Treachery in Tibet (13 page)

‘Yes, friendly fire, I’m afraid. Our own shrapnel killed three of my Sikhs and two of our ponies.’

‘Ah, damned sorry. That’s the trouble with shrapnel. Can’t quite control it, yer know. But look, quite a few of the Tibetans have retreated to Guru, a couple of miles away. Will you take a patrol and see if there is any evidence of them making a stand there in the village? We will have to march onto there and I don’t want to be caught napping.’

‘Very well, General.’

Simon mounted his horse and trotted to where Jenkins and Ottley were deep in conversation. ‘William,’ he called, nodding to where the three bodies were lying on the cart, ‘make sure that these chaps are
burnt properly. Get a company mounted and formed up, 352. We must go ahead to make sure that the Tibetans have not retreated to Guru and are not waiting to repulse us there.’

Within minutes, half of the Mounted Infantry were trotting along behind Simon and Jenkins as they moved up towards the little village two miles north of the wall. On the way, they passed the remnants of the wall’s defenders, who completely disregarded them, walking on stoically.

Guru came into sight as soon as the horsemen rounded a bend and it soon became apparent that the village was occupied and that the Tibetans there, at least, were certainly going to dispute the way ahead. One shot rang out and then a fusillade as Simon and his men came fully into sight.

‘Blimey,’ swore Jenkins as they reined in. ‘I thought there wasn’t supposed to be any fight left in them lads. Looks as though they’ve been waitin’ for us.’ He pointed ahead.

Muskets, rifles and more of the strange tube-type blunderbusses could be seen poking through windows and above walls from the houses that lined the entrance to the village. Soon bullets and musket balls were flying over the heads of the mounted men as they paused uncertainly.

Fonthill frowned. He didn’t want his to be the only command that suffered more fatalities. He turned in the saddle, pointed and shouted, ‘Back round the bend. Quickly, now.’

The company galloped back the way they had come, accompanied by the jeers of the village’s defenders. There, they halted, the breath of their ponies rising in the cold air.

‘What now, bach sir?’ asked Jenkins.

‘Take six of the best marksmen in the company, get them behind whatever cover you can find round the bend and then open up fire on those chaps firing from the village. I will give you five minutes to make ’em get their heads down. Then I shall lead the rest of the company in a charge to clear the village. Understood?’

‘Oh yes. Make sure you grip with your thighs when you charge, though. I’m not goin’ to be with you to keep you in the saddle.’

Fonthill sighed. ‘Oh, get on with you. Now,
Daffadar.’

‘Sahib.’ A giant Sikh NCO, whose huge turban was precariously kept in place on his head by a scarf tied under his chin, edged his pony forward.

‘Line the men up across the road, out of the sight of the enemy, with sabres drawn. As soon as Company Sergeant Major Jenkins has kept up fire on the enemy in the village for about five minutes, I shall lead a charge with the remainder of the company. As we charge, we will shout like hell. Tell the men that.’

The
daffadar’s
teeth flashed white behind his beard. Every cavalryman, whether Mounted Infantry or not, reflected Simon, loved a charge. ‘Oh yes. Very good, sahib.’

‘Wait. There is more. The enemy will be behind cover in the buildings and behind walls. So we will charge straight through the village, cutting down anyone who is in our way. When I give the order, we will halt, dismount, the handlers will take the horses and then the rest of us, with our carbines, will run back and clear the enemy on foot from behind their defences. Understood?’

‘Yes, sahib. Very understood.’

Fonthill watched as Jenkins, with his six men, began to crawl around the bend in the road, until they had disappeared from sight.
He looked at his watch and marked the time as soon as he heard their first shots. Then he remounted his pony, urged it into the centre of the road and waited as the
daffadar
lined up the company – some forty-six men – across the track behind him.

Sitting there, listening to the sharp crack of the marksmen out of sight ahead, Simon realised that his mouth had gone dry. He had never been a cavalryman but he remembered enough from his training as an infantry subaltern to know that cavalry
did not
charge riflemen firing from cover, unless the situation was desperate. He gulped and wished, for a brief moment, that Jenkins was with him. The situation was always less desperate if his old comrade was by his side. But there was no alternative today. There was no way to outflank the village, so it would have to be a direct charge and Jenkins, as the best shot by far in the unit, would have to lead the sniping. He was banking that the Tibetans in the village would not be trained soldiers and that they would not fancy tangling with nearly fifty men thundering down on them, shrieking and waving their sabres.

He took out his watch. One minute to go. Jenkins and his marksmen were still firing. Fonthill turned and looked behind him. The company was lined up, stretching across the road two deep. He could not resist a grin. The men sitting their ponies, eyes gleaming and grinning back at him, looked more like a band of brigands than soldiers. Most had now wrapped their scarves round the lower part of their faces, bandit-fashion; their long
poshteen
sheepskins draped down either side of their saddles, making their wiry little ponies look even more diminutive; and their sabres glistened in the cold sunlight. Simon was reminded of Wellington’s remark about his raggle-taggle army facing Napoleon’s troops in the Peninsular War: ‘I don’t know
what they do to the enemy, but, by Gad sir, they frighten me.’

He looked at his watch again. The correct tactics for a cavalry charge, he seemed to have read somewhere, were to begin by trotting gently, then to canter and then, when near the enemy, to break into a gallop for the charge. But, what the hell! Now he was near enough to the enemy and he wanted to instil terror into them as soon as he and his men rounded the bend. So now, he slowly filled his lungs, raised his sabre, pointed it straight ahead and screamed: ‘Charge!’

He dug in his heels, tugged on the right rein to wheel his pony round the bend and put his steed to full gallop. He caught a glimpse of Jenkins on his feet to his right, waving him on, and heard the thunder of hooves behind him. As he rode, head down, he saw rifle flashes from a wall to his left but heard nothing. A man with what appeared to be a pike lunged at him but he crashed it aside with his sabre. Then another appeared directly ahead of him, waving a long Tibetan sword. He pulled his pony to the left and cut at the man, slashing his arm. Then he was in the middle of what appeared to be a completely deserted village.

He allowed the pony to fall back into a trot and realised that he had been concentrating so hard on keeping his seat that he had forgotten to yell. Looking around, he saw that the buildings seemed to be untenanted. Had the villagers – or soldiers, if that was what they were – all congregated at the entry to the village? He held up his hand to halt his company and called for the horse handlers. Slipping the sabre back into its saddle sheath, he half fell from his horse and threw the reins to the trooper who ran forward. He drew his revolver and stood for a moment scanning the buildings on either side. Nothing.

In moments, he was surrounded by his men. ‘
Daffadar
,’ he shouted.

The big man materialised at his side.

‘Any casualties from the charge?’

‘No, sahib. No one hit. All here.’

He sighed with relief. ‘Good. Ensure your carbines are loaded. Yes? Good. Now, at the double, back to the end of the village. Run.
NOW
!’

Although beginning in the lead, Fonthill was soon overtaken by long-striding Sikhs who ranged out ahead of him. A musket poked over a wall and the man behind it was immediately brought down by a carbine shot. The Sikhs soon disappeared into the houses and grey-shrouded Tibetans began pouring out, their hands upraised. One tall man, with long Manderin-moustaches – a priest lama, perhaps? – sprang from a doorway and swung his sword horizontally at Simon, who ducked instinctively and fired his revolver directly into the man’s chest. Not waiting to see if the man fell, Fonthill ran on. Then he realised that he had reached the end of the village and saw Jenkins and his marksmen trotting up the road to meet him.

‘Ah,’ puffed Jenkins. ‘Thank God you’re all right. You was never exactly good at chargin’ on ’orseback wavin’ a sword, bach sir. I’m amazed you did it without me.’

Fonthill put an arm on the Welshman’s shoulder and leant on him, trying to regain his breath. ‘I was never much better running up a Tibetan street at some ridiculous altitude, either,’ he panted.

He turned. The Sikhs led by the
daffadar
were rounding up scores of terrified Tibetans, who soon began grinning as they realised that they were not to be killed out of hand. Then, sheepishly, women and children, all muffled to their chins, began dribbling out from the
dwellings, putting out their tongues in signs of friendship.

Down the trail, a company of Gurkhas, their pillbox hats jauntily showing above their greatcoats, were trotting towards the village, their rifles at the trail.

‘Well,’ grunted Jenkins, ‘I reckon that’s the bloody end of that funny old battle, look you.’

‘I reckon it is,’ said Fonthill. ‘Thank God for that.’

After Alice had sent her despatch and returned to the fire that Jenkins lit between their tents, she lifted her tin cup of steaming tea and frowned at Simon. ‘Damn,’ she said. ‘I meant to ask if any guns of Russian make had been found amongst the dead. Did you see any?’

‘Some rifles, although they didn’t look Russian. Mostly they used – or tried to use – muskets. From the evidence so far, it doesn’t appear that Moscow has been supplying the Tibetans with arms.’

Alice snorted. ‘There you are. It looks as though Curzon has been completely wrong about the Russian influence in Lhasa. If he is, then this whole invasion is based on a myth.’

Fonthill raised a hand. ‘Now, don’t go jumping to conclusions. We have only had one real clash with the Tibetans so far and—’

‘It wasn’t a clash, more like a disgraceful massacre.’

‘Well, whatever it was, we’ve only come up against them once. There are likely to be others and we shall see then, when we penetrate
deeper into the country. And, don’t forget, there are other reasons for making the Tibetans negotiate. They’ve broken treaties and not behaved like a civilised nation at all.’

Alice blew the steam away from her brimming mug. ‘Well, what do you expect from people who live on the roof of the world, paint their faces and had never seen a wheeled vehicle until we brought one in – carrying guns, of course.’

‘Oh dear, please don’t go on.’ Simon shrugged. ‘Anyway, Younghusband is hoping that this battle – if you can call it that – will have put the fear of God into the lamas in Lhasa and that we shall meet no further opposition. Let’s hope so.’

That, however, soon proved to be a pious hope.

Anxious to push on – a welcome and, most of the officers felt, probably temporary change of heart – Macdonald sent Fonthill and his Mounted Infantry scouting out ahead and widely to the flanks to flush out any further Tibetan forces before the advance recommenced. The unit had been reinforced by a number of Gurkhas, many of whom had never sat a horse in their lives until their intensive training back at the border. Nevertheless, as befitting their reputation as being among the most versatile and dedicated troops in the army of the Raj, they soon became as comfortable in the saddle as the Sikhs. In fact, ‘Fonthill’s Horse’, as it became known, had now assumed something of the mantle of an
elite
force, widely respected throughout the invading force – and certainly its most actively employed.

It was patrolling ahead when Macdonald’s ‘reconnaissance in force’ stoically gathered together its long tail and began to advance once more towards Gyantse. It plodded along beside the still frozen banks of the Bham Tso and Kala Tso lakes, their lush wildlife on the
ice-free open patches of water contrasting starkly with the twisted corpses from the battlefield, where the iron-hard ground had resisted all attempts by the Pioneers to bury them. Alice, whose pony daintily threaded its own way between the once-human detritus, thankfully turned her head away to note the wildfowl: sheldrake, pintails, geese, teal and mallard. If she kept her eyes focussed to the left, she could have been in a wintry Norfolk.

Way ahead of the main column, however, Simon was leading the first of his two companies – he refused to call them squadrons, maintaining that his men remained Mounted
Infantry
– when he was fired upon as he approached a village called Samada. Retiring to regroup with his second company, he extended his front and, at the trot, approached the village, ready to break into a charge if fired upon again. In the event, he found that the defenders had retreated and the village was devoid of inhabitants.

‘Funny bleedin’ lot, these Tibeterans,’ confided Jenkins. ‘They can’t seem to make up their minds whether to be ’eroes or cowards, see. Perhaps it’s the weather up ’ere.’

Cautiously, the Mounted Infantry continued its patrol northwards along the trail, beside the Nyang Chu. The route was marked by small fields of barley and then, to a cheer from the Sikhs, a patch of stunted willow trees – the first real trees that the warriors had seen since climbing into the mountains. Then, just at the point where the river entered what was to be a fifteen-mile gorge that ended at the plain of Gyantse, Simon, Jenkins and Ottley, riding ahead, were fired on once again, from a wall that stretched across the trail at a place called Kangmar, the village of the Red Foot, so called from the surrounding spurs of toe-like red sandstone.

This time, however, it was a much more formidable proposition than the wall before Guru. It was loopholed, it extended right across the mouth of the gorge and it curled quite high up the mountains on both sides. Behind the wall, the Tibetans were gathered in considerable numbers.

‘Ah,’ muttered Jenkins, leaning forward in the saddle and munching his moustache, ‘I suppose we now give it another of our famous charges, jump the wall and then trot on to this Gutsey place.’

‘I rather fancy not,’ said Fonthill. ‘I don’t want to be a dead hero. We are here to scout and we’ve found what we are looking for. Let’s get back to the General.’ He paused only long enough to make a sketch of the Tibetan position before ordering the return to the column.

There, he found the Macdonald ensconced with Younghusband and he reported to both, showing them the sketch. ‘They seem pretty determined this time,’ he said, ‘and it looks as though they intend to defend in some depth. As best as I could see beyond the wall, the road narrows beside the river considerably and then there is a spur across the road which offers a good, sound, second line of defence.’

The two officers scanned the sketch. ‘Hmm,’ murmured Macdonald, ‘as far as we know, this blocks the only road to Gyantse and Lhasa, so we shall have to crack this nut if we want to get on.’

Younghusband nodded. ‘And we certainly do want to get on. Good work, Fonthill.’

‘We will sound reveille at 5 a.m. tomorrow morning and advance in battle formation,’ Macdonald’s voice was firm. ‘You will scout ahead, as usual, Fonthill, so you should be out at 4 a.m.’

‘Very good, gentlemen.’

Alice, of course, was concerned at the news. ‘Not another bloody
wall,’ she hissed, ‘which, presumably, Mac will knock down with his artillery and then butcher the peasants behind again with his Maxims and rifles.’

‘I doubt if it will be that easy, this time. For God’s sake, Alice, stay well out of the way. Remember what happened to that chap from the
Daily Mail.’

‘Oh, I shall be all right. I have the magnificent Sunil to defend me. We could invade Lhasa on our own.’

It was dark and, of course, bitingly cold, when Fonthill and his Mounted Infantry trotted away in the morning. Three hours or so later they approached Kangmar with caution, only to find that the wall now seemed completely unmanned. Fonthill, with Ottley, climbed as high as they could up the near-precipitate slopes on either side – Jenkins, of course, offering to stay with the men below, ‘to make sure we’re ready in case they attack.’ Through their field glasses they were able to confirm that the Tibetans had abandoned their positions during the night and had retreated to the stronger position that Simon had glimpsed at the throat of the gorge.

Fonthill ordered up some of his nimble-footed Gurkhas to climb the mountainside as high as they could. Gasping for breath, he scrambled up after them with his binoculars. He had to pause some hundred feet below them and stayed there, focussing his glasses. When the little men rejoined him, they reported that a line of sangars had been built and manned high on both sides of the defile and that the muzzles of numerous
jingals
, the blunderbuss Tibetan artillery, could be seen trained on the road below.

‘Hmm,’ mused Simon, ‘this is not going to be easy.’

And so he reported to Macdonald when, eventually, the main
column came up. ‘They have taken up good defensive positions and it looks to me as though they are going to stay and fight properly this time,’ he said. ‘Past the wall, the road along the bottom of the defile bends to the right for about a mile. Here the valley looks as though it widens out to about 150 yards. On the left the cliffs are perpendicular, solid walls of rock. On the right, though, the rocky slopes could probably be climbed by Gurkhas, with great difficulty – a fair old scramble, I would say.’

Macdonald coughed and, for once, took the cigarette from his mouth. ‘Could you see what lay beyond?’ he asked.

‘A little, though not in great detail. After the wider bit, the road twists back to the left round a spur and narrows even to about six feet and seems to be studded with boulders. I reckon that, in addition to the men we could see up high on the sangars, this is where the main body of Tibetans will be. But I can’t be sure. It is not until we advance that this will become clear.’

‘Ah. Bloody difficult by the sound of it.’

Fonthill cleared his throat. ‘May I make a suggestion, General?’

‘Humph. Suggest away. But I don’t guarantee to follow it. We can’t afford to take extreme risks, Fonthill. We are far from home, with a very limited force and a line of supply that is stretched to twanging point.’

Simon struggled to suppress a smile. Typical Macdonald!

‘Quite so. But I had some experience of fighting in hills something like these – though, of course, nothing like so high – on the North-West Frontier.’

Macdonald frowned. ‘Very well. What do you propose?’

‘I would hold back your main body and send Gurkhas – they can
climb like mountain goats – up the mountain to the right, where some of my men have managed to get up quite high today. Let them clear the sangars. Then let me advance with my Mounted Infantry along the road below to draw the fire of the Tibetans along the defile so that we can test how many there are and how strong. We may even be able to clear the way for you behind us.’

The General stayed silent, puffing on his cigarette. Eventually, he nodded. ‘Very well, Fonthill. But don’t take on the whole Tibetan army on your own.’ He let his features lapse into his sour smile. ‘Dammit all, man, remember you’re not a Regular soldier – and you’re even older than me. So don’t take undue risks. But first I must get the Pioneers to dismantle this damned wall and that will take all day, I should think. I will put the Gurkhas up the mountainside tomorrow and I will try and get the guns hauled up to a position where they can bear on the sangars. Have your men ready to go in when the little fellers have done their work. I shall give the order then.’

Fonthill nodded and turned away. Not the most supportive of responses but about as much as could be expected from the man!

For the rest of the day the 23rd Regiment of Pioneers, big Sikhs to a man, worked at pulling down the wall. They did so without a shot being fired at them and Simon wondered at one point if the Tibetans had, in fact, completely deserted their second position and fallen back on Gyantse. His scouts up the mountainside, however, reported that the sangars, at least, were still manned and their
jingals
were still in place, their wide muzzles still threatening any advance along the road.

That evening, Fonthill sought out Sunil, whom he found meticulously cleaning his rifle.

‘I have just not had time to thank you for looking after the
memsahib back at Guru,’ he said, squatting down beside the youth. ‘I am sure that if you had not been there, she would have rushed up the wall, like that fellow from the
Daily Mail,
and been seriously wounded, if not killed.’

Sunil flashed his teeth in a wide smile. ‘Ah, thank you, sahib. She brave lady and don’t listen to me much when I say, “don’t go.” But I tell her I shoot her if she leaves me, so she stayed, writing … always, what you say, scrobbling?’

‘Scribbling. Yes, but she’s a damned good reporter and she likes to get near the action. This fight tomorrow could be far worse than the scrap at Guru and I won’t be able to be anywhere near her, so watch over her, that’s a good chap.’

‘I watch, yes. I watch.’

‘Good man.’

Shortly after dawn the next day, the Gurkhas were sent scrambling up the mountainside until they disappeared into the mist.

Ottley and Fonthill stood below amongst the ruin of the wall, watching them. ‘They’re not going to be able to see much, let alone fight up there in this cloud,’ said the Captain, his nose, almost as red now as his hair, peeping out from behind the turned-up collar of his
poshteen.
‘What’s more,’ he sniffed the air, ‘I think there’s a bloody snowstorm coming on. God help them up there.’

Simon nodded. ‘Yes, I think you’re right. I wish we hadn’t dismantled the tents. There’s precious little cover for men or horses down here.’

Within minutes the snowstorm had whirled down all about them, blotting out each man’s view of anyone or anything but his close
neighbour. Fonthill could only order the ponies to be covered with their blankets and the men to take what shelter they could. So they all crouched in the freezing cold, to the point where Simon wondered if anyone would be able to move if and when the order to do so came.

It was a blessed relief, then, when the storm lifted, leaving a grey-black cloud above their heads, so low that it could almost be touched – and, of course, still obscuring the Gurkhas, if they had survived up there in the heights. At that moment, a young subaltern came running up.

‘General presents his compliments, sir,’ he said. ‘He doubts whether the Gurkhas have been able to clear the hillside but you are to take your mounted men and advance down the defile – he emphasises with caution – to test the enemy’s defences and report back.’

‘Thank you,’ said Fonthill, his teeth chattering. ‘We’ll move if the ponies haven’t been frozen to the ground. No,’ he grinned. ‘Don’t tell the General that. Just say that we will move immediately.’

He found Ottley and Jenkins and relayed the order. ‘We will go in single file,’ he said, ‘at a smart trot. Very much in extended order, with about fifteen yards between each man. I will lead A Company, with Sergeant Major Jenkins, and you will take B Company.’

‘I would much rather come with you, Simon. After all, it used to be my troop.’