid bare within the operations of the eight-nation alliance with Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Austro-Hungary, Japan and Russia, mounting what was termed the China Relief Expedition. The objective of the multi-national force was to establish a base at the occupied city of Tientsin, march from there to Peking and rescue the foreign nationals from the besieged Legations. The expedition was dogged by communication failures, uncoordinated troop deployments, low morale and a breakdown in overall command. When Peking was eventually reached, what remained of military order was replaced by chaos. In the days following the entry of the alliance forces into the city, there began an orgy of looting, execution, rape, torture and murder, described as an unfolding kaleidoscope of human behaviour more nightmarish and more brutal than any of us could have believed possible.

In a note describing his final hours in the city, our author, together with a group of three fellow correspondents, wrote; not one of us had ever known such an assault on the senses; not one of us had ever been exposed to such obscene visions of reality. In our hearts we all knew, we had a silent understanding and a shared pledge that there are things we must not write, and that may not be printed for our readers, which show that this Western civilisation of ours is merely a veneer over savagery.

The span of history will deliver the analgesia to soothe the savage breasts of those having to deal with the inability of our politicians and our best generals to make clear, correct and courageous decisions; and to live with the moral decline, treachery and back-stabbing of the self-serving hordes that inevitably rise from their slime in times of conflict. But, until history evolves, this is the silent trauma of war.

Adrian Musgrave

September 2021

WAR WITH THE BOER

FROM CUBA TO CAMPAIGNING FOR ROOSEVELT

Despite the pleasures of my recuperation under the Red Cross and the tender ministrations of my lovely volunteer nurse, Mary, I knew that I had to leave my hospital bed and rally again to the cry else all that had been achieved in Cuban fields might be for nought.

My book Under Two Flags in Cuba was to have been published in the spring of 1898 but the manuscript, together with three hundred photographs illustrative of Weyler's regime in Cuba, and some historical letters that had passed between the Captain General and Premier Canovas, were seized in Havana with my effects when I was deported to Spain at the beginning of the war. Thus the circulation of that work was curtailed and now, during my convalescence from a prolonged attack of fever contracted in the campaign, and a chest wound from the pistol of an incensed Spanish officer, I must prepare a new work. Yet even as I write, a number of books on Cuba are being issued from the pens of writers who have never set foot on Cuban soil. In each of these the primary cause of the war is omitted, and frequent criticism of the Cubans, based entirely on misconception, is raising doubts of the justification of American intervention in the Island. With the State elections now just a few short weeks away, these false and sycophantic accounts are being taken up as the clarion call of the Democrats, in their pandering to the post war, anti-imperialist sway of public opinion.

Returning from Cuba as a war hero, my friend and mentor, Theodore Teddy Roosevelt, now has the Republican nomination for State Governor of New York. An air of over confidence has somewhat weakened the Republican resolve, though, and Roosevelt is under pressure from The Democrats, headed by Richard Croker who has backed the nomination of Augustus Van Wyck, brother of Robert, the incumbent puppet Mayor of the consolidated City of New York. It is, of course, well known that, as head of Tammany Hall, Croker receives bribe money from the owners of brothels, saloons and illegal gambling dens; and that within Robert Van Wyck's administration, he completely dominates the government of the city. Even though the New York Times has described the Van Wyck administration as one mired in black ooze and slime, there is much to be done if Roosevelt is to take his rightful position as Governor. So this time, it was at the ballot rather than the battle that we had to be victorious, and it was with some urgency that I sent a note by courier to Jacob Riis of the New York Sun, volunteering my services to Roosevelt's campaign. By return, I received an invitation to a meeting with the lieutenants; Timothy Woodruff, Sereno Payne, David Healey, Frank Smith and Buck Rogers, who pulled me to safety from the sights of a Spanish sniper at San Juan Hill. It was soon decided that under the banner cry of No Croker Domination, the real record of the war, and of Roosevelt's own heroic and defining action as leader of the Rough Riders, must be told. My role was to deliver as vividly as I was able, a series of free public lectures laying out in graphic fashion the facts and the truths about the war. Other orators would then pick up the themes of patriotism and support for the national administration, with a special emphasis on the fact that only those men with clear and assured records of action should be considered for office. With venues booked, details circulated to every New York newspaper, and public meetings scheduled for every night through September and October, support for Roosevelt quickly picked up. Whether or not my lectures helped the cause will never be known; nor does it matter. The elections were to be held on November 8th with forecast results that not even the most optimistic could have hoped for. Roosevelt was sure to become Governor, and for the first time in history, the Republicans also led every poll for the seven posts in the New York State cabinet office.

Through the spring and early summer, I was also busy with the rewriting and updating of my book which is now to be published as Under Three Flags in Cuba. 1899 was a year of turmoil in New York and tensions were also escalating on the world stage. In Britain, Lord Salisbury's political manoeuvrings and negotiations on the issues of the rights of the Uitlanders, control of the gold mining industry, and the British desire to incorporate the Transvaal and the Orange Free State into a federation under British control, were causing chaos within the South African Republic. The Boers recognised that this would eventually result in the loss of ethnic Boer control and, under a blatant display of filibustering, they ensured that the June 1899 negotiations in Bloemfontein failed. In response, Salisbury's Colonial Secretary, Joseph Chamberlain, formally demanded full rights and representation for every Uitlander residing in the Transvaal. This left the Boer with no options and it could now be only a matter of time before war with the British was declared.

1899 drew towards its turbulent conclusion during the first few days of October. My book was published on the 1st; and on the 3rd, I received a telegram from the editor of Black and White Review, informing me that passage to South Africa was booked for me on the SS Assaye, leaving in two days’ time. Salisbury's force of 10,000 extra troops landed in Capetown on the 4th, and war with the Boer was now imminent. On top of all this, my head was in even more of a spin because I had fallen hopelessly in love with Mary, my ministering angel. I could not imagine life without her so, as I was leaving to join my ship on the 5th, I plucked up the courage to propose, and left a much happier man when she accepted.

AN ULTIMATUM FROM THE TRANSVAAL

The fiasco of the 1895 Jameson raid had alienated many Cape Afrikaners from the British, and united the Transvaal Boers behind President Kruger and his government. In spite of the four years of truce that followed, it also had the effect of drawing the Transvaal and the Orange Free State together in opposition to perceived British imperialism. In 1897 a military pact was concluded between the two republics as they silently and grimly prepared for the inevitable.

By August 1899 the Transvaal army had been transformed; approximately 25,000 men equipped with modern rifles and artillery could be mobilised within two weeks. However, President Kruger’s victory in the Jameson incident had done nothing to resolve the fundamental problem; the impossible dilemma continued, namely how to make concessions to the Uitlanders, or foreigners, without surrendering the independence of the Transvaal.

The failure to gain improved rights for Uitlanders became a catalyst for war and a justification for a major military build-up in the Cape Colony. The case for war was developed and espoused as far away as the Australian colonies. Several key British colonial leaders favoured annexation of the independent Boer republics. These figures included Cape Colony Governor Sir Alfred Milner, Cecil Rhodes, British Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain, and mining syndicate owners such as Alfred Beit, Barney Barnato, and Lionel Phillips. Confident that the Boers would be quickly defeated, they planned and organised a short war, citing the Uitlanders’ grievances as the motivation for the conflict.

Lord Salisbury, the Prime Minister, believed that the British government had an obligation to British South Africans; and that the Boers’ treatment of black South Africans could not be tolerated. He mistrusted the abilities of the British army but it is difficult to understand why the British government went against the advice of its generals to send substantial reinforcements to South Africa before war broke out. One argument is that they simply prevaricated in accepting that the Boers were preparing for war, and also believed that if Britain were to send large numbers of troops, it would strike too aggressive a posture and so prevent a negotiated settlement being reached.

President Steyn of the Orange Free State invited Governor Milner and President Kruger to attend a conference in Bloemfontein. The conference started on 30th May 1899, but negotiations quickly broke down, despite Kruger’s offer of concessions. In September 1899, Chamberlain sent an ultimatum demanding full equality for British citizens resident in Transvaal. Kruger, believing that war was now inevitable, simultaneously issued his own ultimatum prior to receiving Chamberlain’s.

News of the ultimatum reached London on the day it expired. Denouncing it as an extravagant farce, the editor of the Times said when he read it that, an official document is seldom amusing and useful, yet this was both. The Globe ridiculed this trumpery little state, while the Daily Telegraph declared: of course there can only be one answer to this grotesque challenge. Kruger has asked for war and war he must have!

Even the champions of the Boer, at home and abroad, were astounded. We had been told that the God-fearing President in Pretoria was profoundly anxious to preserve peace. The English nation was warned that its political leaders, blinded by lust of empire, were forcing a war upon a people willing and anxious to grant all reasonable concessions that did not jeopardise their independence: if war came, the blood was to be on the heads of Mr. Chamberlain and his supporters.

The ultimatum, after denying the right of her Majesty’s Government to intervene in the internal affairs of the South African republic, demanded:

1. That all differences should be settled by arbitration.

2. That British troops should be removed from the frontiers.

3. That all troops landed in South Africa since June 1st should be sent home.

4. That no further troops should be landed.

In the event of these demands not being agreed to within forty-eight hours, the South African republic would consider war declared.

Until I visited South Africa, I confess that I sympathised with the Boer desire to keep the government in their own hands; superficial investigation there, however, revealed such a mass of corruption and brutality, that all trace of sympathy vanished. In the Transvaal, a warlike spirit had been infused into the burghers; war was the main topic, and when fighting still seemed preposterous to outsiders, hundreds of Uitlanders removed their families from the Republic. Arrogance and intolerance of all things British grew with the martial spirit, and numerous instances of brutality were reported. The open threats of the Boers swelled the steady exodus into a rush that became a mad panic, and spread to the border towns exposed to the threatened invasion.

As commando after commando was hurried to the border, thousands of Uitlanders barricaded their stores and houses, and started for British territory. The inevitable sufferings of these refugees, exaggerated by the excitement and fear of the moment, were greatly augmented by the crass brutality of the Boers. Mr. Schreiner has officially denied that these outrages were perpetrated. Rabid colonial loyalists say that he was too busy mollifying his supporters by securing the neutrality of British South Africa in a British war, to attend to such matters.

I can only state facts as I learned them from the refugees themselves, plain British women, typical mothers of the nation, who were crowded into seat-less coal and cattle trucks, and sent over the frontier. On both Cape and Natal journeys Boers gathered at the wayside stations, baiting the refugees being a regular diversion for the burghers. Mr. Langham, a reformist who ventured to the station when the Krugersdorp commando was entraining, was kicked, beaten, and mortally injured. At Viljoen’s Drift rude official searches were made; at Paarde Kraal ladies were kissed, and told to prepare for Boer paramours; at Kroonstaad a Scotch lady who resented an insult was struck in the face. On at least three trains, fathers who ventured from the station to buy milk for their famished children were driven back to the cars by the sjamboks of mounted burghers; several bore bleeding weals on their faces. A father who protested that his child would die, was assured, with a slash, that it would be one more rooinek in hell. An American was beaten and kicked, the ZAR Police pushing their revolvers in his face when he demanded protection.

On October 1st at Machadodorp, and at other points at other times, all male passengers