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1899 - From the letters writer by Lt Col Park in Ladysmith

27th December We are all feeling terribly down in the mouth today, as an unlucky shell came right into our mess this morning and burst there, killing poor Dalzel on the spot, and wounding eight other officers more or less. Price-Dent, and Caffin of the Yorkshires, are dangerously wounded, and Lafone, Byrne (Inniskillings), Tringham (Queen’s), Twiss, Scafe, and Kane very slightly - all with knocks on the head from bits of stone. Price-Dent has a piece of the back of his head knocked off, exposing the brain, and Caffin has his right arm broken and a bit of stone in his lung, and the doctors think badly of both cases. The rest are all right. I was down in the orderly-room at the time, and most of the officers had just left it and gone back to the mess, which is a big canvas and tarpaulin shelter behind a 7 ft. thick stone wall, with an earth bank behind it, and is pretty safe; but, by bad luck, the shell just scraped the top of the wall and burst over the heads of the fellows sitting underneath, sending showers of stones and dirt over them. Dalzel was sitting further on at a table reading, and had just laughingly said he wouldn’t move but would take his chance, when he was struck and killed instantaneously. One of the newspaper correspondents has very kindly sent a message through for me, asking his editor in London to break the news to Dalzel’s sisters, so that I hope they will know before they see the bare official news in the papers. Our mess can’t be seen from anywhere near the Boer guns, so that this shot was a pure fluke, and must have been aimed at something else. It has wrecked the mess, smashing two-thirds of the tables and chairs, and cutting the canvas and tarpaulin into shreds. It was a big 6-inch shell from a hill nearly four miles off. We have a look-out man, with a whistle, who blows whenever this gun fires, so that everyone has lots of time to get under cover , and the fellows in the mess thought they were quite safe. It is not likely to happen again in 1000 rounds. Poor Dalzel will be buried this evening in the cemetery here.

We had a very heavy thunderstorm last night, and it poured with rain for five hours. I hope it won’t flood the Tugela so that Buller’s force can’t cross. I feel too low in my mind to write more.

A picture of Lt Augustus Frederick Dalzel, Devonshire Regiment. My thanks to Elmarie for this image.

What occurs to me, is simply that the breakfast table in the mess is a rather silly place to die, the poor fellow, those three remaining companies of his regiment, held in reserve in the forthcoming new year, would have the opportunity to avenge his unfortunate death on the 6th of January, with the bayonet!

I for one am sorry to read of the despondency, clearly felt by Cecil Park, notwithstanding, those Boer's mentioned towards the end of this entry, certainly did not have a thousand rounds and very soon would have shelled, civilians, women and children for the last time, moreover, it would be his own lads that would settle matters once and for all in Ladysmith, a number of whom would go on to be founder members of the Defenders of Ladysmith Association.
They were all magnificent, Thomas Atkins at his very best.

djb wrote: 1899 - From the letters writer by Lt Col Park in Ladysmith

27th December We are all feeling terribly down in the mouth today, as an unlucky shell came right into our mess this morning and burst there, killing poor Dalzel on the spot, and wounding eight other officers more or less. Price-Dent, and Caffin of the Yorkshires, are dangerously wounded, and Lafone, Byrne (Inniskillings), Tringham (Queen’s), Twiss, Scafe, and Kane very slightly - all with knocks on the head from bits of stone. Price-Dent has a piece of the back of his head knocked off, exposing the brain, and Caffin has his right arm broken and a bit of stone in his lung, and the doctors think badly of both cases. The rest are all right. I was down in the orderly-room at the time, and most of the officers had just left it and gone back to the mess, which is a big canvas and tarpaulin shelter behind a 7 ft. thick stone wall, with an earth bank behind it, and is pretty safe; but, by bad luck, the shell just scraped the top of the wall and burst over the heads of the fellows sitting underneath, sending showers of stones and dirt over them. Dalzel was sitting further on at a table reading, and had just laughingly said he wouldn’t move but would take his chance, when he was struck and killed instantaneously. One of the newspaper correspondents has very kindly sent a message through for me, asking his editor in London to break the news to Dalzel’s sisters, so that I hope they will know before they see the bare official news in the papers. Our mess can’t be seen from anywhere near the Boer guns, so that this shot was a pure fluke, and must have been aimed at something else. It has wrecked the mess, smashing two-thirds of the tables and chairs, and cutting the canvas and tarpaulin into shreds. It was a big 6-inch shell from a hill nearly four miles off. We have a look-out man, with a whistle, who blows whenever this gun fires, so that everyone has lots of time to get under cover , and the fellows in the mess thought they were quite safe. It is not likely to happen again in 1000 rounds. Poor Dalzel will be buried this evening in the cemetery here.

We had a very heavy thunderstorm last night, and it poured with rain for five hours. I hope it won’t flood the Tugela so that Buller’s force can’t cross. I feel too low in my mind to write more.

1899 - From the diary of Major George Tatham, Natal Carbineers

Helpmakaar Post getting it again with Mausers and Pom-poms, also fairly heavy rifle fire on the Surprise Hill side. This continued almost all through the night.

1899 - Diary of the siege of Mafeking by Edward Ross

Wednesday, 27 December

The funeral ceremony last night of the dead killed in yesterday’s attack was extremely impressive. The men, about 18 or 19, were laid in one long trench, each body sewn up in white canvas, and the three officers for whom coffins had been made were placed each in separate graves. The Reverend Weekes, English church, and Father Ogle, Roman Catholic priest, officiated. After the service Lord Cecil gave the command and five buglers blew the last post, with two squads of men round with reversed arms. B.P. with all the staff and other officers were there, together with a large crowd of townspeople. The cemetery, which is now of course a miniature fort, garrisoned by some of the Volunteers, must be rather a ghastly and creepy sort of place for these latter to be camped in. A very touching little incident occurred during the lowering of Captain Vernon’s body. Four of his own men held the ropes, and just as they were letting go and in the midst of a very impressive silence, the rough hard voice of an old soldier, a hardened character of the world, and who was holding one of the ropes, was heard to fervently ejaculate, "God bless you Captain” ! Coming from such a hard adventurer it brought tears to the eyes of many onlookers.

Today has been exceedingly quiet, hardly a shell has been fired. A big shell last evening again damaged Weil’s place, another bursting over the top of Lady Sarah Wilson’s dugout, the only damage done was to an iron store occupied by a man named Soloman. He was inside and got slightly braised.

The Boers today sent in the gold watch and chain and ring taken from the dead body of Lieutenant Paton. This was very good of them, but still there are a host of things still missing.

Lord Cecil, in talking of the charge of C. squadron, said it was absolutely the finest show he had ever seen and it would be the extreme pleasure of his life to lead such men.