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Picture courtesy of Noonan's

QSA (1) Defence of Ladysmith (4039 Pte. P. H. Curtis, Rifle Brigade)

Philip Henry Curtis served with the 2nd Battalion, Rifle Brigade, and was wounded at Surprise Hill, Ladysmith, on 11 February 1899.

QSA (1) listed on WO100/210p155. Noted ad being invalided. Left SA 26 June 1900.

Service papers extant. Also served in the Nile Expedition 1898 (Medal).

Also served RFC. Court martialled in May 1918 for disobeying a command.

Fortuitously for myself there was an error in the catalogue to the QSA medal to Philip Henry Curtis, post above, and erroneously gave the wounding at Surprise Hill on 11 Feb 1899; not only was the date incorrect but he was in fact wounded twice during the defence of Ladysmith; this is his story as far as I can piece it together:


BIRTH: 23 May 1879
Tewkesbury Road, Tottenham, London, Middlesex, England

DEATH: 11 NOV 1953
Edmonton, London, Middlesex, England

Parents

Father: Philip Henry Curtis (1854 - 1936)
Mother: Jane Elizabeth Luesby (1857 – 1883)

Military Career

Philip was determined to enter the military from a young age; his first attempt was in October 1894 at the age of 15 when he enlisted with the 3rd Middlesex Regiment falsely giving his age as 18 years and 5 months.

His second attempt was in January 1895 enlisting with the Royal Artillery having lied about his age. He only lasted 3 weeks before he was discharged for reasons of misconduct.

His third and successful attempt came in October 1895 at 16 years old when he enlisted with the Rifle Brigade, giving his age as 18 years and 10 months, and was allocated regimental number 4039.

He was 5ft 71/4”, weighed 125 lbs with a fair complexion, dark brown hair and brown eyes.

Philip then served with the Rifle Brigade in Singapore and Malta before embarking on the Sudan campaign in 1898.

He was with the Rifle Brigade at the Battle of Omdurman on the 2nd September 1898 and was awarded the Queens Sudan Medal along with the Khedive's Sudan Medal with clasp for “Khartoum”.

Second Anglo Boer War[1]

The 2nd Battalion sailed from Crete on the Jelunga on 2nd October 1899, and reached Durban on the 26th October 1899 and arrived by rail at Ladysmith on the 30th October 1899.

From the commencement of the siege the battalion held King's Post and Leicester Post on the north of the town, and, unlike some other battalions, they strained every nerve for weeks to make these posts absolutely unassailable.

The rocky nature of the ground, the want of suitable tools, and the fact that many of the diggers had to be on duty in the trenches all night, made the task superlatively difficult Observation Post, about a mile in advance of King's Post, was till 9th November held by a weak detachment of the 5th Lancers, who were attacked on that day, and the Rifle Brigade had to reinforce them. The attack was repulsed.

Surprise Hill (11 December 1899)


On the morning of 8th December it became known that General Hunter with 600 men of the Imperial Light Horse and Natal Carabiniers had blown up two big guns on Lombard's Kop and captured a maxim.

This fired Colonel Metcalfe to do something similar, and he got Sir George's sanction to endeavour to destroy the howitzer on Surprise Hill.

On the night of the 9th he reconnoitred the route, and on the 10th at 10 pm started with five companies 2nd Rifle Brigade and a few Engineers under the ever-ready Lieutenant Digby-Jones.

The hill-top was reached; after some delay the howitzer was found, not in its emplacement; the explosive was inserted; a fuse was lit, but no explosion happened; another had to be set.

This time the gun was destroyed; but meanwhile the Boers had gathered in force on the hillside, and our men had to charge with fixed bayonets, never firing a shot. Many Boers were bayoneted.

On their way down they were attacked by the Pretoria Commando where the young Deneys Reitz was among them.

Sources for this account include Commando by Deneys Reitz and unpublished writings by Reitz[2]:

“December 10, 1899. A warm, clear, dark, moonless night. Twelve men of Isaac Malherbe’s corporalship were on sentry duty. They marched out to a vantage point over the town. Two went on lookout while the others slept. The 17-year-old Deneys Reitz awakened at 12:30 a.m.: he was to take his turn at 1:00. He lay on his blanket gazing at the great populations of stars.

The sound came of many men walking close by, a muffled trampling. The sound of rifle-fire and wild cheering at the top of nearby Surprise Hill. A tremendous roar and a sheet of flame.

The English had done it again. They had blown up a Boer howitzer.

Malherbe right away led his group of twelve straight to the hill. He told his men not to worry. They would soon be joined by a group under Corporal Tossel that lay closer to the base of the hill. And then the Pretoria commando would surely come forward to help cut off the English as the soldiers returned to Ladysmith. But he was wrong on both counts.

Tossel’s men had fled without even firing a warning shot, and the gunners had been bayoneted by soldiers who shouted out “Rule Britannia!” as they lunged. The Pretoria field-cornet judged the situation too hazardous. The twelve men were on their own.

Deneys was up front with Malherbe as they approached the black shape of the hill. There they ran smack into pickets. Both fired. A sergeant fell dead and the rest ran away. Now a larger party swam forward.

Malherbe’s men fired until this group dissolved in the darkness. The Pretoria young men moved along the bed of a spruit at the base of the hill, looking for a place where they could fire on the English.

As Deneys walked closely behind his tentmate Samuel van Zijl, a bullet from close range struck van Zijl in the throat and set his beard on fire, eerily lighting his face. He was badly wounded and subsequently died of his wounds.

Deneys lay van Zijl down with a blanket under his head, then hurried to join the others further up the spruit. They waited for the mass of English to come down the hill.

The British had no idea anyone was waiting for them. They tramped down the slope, shouting and singing. Deneys saw the glow of their cigarettes in the dark. “Good old Rifle Brigade!” the soldiers sang out.

Malherbe waited until the massive dark shape of the men came within 15 yards, then gave the order to fire. Deneys wrote of the events in a letter to his father:

We then fired amongst them. They stopped, and all called out, “Rifle Brigade.” They must have supposed that we belonged to their people. Then one of them said, “Let us charge.”

As the damaged British column streamed into Ladysmith, the Boer men sat quietly and waited for daylight.
At dawn Deneys saw, arranged in a rough circle around them, 55 dead or wounded British soldiers.
Among them lay three burghers who had bravely come through the dark to help them, two now dead and the third in his last throes.

To the side obediently sat a few English prisoners captured during the conflict. Gradually came other Pretorians to look on what had happened and to praise the courage of Malherbe’s men”

Colonel Metcalfe lost 1 officer and 11 men killed, 36 wounded, and 10 prisoners or missing, but a bit of good work had been boldly and skilfully executed.

Philip Henry Curtis was wounded by a Gunshot to his right thigh, initially reported as severely wounded; however it was an injury that did not require any further treatment.


Battle of Caesar’s Camp

After almost a month of his wounding Philip Curtis was back in the front line for the Battle of Caesars Camp.

At three on the morning of 6th January the battalion heard the furious rattle of musketry round the southern defences, and about 5.30 they were ordered to send six companies to Caesar's Camp, four miles off, arriving there about seven.

Five companies were pushed into the firing line, which was distant from the enemy only 80 yards. "For nearly the whole day the fight raged fiercely, first one side then the other gaining a slight advantage, but we could not succeed in dislodging the Boers" from the south-east of the hill.

At 3.30 the enemy tried to rush forward, but were driven back, and shortly afterwards retreated under a heavy fire, "some companies firing their last round".

The battalion this day lost 1 officer killed and 1 mortally wounded, and 20 men killed, 5 officers and 32 men wounded.

That night officers and men lay on the stricken field soaked and physically wretched, but knowing that another big bit of work had been done.

It was during this battle that Philp was wounded for a second time by two gunshot wounds and where he lay bleeding on the battlefield for over an hour; only this time his wounds would be so severe that it would result in him being discharged from the military as medically unfit.

Medical Assessment of Philip’s Wounds[3]


On the 8th January 1900 Philip was admitted to the Stationary Hospital in Ladysmith.

His injuries are shown to be gunshot wounds to chest, shoulder and neck. There is also an entry on the admittance form which denotes an injury to the right thigh, but this is crossed out. It is possible that this refers to a wound sustained at Surprise Hill, and which did not require further treatment.

On the 28th May 1900, Philip was transferred to an ambulance train, and returned to England aboard the SS Cheshire. On the 20th June 1900 he was transferred to Netley Hospital in Hampshire.

The medical report at Netley, on the 5th July 1900, showed the extent of the injuries Philip had endured.

He suffered two wounds from Mauser bullets. One bullet entered through the right sterno-clavicle, dislocating and breaking the clavicle and exiting through the right armpit, level with the nipple.

Philip stated that he had bleeding for one hour after he was hit.

Examined six months after the battle, the injury still remained unreduced, and the sternal end of the clavicle much weakened (though the report states that Philip suffers no inconvenience and has perfect mobility).

The second wound was from a Mauser bullet entering one inch below the left mastoid process, exiting from the side and back of the neck, three inches below the occipital protuberance.

The report describes it as a ‘flesh wound’, giving no trouble. Further medical reports took place in September and October, assessing Philip Henry’s ability to continue service, and entitlement to pension.

A report on the 7th October 1900 stated that the gunshot wounds are quite healed, but the inner end of the collar bone is ‘projecting very much in front’, and the right arm is slightly weakened by the wound in the axilla.

The report stated that the injury was permanent and will not improve, though for purposes of assessing pension it was ‘not nearly equal to the loss of a limb’.

The report concluded that the injury has impaired Philip Henry’s capability to earn, and that the state should contribute the equivalent of half-pay.

His final discharge report indicated that the injury was ‘permanent, prevents one-third’.
Philip was awarded a pension for life of 1/- a day. He was discharged from the army, pronounced as being medically unfit on the 23rd November 1900.

For someone who tried to enlist at the age of 15 his military career ended at the age of 21 years old.

After the War

Following his discharge from the military Philip married Eleanor Emily Crow (1882 – 1952) in January 1903 and would go on to have 5 children together.

He worked as a carpenter and in World War 1 enlisted in the Rifle Brigade and served with the 6th Res Bn on 1 Nov 1915. He transferred to the RFC on 24 Aug 1917 and served in France from October 1917 to January 1919 before being discharged on the 30th April 1920.

References:
[1] www.angloboerwar.com/unit-information/im...ts/644-rifle-brigade
[2] streamsandforests.wordpress.com/2010/09/04/surprise-hill/
[3] Ancestory.com