=The Rev. T.H.  Wainman.=

But this is a long digression!  The Wesleyan chaplain was the Rev. T.H.  Wainman, a sturdy Yorkshireman, who had spent many years in South Africa as a Wesleyan missionary.  He was not new to the duties of a chaplain, for years ago he was with Sir Charles Warren in Bechuanaland.  He took to his new work as though he had only just laid it down, and bullets and shells seemed to have no terror for him.

At the parade service at Chievely on the day of the advance to Spearman’s Hill, Mr. Wainman took for his text, ’Speak unto the children of Israel that they go forward.’  He might have known what was coming, for the last line of ‘Onward, Christian Soldiers’ had hardly been sung, and the Benediction pronounced, before rumours of the advance spread through the camp, and by two p.m. the advance had really commenced.  At daylight next morning the battle began, and Mr. Wainman describes what he calls a ‘cool piece of daring.’

=’A Cool Piece of Daring.’=

’At the same time the firing of cannon to our right was fast and furious, the shells dropping and bursting right among our field artillery.  I watched with breathless anxiety, expecting all our guns to be abandoned, and half the men killed, when to my astonishment the men rode their horses right among the bursting shells, and hooking them to their guns rode quietly away, taking gun after gun into safety.  In some instances a horse fell, and this necessitated the men waiting in their terrible position until another horse could be brought, harnessed, and attached to the gun.  Eventually all were brought out of range, but a more plucky piece of daring and heroism I have never witnessed, and never expect to witness in my life.  The officers rode up and down directing their men as though heedless of danger, and the only casualty I heard of, excepting the horses, was a captain having his foot shattered.’[15]

He himself showed many a cool piece of daring before he got to Ladysmith, and when, after the fight at Spion Kop, some one had to go and bury the dead, he bravely volunteered, and performed this last ministry for his dead comrades under heavy fire.  For his bravery on that occasion he was promoted to the rank of major.  Those associated with him in this awful task were Major Gedge, the Church of England chaplain, and Fathers Collins and Matthews (Roman Catholics).  This was the Father Matthews who was captured with his men at Nicholson’s Nek, and afterwards released.

There was now but little opportunity for ordinary Christian work.  The last struggle for the relief of Ladysmith had commenced, and was to be carried on in grim earnest to the end.  The men were ready to follow their leaders anywhere, but could not understand the frequent retreats.  This much every man knew, however, that when he marched out with his regiment in the morning it was very doubtful whether he would be alive at night.  This thought sobered every one, and many a man prayed who had never prayed before.