On 12 March 1879, in fog before dawn, a Zulu force led by Mbilini overran a company of the British 80th Regiment camped with a stranded wagon convoy at the Intombe River near Luneberg, killing Captain David Moriarty and some 60 of his men. Color Sergeant Anthony Booth covered the survivors' retreat and won the Victoria Cross.
A convoy stranded at the drift
In March 1879, during the Anglo-Zulu War, five companies of the British 80th Regiment under Major Charles Tucker held Luneberg, near the Zulu border. On 7 March a company under Captain David Moriarty marched out to bring in a convoy of wagons coming from Derby. Heavy rain swelled the Intombe River, and the escort camped at the drift, most of it with the wagons in a V-shaped laager on the far bank. The war's first great Zulu victory is told in our article on the Battle of Isandlwana.1
On the night of 11 March some 70 men were with Moriarty on the north bank and some 35 under Lieutenant Henry Harward on the south bank. No outlying pickets were posted.2
Out of the fog
Before dawn on 12 March, under cover of fog, a large Zulu force came close to the wagons unseen and rushed the camp on the north bank. Moriarty was killed, and with him many of his men, who had no chance to resist. The British sources name the Zulu leader as Umbelini, the man known today as Mbilini. Estimates of his force run from 800 to over 5,000; Tucker put it at not less than 4,000.3
On the south bank Harward's men opened fire but could not stop about 200 Zulus from crossing the river. Harward saddled his horse and galloped to Luneberg. Color Sergeant Anthony Booth rallied a few men and covered the retreat of the survivors for about three miles, keeping the Zulus at bay. He received the Victoria Cross, announced in the London Gazette of 24 February 1880.4
The cost
About 60 men of the 80th were killed or missing: Tucker's first count was 40 known killed and 20 missing out of 104, and the regimental history gives 61. Two wagon conductors and 15 drivers also died. The Zulus carried off the oxen, rifles and ammunition.5
Harward was tried by court-martial at Fort Napier, Pietermaritzburg, on 20 February 1880 for shamefully abandoning his men, and was found not guilty. The general who had to confirm the verdict refused, writing that the more helpless his men's position, the more it was an officer's duty to stay and share their fortune, and by order of the Commander-in-Chief, the Duke of Cambridge, his rebuke was read at the head of every regiment. Harward resigned his commission in May 1880.6
Mbilini did not long survive his victory: on 5 April 1879 he was mortally wounded in a skirmish with mounted men of the 80th near Luneberg, and his last refuge lay on Hlobane mountain. The battle fought there is told in our article on the Battle of Hlobane.7
Also on 12 March
1940: The Soviet Union and Finland signed a peace treaty in Moscow, ending the Winter War; the next day Neville Chamberlain told the House of Commons that the terms “were signed in Moscow last night” and that an armistice had begun that morning.8
