Gough managed to escape that
night and to report that it was Botha himself, with over a thousand men,
who had eaten up his detachment. The prisoners and wounded were sent in
a few days later to Vryheid, a town which appeared to be in some danger
of capture had not Walter Kitchener hastened to carry reinforcements
to the garrison. Bruce Hamilton was at the same time despatched to head
Botha off, and every step taken to prevent his southern advance. So many
columns from all parts converged upon the danger spot that Lyttelton,
who commanded upon the Natal frontier, had over 20,000 men under his
orders.

Botha's plans appear to have been to work through Zululand and then
strike at Natal, an operation which would be the more easy as it would
be conducted a considerable distance from the railway line. Pushing on
a few days after his successful action with Gough, he crossed the Zulu
frontier, and had in front of him an almost unimpeded march as far as
the Tugela. Crossing this far from the British base of power, his force
could raid the Greytown district and raise recruits among the Dutch
farmers, laying waste one of the few spots in South Africa which had
been untouched by the blight of war. All this lay before him, and in
his path nothing save only two small British posts which might be either
disregarded or gathered up as he passed. In an evil moment for himself,
tempted by the thought of the supplies which they might contain, he
stopped to gather them up, and the force of the wave of invasion broke
itself as upon two granite rocks.

These two so-called forts were posts of very modest strength, a chain of
which had been erected at the time of the old Zulu war. Fort Itala, the
larger, was garrisoned by 300 men of the 5th Mounted Infantry, drawn
from the Dublin Fusiliers, Middlesex, Dorsets, South Lancashires, and
Lancashire Fusiliers--most of them old soldiers of many battles. They
had two guns of the 69th R.F.A., the same battery which had lost a
section the week before. Major Chapman, of the Dublins, was in command.

Upon September 25th the small garrison heard that the main force of the
Boers was sweeping towards them, and prepared to give them a soldiers'
welcome. The fort is situated upon the flank of a hill, on the summit of
which, a mile from the main trenches, a strong outpost was stationed.
It was upon this that the first force of the attack broke at midnight
of September 25th. The garrison, eighty strong, was fie