Having had an extensive look through the South African Field Force casualty rolls, it is apparent that disease took its toll throughout the campaign and was responsible for approximately 65% of the 22,092 deaths of the British forces. A quick count of the different diseases mentioned in Watts In Memoriam equates to over 35. The majority are recorded as enteric/typhoid and dysentery. However, there are inclusions pertaining to the plague and scurvy. Below is a soldier who was recorded as dying from scurvy as per the Natal Field Force casualty roll. Where as Watt records enteric fever as the cause?
552 Armourer Sergeant William Percy Rickards (not Richards as on the cemetery memorial), Army Ordnance Corps, serving with the 1st Battalion (Princess Victoria's) Royal Irish Fusiliers
Sgt Rickards was buried in Intombi cemetery
Ladysmith, uThukela District Municipality, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. He died on the 3rd of March 1900.
There are 2 medal rolls for Sgt Rickards one for the Army Ordnance Company (Armourer section) and one for his service with the Royal Irish Fusiliers. Both rolls record QSA with Talana & Defence of Ladysmith clasps. His personal effects and will was left to his wife Frances Natalie Rickards who resided at Hyde Park Barracks Middlesex.
With regard to the cause of death being scurvy or enteric? I have included a few extracts relating to scurvy. Although there are very few cases recorded in the Field Force casualty rolls, I would have imagined that there were more deaths from scurvy than were previously recorded?
Taken from an extract from 2nd Battalion Royal Irish Fusiliers.
Defence of Ladysmith.
On the 17 November 1899, the 2nd Battalion arrived at the front and were among the troops that came to the Relief of Ladysmith. Relief had proved impossible until new tactics in infantry and artillery had been developed. These tactics were employed successfully at the battle of Pieter’s Hill on the 27 February 1900 where the 2nd Battalion lost one hundred men. During the siege, the two companies of the Royal Irish Fusiliers, who had not been deployed at Nicholson’s Nek, suffered from scurvy and typhoid.
Burnett: Chapter 5: Ladysmith during the siege
Towards the end of December sickness increased considerably in Ladysmith, and the numbers in Intombi Hospital were rising daily; by the 30th they had reached about 1,100. Our own regiment had so far been extremely fortunate, we had suffered considerably from enteric during the year before the war, and had no doubt got a good deal hardened to it, and this, aided by the gravel soil we were camped on, and the great care taken to keep the ground as clean as possible, no doubt saved us many lives. Major Marling had been unwell for a considerable time, and had only just been able to be present at the reconnaissance of December the 8th, and on December 24th he was admitted to Intombi Hospital, where he remained till the end of the siege suffering from a very bad attack of dysentery. Captain Wellby took over command of " A " Squadron in his absence. On January 1st Captain Davey took over command of *' B " Squadron, and Captain Burnett acted as Adjutant for the remainder of the war.
In the early days of the siege food was more or less plentiful, but as time wore on we suffered severely from the lack of supervision, and waste that went on during the early period. Our rations, of course, were gradually reduced, as were those of the troops in Ladysmith, and one can readily imagine the effect of a diet of horseflesh, and bread (?), made out of sour mealies, and such similar fare on the emaciated frames of the wretched patients. Scurvy and starvation played terrible havoc, and these, with the addition of enteric and dysentery, were far deadlier foes than any " Long Tom " or other shells. Words fail me when I try to describe the scenes that one strove to avoid witnessing, but to glean any idea of what Intombi was like, one must picture to oneself a vast collection of tents, both large and small, and the same filled to overflowing with men in every stage of disease and illness—the middle of some stifling night in February—the whole place reeking with most nauseating odours—frail skeletons of men, strong in their delirium, fighting and wrestling with gentle nurses—weird groans and sounds from everywhere, and in the morning a mournful procession of men, carrying on stretchers lifeless forms of poor souls, wrapped in Government blankets, to their last resting place, the bearers halting many times through sheer exhaustion during the walk of a few hundred yards which separated the cemetery from the camp. It was a poor look out for any, save those of the strongest constitutions and wills, who got really ill during the latter part of the siege, as in addition to there being practically no food, spirits, drugs, and medical comforts of every sort gave out. It was not a question of getting better, but of being kept alive at all.
