Remembering Rorke's Drift

[TheGreenGoblin]

I visited Rorke's Drift some years back and even there there was a pervasive sense of something, not so much of grandeur, although there was that in the not too far distant Drakensberg Mountains, but of something else, something momentous having happened there. The very name Rorke conjures up the ghost of the eponymous English ferryman James Rorke who drowned there and who took his final trip with another darker, more ancient ferryman, not across the Styx, but the Buffalo River, and whose grave still lies at the foot of the nearby hill. Perhaps it was the low lying fog that sat sullenly low on that hill and the silence punctuated only by the muted drip drip of the drizzle on the verdant grass around the simple museum there that made my sometimes over-imaginative mind feel almost oppressed by the place on that day. Nonetheless the images flickering in my brain, of the Stanley Baker in the the role of Lieutenant John Chard, whose bravery is still immortalized by the South African army John Chard medal, and other scenes from the film watched by me so many times, did nothing to assuage the quiet reality of the place.

For all those that fought and died there (17 dying at the mission station and more than 300 Zulus dying in the attack) there must be some peace now midst the surrounding verdant beauty but is seems that for most of the beleaguered men at the mission station left alive after the battle there was precious little peace for them afterwards.

Rorke's Drift – a tale of heroic victory and rejection

RIP David Rattray and all those that have died there at and since the battle.

[Pontius Navigator]

At Windsor Castle a short while back Chard's report to Queen Victoria complete with lillustrations was on display.

[Capetonian]

David Rattray did more to uplift and help the indigenous people of the area than anyone else. The gratitude he got was being murdered by them.

[TheGreenGoblin]

Welsh troops returned to the battle scene 200 miles north of Durban in 1999 and held a commemorative service in the chapel at Rorke's Drift. Several thousand Zulus came down from the hills, bringing the elders who could no longer walk in wheelbarrows. The Zulus, like the Welsh, are renowned for their singing voices. As their voices soared together, Rattray stood at the back of the gathering and wept. He leaves his wife and three sons.

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2007/j ... outhafrica

[TheGreenGoblin]

For those who find this sort of history interesting and are within striking distance of the venue, David Rattray's protégé and guide at the Rorke's Drift site will be speaking at the Infantry Battle School in Brecon Wales on behalf of the St Teilo's Church Roof fund this week i.e. 22nd October 2019!

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/rob-cask ... 2842149831

Here he gives a bit of his background back in 2010.

Not everyone at Rorke's Drift died a miserable death. The last survivor, Frank Bourne, lived to be 91. He died on 8 May 1945 – VE day.

Frank Bourne's grandson will be in attendance at the talk.