An Illustrated Tour of the 1879 Anglo-Zulu Battlefields

Adrian Greaves

• Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9781399040709
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: African History
• Index: History

Greaves' work offers detailed maps and firsthand insight into the Anglo-Zulu War, providing necessary insight and overviews of the conflict's pivotal battles like Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift. In 1878 southern Africa's two most senior figures, army commander General Lord Chelmsford and the High Commissioner Sir Henry Bartle-Frere created a false threat of a Zulu invasion of British Natal. In an astonishing act of over-confidence and without any government permission, Frere and Chelmsford invaded Zululand with five independent columns of troops. Both leaders ignored the serious implications of their two recently failed expeditions against the Zulus' neighbouring King Sekhukhune and his Pedi people. The Zulu war lasted only six months and witnessed two separate British invasions of Zululand – one catastrophic, one successful. This book gives the reader a general overview of the Anglo-Zulu war of 1879 with descriptive text, location photographs and illuminating map overviews of the twelve main battles including Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift. The author's unique maps are based on his own lecture notes and 'battlefield map handouts' as a Zulu War battlefield guide for over 25 years. These maps were avidly collected by his many groups and other guides; they clearly explain each battlefield's layout and sequence of events but also included many little known details of each fierce and bloody engagement. At the suggestion of the Anglo Zulu War Historical Society, these maps are now reproduced in book form. While volumes have been written on the subject, this work gives us an even better insight into these gruelling and complex battles.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• Overview
• Chapter 1 The 1878 British Attack Against King Sekhukhune and his Role in Precipitating the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879
• Chapter 2 Locations and Invasion Orders to Column Commanders
• Chapter 3 Helpmakaar to Rorke’s Drift, 22 December to 3 January 1879
• Chapter 4 Advance from Rorke’s Drift to Isandlwana, 11-12 January 1879
• Chapter 5 The Zulu Army Advance from Ulundi, 16 to 22 January 1879
• Chapter 6 The First Battle of Hlobane, 21/22 January 1879
• Chapter 7 Disaster at Isandlwana, 22 January 1879
• Chapter 8 Fugitives’ Drift - Formerly Chief Sotondosa’s Drift, 22 January 1879
• Chapter 9 Rorke’s Drift, 22 January 1879
• Chapter 10 Fort Pearson and the Skirmish at Fort Tenedos, 25 January 1879
• Chapter 11 The Battle of Nyezane, 22 January 1879
• Chapter 12 The Seventy-Two Day Siege of Eshowe
• Chapter 13 Ntombe River (Meyer’s Drift), 12 March 1879
• Chapter 14 Hlobane, 28 March 1879
• Chapter 15 Battle of Khambula, 29 March 1879
• Chapter 16 Battle of Gingindlovu and the Relief of Eshowe, 2 April 1879
• Chapter 17 Death of the Prince Imperial of France, 1 June 1879
• Chapter 18 Chelmsford’s Advance on Ulundi, 3 June to 4 July 1879
• Chapter 19 Ulundi, 4 July 1879
• Chapter 20 The British Withdrawal from Zululand after 4 July 1879
• Chapter 21 The British Attack against King Sekhukhune at Tsate, 28 November 1879
• Chapter 22 Death of King Cetshwayo and the Division of Zululand 149
• Chapter 23 The Boer Attack on the British at Bronkhorstspruit, December 1880
• Appendix I: Decorations and Medals of the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879
• Appendix II: Sister Janet: The Rorke’s Drift Nurse
• Appendix III: Gold Fever at Rorke’s Drift
• Appendix IV: The Defences at Rorke’s Drift
• Appendix V: Laying the Blame
• Appendix VI: Medal Confusion: Who was Awarded the South Africa Campaign Medal?
• Appendix VII: The Welsh Question
• Appendix VIII: Disembowelling and Disarticulation
• Appendix IX: Corporal Christian Ferdinand Schiess VC