rorkesdriftvc.com :: View topic - Zulu atrocities against the drummer boys?

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 1:56 am

Alekudemus

I have no difficulty with your contributing, of course, but when Jobbins is so obviously incorrect, even to the number of Boys in the camp, then his account has little worth, as far as I am concerned. He was not at Isandlwana and almost certainly picked up the gossip from those who returned with Lord Chelmsford on the 23rd. I am only concerned that others reading this thread might be persuaded that what Jobbins repeated was correct.

KIS

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 5:07 am

Keith

This is most helpful - does it mean that even though they were there, the rankers (such as Pte Charles Lewis) cannot actually have seen the disembowelling they described?

Paul

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 1:20 pm

Hi all

This subject is one most fascinating, as Hercule Poirot would say. I am with Keith that much of this is 'campfire gossip' but I find it hard to toss aside Makin's account of witnessing mutilations, including apparent maltreatment of young lads, in broad daylight? What are your views on his account? It was very kindly posted by JY on page 1 of this topic.

Cheers

Glenn

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 6:24 pm

Gentlemen

A thought has just struck me. Many say that it wasn't possible to have seen any mutilated corpses or so called 'atrocities' on the night of January 22nd. Yet we still have enough visibility for soldiers to bayonet wounded and drunken Zulus, Officers to recognise bodies and I dare say, candles and matches to provide brief, yet ample light. Just as a pointer to back my candle and matches theory. The body of Liz Stride, one of the victims of Jack the Ripper, was found dead in Berner Street by a man named Louis Diemschutz, and he lit a match in the pitch black that provided enough light to plainly see the dead woman and the fact her throat was cut.

Just covering my back on that one!

Glenn

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 10:03 pm

Paul

No-one in Chelmsford's party witnessed any disembowelling because they arrived about 8 p.m. in pitch darkness. Some officers may have witnessed the results of disembowelling but I feel sure that few rank and file did so. The column left Isandlwana at first light and their departure preparations would have ensured that they saw virtually nothing, other than bodies in the immediate vicity of the nek. I am not familiar with the Lewis letter and will write you off-site about it.

KIS

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:47 pm

Keith,

If the only bodies, in your view, the departing troops saw were 'in the immediate vicinity of the nek' this would give us some answers to our mystery. The troops would have marched through the wagon park, yes? Now, if we take Makin gospel when he says 'The first we saw was a little drummer boy' we can understand now that as the troops departed Isandlwana, on the outskirts of the camp, this was what they saw. It makes sense that the 'double scaffold' Makin recalls was also in this vicinity, amongst the wagons and other transport equipment. On this scaffold had been, he states 'two other boys'.

To clarify, the troops left Isandlwana at daybreak, viewing only the bodies on the outskirts of camp on the Nek. They witnessed the fate of three young lads, described so vividly by Makin, who saw them whilst entering the camp but in the opposite direction the following May. It would ring true that these 'boys' were furthest from the fighting and as far back as possible during the action, amongst the last stands and rallies, meeting their grisly end when all the older men had perished

Anyone concur?

Glenn

Posted: Tue Mar 14, 2006 11:58 pm

Glen

I'd had to concur with you on the placement on the bodies of the band boys. I would imagine that the older men would have certainly taken them under their wing and pushed them to the back, away from the fighting as much as possible. Until, of course, there was no one left to defend them. We also have the account of the boy who refused to leave his post (sometimes attributed to boy Green who was the surgeon's servant) and was killed in situ.

I would imagine that even in the false dawn there would have been enough to see at least some of the mutilations. I have seen photos of the wagon park when troops were taken back to recover the wagons and the scene is pretty gruesome even some time after the battle.

However, I go with what Keith says in that mutilations did not go beyond the gathering of muti and the disemboweling of the victims. Torture is not the Zulu's way, not then and not ever. I think the tale has grown in the re-telling of it.

Dawn

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 6:08 am

I'm weighing in supporting the position represented by Keith but will offer an additional observation as to visibility. Although it's true that the remainder of 3 Col. set off at first light one must remember that even in their reduced state a certain amount of time would be required to fall in, receive orders of march, deploy and then set off leaving the possibility that those at the rear of the march could have a great deal more light available when they set off than those who set off first. (A column couldn't all take off at the same time other than in mob formation.)

Having said that I think it's less a question of what they saw than what they thought they saw. It must be remembered that they had at that point been awake for over 24 hrs and although 'bedded down' for the night with "only the clothes we stood up in" sleeping seems to have not only been discouraged by Lord Chelmsford as he paced the lines all night long but an unlikely luxury for all but the most hopelessly exhausted men. Not only were they expecting to be attacked themselves they had been marching all over the countryside all day long and been faced with the nearly impossible to comprehend fact that they had been defeated in battle and were presently resting among the carnage. Their one forlorn hope was that the majority of those left behind at Isandlwana had somehow managed a fighting withdrawal to Rorke's Drift (a hope possibly encouraged by the fire light reflected in the western sky). There was however one fact mitigating against this illusion.

The smell. I don't mean the smell of decaying flesh. It is impossible to portray the smell. Neither man nor animal who violently meets their end goes "gentle into that Good Night". When a body dies violently it evacuates it's bowels, bladder,stomach (if not killed instantly), sinuses and a goodly portion, if not all, of it's blood. Any of these smells, taken individually is trying enough but when taken in total is inexplicable. One's mouth tastes of copper and bile, one's eye's and nose sting, run and tear from ammonia, one's nose is assaulted with the vilest concoction of feces, blood, urine, and the soured contents of one's lately living friends' stomachs in such intensity that one's mind is forced back in upon itself in defence when forced to lie quietly amidst it all whilst contributing only the stale smell of one's own sweat. In short it is a mind numbing experience that can only be fully survived through discipline and the passing of time. When the remnants left the field that morning they were not in their 'right minds' although physically functional in a reduced capacity although with the sun would come some comfort, their ability to process visual information would be likewise compromised.

One should also remember that none of the men present had ever experienced any similar occurence (the closest having been during the Napoleonic wars) nor had they ever experienced the Zulu ritual of disembowelment so could easily have been forced into visual overload with subsequent misinterpretation. The mind sometimes resorts to extreme measures in order to re-stabilize and these measures sometimes result in demonization.

Nor should anyone be blamed for that as long as subsequent generations compensate for it.

Only my opinions.

Best

Michael

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 7:55 am

Michael
Quite a stomach-turning description but insightful all the same.

Inconsequential in comparison is my late husband's observation, when he was an ambulance driver, that dead peoples' shoes fell off at the time of the trauma, even laced up ones. I suppose there is a medical explanation for this (probably something to do with loss of blood?) but he said it was quite spooky sometimes to see these lost shoes just lying around at the scene of a car accident.

I think we've probably grossed everyone out now.

Dawn

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 8:12 am

Hi all

Hate to be repetative, but is anyone taking on board Makin's account of his visit in May? I'm not going to say what I posted again but his account cannot be simply be discounted, it proves or at least gives a viable chance that some of youngsters in the camp, be they Drummers, Boys or Servants, met a gruesome end and incredibly horrific mutilation that did go beyond the normal stomach opening.

Of course, the Zulus did not torture as a people but there have to be sadistic individuals in the ranks of a force of 20,000 plus.

Can anybody explain why these boys had been hung on hooks if not for some horrific torture?

Glenn

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 8:34 am

Glenn

Well, I went back to Makin's account and, as he was there some months after the battle when the bodies would have been decomposed, there is never going to be an explanation of why they were struck up on a 'double scaffold' or the butchers' hooks.

My theory is that any such mutilations took place after death. Why strung up? Why do they hung up animal carcasses - because it's easier to access the body parts? Maybe the same principle applies for the collection of organs for muti?

Torture? I just don't see it. What was to be gained by it except sadistic satisfaction? The boys had no vital information to be give. Besides, who of the warriors was going to do that when there was plunder to be had? I don't think I've read a single Zulu account (and I acknowledge that there aren't many) that say that after the battle they tortured anyone. No, it just doesn't stack up.

And now that everyone's lost their dinner....

Dawn

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 9:33 am

I know you say torture wasn't the Zulu way...not now and not then Dawn but there is evidence that Zulu killed as Chelmsford entered the camp were heavily intoxicated. Another thing about the use of the word "Torture", surely that is subjective? Are we using the word in the context of information being obtained?(I don't think so) or that it was an ordeal? Plus read the newspaper report below for a more recent account with strange overtones of the Isandlwana reports. I don't know if these are Zulu names but I thought I'd post it just for perusal.

Traditional healer Jim Kgokong Shego had his genitals, his belly button and anus cut out for muti while he was still alive.

A rock was then tied around his waist and he was thrown into a mine shaft filled with water.

This was the evidence in the Pretoria High Court trial on Wednesday of four fellow traditional healers.

Traditional healers Jeremiah Africa Madonsela, 50, Elias Magabane, 55, April Mahlangu, 43, and Simon Leeu Ndala, 52, all pleaded not guilty to murdering Shego at Mountainview in KwaMhlanga, Mpumalanga, on June 7, 2000.

'Madonsela took the knife and cut out the man's testicles'
John Msiza, who helped pin down Shego's legs while Madonsela allegedly removed his body parts, testified against the four accused in return for indemnity on Wednesday.

Msiza was an apprentice traditional healer and an assistant of Shego. Msiza said the four accused abducted him at gunpoint on the day of the murder.
Madonsela took out a knife and he ordered us to pin Shego's legs wide open." Msiza said two of them held open his legs while two more pinned his shoulders to the ground.

"Madonsela took the knife and cut out the man's testicles. He then cut around his navel and took it out. He also cut around his anus and took that tissue out," Msiza testified.

'Witch doctors' used human flesh for their muti
He said Shego cried and asked them whether they were killing him.

After the human flesh was placed in a plastic bag, Madonsela ordered them to tie a rock around the man's waist.

Shego, who was still breathing, was thrown into a mine shaft filled with water.
2000

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 11:06 pm

Might I just establish something please, are we ALL in agreement that some young lads were hung on hooks as stated by Sam Jones and Trooper Makin?

If this is so, and I don't think anyone can deny that indeed they were hung on hooks, the question remains as to why?

If indeed these boys were tortured, as Jones concludes, then I believe it was merely for sadistic pleasure or other more sickening purposes, wanting to gain information would not, in my view, have been part of the incident. I don't know if anyone recalls the torso in the Thames saga a few years ago, where it was concluded that a young boy had been brought from Africa to the UK and was murdered in some sort of evil cult or tribal killing, the screams of children, according to the reporter, being terrible enough to summon spirits and supernatural powers. I am aware that this was not, to my knowledge, a Zulu killing, but nonetheless it gives a possible reason why these boys were hung on hooks while, possibly, still alive.

I don't want to cause trouble by branding the Zulu people child killers or any extreme nonsense like that but I'm just putting forward a viable theory as to why this incident occured on Jan 22nd. Is it not also believed by some that Trooper Raubenheim was also tortured to death in the days before Ulundi? Did not Piet Roteiff (Unsure of spelling) and his men die by being impaled alive by Dingane? Pte Joseph Williams at Rorke's drift was also mutilated, possibly dismembered, while still alive outside the Hospital?

As we said before, this was war. A damn bloody business. It was not noble and it was not humane. Men were free to induldge in whatever pleasures they desired when victorius, neither side took prisoners and the men who were there have left their accounts behind so we can see that this happened, not so we can brush them aside and call them nonsense

Glenn

Posted: Wed Mar 15, 2006 11:48 pm

Though it boggles the mind how they would cut out the anus (errr... are they speaking of some part at the end of the intestine? The whole two cheeks? Okay, not good dinner conversation there but...)

I do recall that article vaguely of the African child who was 'harvested' for Muti in Britain.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1899609.stm

"Limbs from children, primarily the sexual organs, are said to be the most potent. These are sometimes taken from live victims because their screams are thought to enhance the power of the medicines. "

Just a quick thought... would an iSangoma have accompanied the impi into battle (or at least to harvest the spoils, pardon the pun)?

Should there be a differentiation between impalement and 'harvesting' or indeed between impalement and other punishments? Was impalement a traditional Zulu punishment? (This is where my prior research is a total blank I'm afraid).

Speaking of intoxication does the use of errr 'magic mushrooms' or other "non-prescription drugs" come into play perhaps? People under the influence have been known to do pretty nasty things.

I think that it really comes down to whether or not it was "policy" (for traditional 'muti' purposes as a rite) or "individual action" (the thesis that it was the work of some sadistic minded individuals in the Zulu ranks).

Best wishes,
Tom516

Posted: Thu Mar 16, 2006 12:18 am

Glenn,

Re-Raubenheim, I have evidence from the officer that found his body on 4th July 1879, that he believed, given the injuries, Raubenheim was tortured prior to death.

Sadly, I can't repeat here as I can't establish the current owner of the documents concerned. Suffice to say he describes the methods used in detail.

Given that information, I'm not going to discount Makin's account.

John Y.