George White and the Victorian Army in India and Africa

Serving the Empire

Stephen M. Miller

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9783030508333
• eBook ISBN:
  9783030508340
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: History

This book offers a detailed investigation of George S. White's career in the British Army. It explores late Victorian military conflicts, British power dynamics in Africa and Asia, civil-military relations on the fringes of the empire, and networks of advancement in the army. White served in the Indian Rebellion and, twenty years later, the Second Anglo-Afghan War, where he earned the Victoria Cross. After serving in the Sudan campaign, White returned to India and held commands during the conquest and pacification of Upper Burma and the extension of British control over Balochistan, and, as Commander-in-Chief, sent expeditions to the North-West Frontier and oversaw major military reforms. Just before the start of the South African War, White was given the command of the Natal Field Force. This force was besieged in Ladysmith for 118 days. Relieved in 1900, White was heralded as the "Defender of Ladysmith." He was made Field-Marshal in 1903.

© The Author(s) 2020

S. M. MillerGeorge White and the Victorian Army in India and Africahttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-50834-0_1

Begin Abstract

1. Introduction

Stephen M. Miller¹

(1)

University of Maine, Orono, ME, USA

End Abstract

On the afternoon of the 28th of February 1900, a small detachment of Imperial Light Horse and Natal Carbineers commanded by Captain Hubert Gough approached Ladysmith in the British colony of Natal in South Africa. A group of armed Boers situated on a low ridge of Umbulwane, a small mountain which dominated the nearby town, stood in their way. As “Long Tom,” the long range 155 mm Creusot gun which had terrorized the soldiers and civilians of the beleaguered town since late October 1899, opened fire, Gough was given an order by his superior, Lord Dundonald, to retire.¹ Eager to make it to Ladysmith in part to see his brother, Captain John “Johnnie” Gough, VC, he “crumpled up the note,” pushed back the Boers, and rode the remaining three miles through open land to Ladysmith. No shots were fired.

As Gough entered the town late in the afternoon, the appearance of his small force, full of health and looking nearly immaculate, contrasted sharply with the men of the Natal Field Force they were rescuing. The siege was in its 118th day and the material situation in the town had deteriorated significantly since the first of the year. Enteric fever or typhoid had spread and the number of casualties moved to the nearby hospital at Intombi was growing to alarming proportions. The population of over 12,000 soldiers and 8,000 civilians had been reduced to eating chevril, horse soup, to supplement their meager rations.² Three failed British attempts to force the Tugela River resulting in defeats at Colenso, Spion Kop, and Vaal Krantz (Vaalkrans) had hurt but not crushed morale. Lieutenant-General Sir George Stuart White, VC, suffering from repeated bouts of fever, reduced rations, and the exhaustion of maintaining Ladysmith throughout the siege, emerged from his headquarters, the former town hall, and greeted Gough with a simple and understated, “Hallo, Hubert, how are you?”³ White then turned to the growing crowds and over the dim of the celebrating voices, H.H.S. Pearse, a special correspondent for the Daily News, who had endured the ordeals of the siege as well, heard White’s voice tremble with emotion as he spoke to his depleted force. “I thank you men, one and all, from the bottom of my heart,” he declared, “for the help and support you have given to me, and I shall always acknowledge it to the end of my life. It grieved me to have to cut your rations, but I promise you that I will not do it again. I thank God we have kept the flag flying.”⁴

No longer reliant on runners who were captured regularly by the Boers or the heliograph which could only function when the weather cooperated, congratulatory messages flooded into Ladysmith from around the British Empire. Queen Victoria’s telegram was one of the first to come through the wires. Friends and fellow officers like White’s primary benefactor, Field-Marshal Lord Roberts, and Major-General John French and Major Douglas Haig, both of whom had left Ladysmith just before it was invested, sent White their regards. Mayors and provosts from Liverpool to Edinburgh, and leaders of social clubs in New Zealand, Canada, Gibraltar, and Burma all chimed in. The Secretary of State for War, Lord Lansdowne, who White had developed a close working relationship with while serving as Commander-in-Chief in India when the former was Viceroy, messaged, “I cannot tell you what pleasure it gives me to know that your gallant defence which we have watched with so much admiration and sympathy has not been in vain. I know you have suffered seriously in health from the prolonged hardships and anxiety which you and the force under your command have borne bravely.”⁵

Lansdowne was correct: White was suffering physically and emotionally. He needed to go home. Although most of his officers remained in South Africa to continue the struggle against the Boers, after the siege was lifted, White immediately made his way to Cape Town to begin his voyage back to Great Britain. White had been to Cape Town only twice before. The first visit took place in 1854, when after his troopship, The Charlotte, sank off Algoa Bay with most of its crew, White was stranded in Cape Town for about a month while he awaited passage to Calcutta.⁶ The second time was perhaps even more tragic. After arriving on 3 October 1899, he met a “nervous and overdone” Sir Alfred Milner, the British High Commissioner in South Africa and Governor of the Cape Colony, at Government House.⁷ Assessing the situation as critical and one demanding his immediate attention, White abruptly left Cape Town and hurried to Natal. War began just a few days later on 11 October. This time, however, a visit to Cape Town brought White some much needed relief. There, he discovered a very kind gesture made by Roberts: Jack, White’s only son who was currently serving with the Gordon Highlanders, had been sent to accompany his father home. In mid-April 1900, White returned to Great Britain as the newly christened, “Defender of Ladysmith.”⁸

Yet despite a long and commendable career which included a Victoria Cross awarded in the Second Anglo-Afghan War, command of the Upper Burma occupation force in the late 1880s and Zhob Field Force in 1890, and, as successor to Lord Roberts, Commander-in-Chief in India, White is a relatively unknown figure today. There are a few places where White is memorialized, commemorated, and remembered. There is a statue of a mounted White in Portland Place in London; a headstone at his family plot in the First Presbyterian Church’s cemetery in Broughshane, Northern Ireland; and a number of placards and photographs in the Siege Museum in Ladysmith, South Africa. But White remains largely a forgotten figure of British imperial military history. Some of this is due in part to the lack of scholarly work on the subject. There has only been one biography to date. The Life of Field-Marshal Sir George White was written by Mortimer Durand, his friend, colleague, and Indian official noted for the 1893 negotiations with Abdur Rahman, the Afghan Amir, which produced the “Durand Line,” the boundary between Afghanistan and India’s North-West Frontier. It would not be fair to call Durand’s 1915 biography a hagiography; it is a thorough account of White’s life in two volumes, well-written, and based largely on White’s personal correspondences with his family members.⁹ Yet, written just after White’s death, and supported by White’s wife, Amy, it shies away from controversy and makes no attempt to portray him in any but the most positive light.

Perhaps the main reason why White has largely been forgotten is because the siege of Ladysmith was something Great Britain did not want to remember. Although praised as the man who saved the town and its garrison and kept the Boers from organizing a successful invasion of Natal, White was also criticized for making the decisions which led to his force getting stuck in Ladysmith in the first place. To make things worse, even before the South African War ended, White became embroiled in a scandal over messages sent between he and General Sir Redvers Buller, the former Commander-in-Chief of British forces in South Africa, as to Ladysmith’s ability to hold out against the Boers’ investment. Although publicly White remained silent through it all, (privately, his letters show a very frustrated individual unable to defend himself), and Buller was largely blamed, eventually being dismissed from the army, the incident convinced many that the event was best forgotten. Leo Amery’s colorful, multi-volume series, The Times History of the War in South Africa, was very critical of White.¹⁰ And the Earl of Elgin’s 1903 hearings which produced the significant report of the Royal Commission on the South African War also raised concerns about some of White’s decisions.¹¹ Perhaps ironically, as the status and reputation of the much younger “Hero of Mafeking,” Sir Robert Baden-Powell, grew in the years to come, that of the “Defender of Ladysmith” shrank.

White’s career in the military, however, merits further investigation. Although a member of Roberts’ ring or circle of close associates, as opposed to Lord Wolseley’s rival Ashanti Ring, he never identified as such, establishing professional contacts on both sides of that often, overstated divide. For much of his long career he was a regimental officer—first, as a junior officer with the 27th (...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Introduction
• 2. The Start of a Military Career (1853–1878)
• 3. Recognition in Afghanistan (1878–1884)
• 4. The Making of a General: War and the Occupation of Upper Burma (1885–1889)
• 5. On the Edge of Empire: Baluchistan (1889–1892)
• 6. Commander-in-Chief, India: Administrator (1893–1898)
• 7. Commander-in-Chief, India: Campaigns (1893–1898)
• 8. The Outbreak of the South African War (1899)
• 9. The Defender of Ladysmith (1899–1900)
• 10. Ending a Career on the Rock (1900–1912)
• 11. Conclusion
• Back Matter