TOPIC:

During July 1890, John Beattie made his way from Shankill to the St Lucia Barracks in Omagh to enlist in the 1st Battalion Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers. A journey of just under 70 miles would see John hang up his labouring attire and don the uniform of the respected Irish 27th regiment of foot. Which, in 1881 with the amalgamation of the 108th (Madras Infantry) became the Royal Inniskillings Fusiliers. Private Beattie was living with his mother Ann and his sisters Eliza, Margaret and Isabella at 34 Eureka Street Belfast. It is believed his father was called William but no mention of him on his next of kin details.
In between his labouring job, John also found time to serve with the 4th (Antrim Militia) Battalion Royal Irish Rifles.


John's home town.

On arrival at the barracks aged 18 years and 1 month.
His attestation papers record him as being born circa 1872, he weighed around 8 stone ,standing at 5 foot 4 inches tall, brown eyes, light brown hair and overall a fair complexion. On the back of his left wrist and back of his hand he sported a bracelet tattoo with the initials JB. His religious denomination was Presbyterian, although this original entry was crossed out and Church of England was recorded. After passing his medical and deemed fit to serve, John Beattie signed his attestation papers with an X.

It's fair to say that 3295 Private/ Drummer Beattie had some difficulty adjusting to army life, and it proved much more difficult for him than when he served in the milita. During the month of November 1891 he was confined for 6 days, offence not stated. Subsequently he was tried by regimental court martial for insubordination and sentenced to 42 days of hard labour. Released in December 1891. Within 2 weeks he was back in jail again, confined for 2 days. June 1892 he was again tried by regimental court martial, charged with conduct prejudicial to good order and military discipline. He was sentenced to a further 28 days imprisonment. By this stage the 1st Battalion appear to have tired of John Beattie and on the 2nd of September 1892 he was posted for service with the 2nd Battalion Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers.

Drummer Beattie is now on his way to warmer climes, where he stays for nearly 6 years. His posting to the 2nd Battalion and his time Imperial policing in India appears to have made him a reformed man. There is no record of him being charged or imprisoned during his service with the 2nd Battalion. During his time in 1897, the Inniskillings were in the Peshawar Column of the Tirah Expeditionary Force, involved in a series of punitative expeditions against the Afridi and Orakzai tribal clans of the Kyber Pass and North West Frontier in 1897/98.


2nd Battalion Tirah

On completion of his long tour of duty John Beattie was awarded the India General Service medal with clasps Punjab Frontier 1897-98 & Tirah 1897 -98.
He was finally transferred to the Reserve on March 25th 1898.

Having had some well earned rest and recuperation it wasn't long before he was recalled to the colours and following the outbreak of the Anglo Boer war he was back in uniform and on his way to South Africa. This time with the 1st Battalion Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers.

The 1st Battalion sailed on the Catalonia on 5th November 1899, they arrived at the Cape around the 30th November, and were sent to Durban. Along with the 1st Border Regiment, 1st Connaught Rangers, and 1st Dublin Fusiliers, they formed the 5th Brigade under Major General Fitzroy Hart. It was originally intended that the 2nd Royal Irish Rifles should be in the brigade, making it completely Irish, but that battalion, alone out of the division, landed in Cape Colony with the divisional commander, Sir W F Gatacre, and the Border Regiment took their place in the brigade.

Unbeknown to Private Beattie, he and his comrades in arms were heading to a river named the Tugela and a place called Colenso, and it is at this third and final battle fought during Black Week that Private
Beattie was severely wounded.



The 5th Brigade were on the extreme left of General Buller's force at Colenso, 15th December 1899. It was intended that they should cross the Tugela at a place called Bridle Drift, but the news on that day reported that drift was never found— Buller suggested it may have been dammed back further up river. However, on the left of the British line Hart’s Irish Brigade left camp at around 4.30am, advancing on the river soon after dawn.  Hart’s orders were for his brigade to cross by the Bridle Drift.  Accompanying Hart at the front of his brigade the native guide indicated that the route was to the right into one of the large loops of the river.  In fact Bridle Drift was on a straight stretch of the Tugela River well to the west of the loop. Hart’s staff remonstrated that Bridle Drift lay further west and that the loop was a death trap.  Major General Hart chose to follow the guide’s directions.  It is evidently clear that the guide was rather confused and indicating Punt Drift at the head of the loop, not Bridle Drift. Also, it did not help that the guide spoke little or no English.



It is said that Hart was a commanding officer obsessed with delivering an attack in close order with fire controlled by volley.  As with many other British officers in the early stages of the War he had no concept of the effect of massed magazine-fed rifle fire of the sort the Boers were about to unleash on his soldiers.  As Hart led his brigade into the loop towards the river bank the commanding officer of his leading battalion, 1st Royal Dublin Fusiliers, ordered his men into open order.  Unfortunately, Hart directed the fusiliers to remain in close order.

As Hart’s men advanced into the loop the Boer riflemen and guns on the far side of the Tugela opened fire, immediately inflicting extensive casualties and causing carnage in the ranks of the exposed clustered Irish regiments. The Inniskillings had been caught in the perfect killing ground.



The soldiers of Major General Hart’s four battalions which were spread along the river bank, were unable to identify any fordable part of the river by which they could cross to the Boer side of the bank.  Various groups tried to swim across, several soldiers being drowned.  Those who made the crossing found that once on the far side there was nothing they could achieve and swam back.

Eventually Buller intervened and ordered Hart to withdraw.  A major of the Connaught Rangers took the order down to the most advanced troops and a withdrawal took place, although some men did not receive the order and a few were captured later in the day.  Hart’s brigade suffered some 500 casualties in an action lasting around an hour.
Lyttelton in support of Hart with his brigade found there was nothing he could do to assist.  The battery of field artillery on Hart’s left flank were left without orders by Hart, however, the artillery detatchment could see little of the Boers as a target and could not assist Harts Brigade.

On reflection, I think it's a fair assumption to say at Corps level, it was poor reconnaissance, inaccurate maps, a lack of competent staff officers, and poor judgement at the command level that contributed to the disaster on that fatefull Friday in December 1899.

The Inniskillings lost 2 officers killed and 9 wounded; 21 other ranks killed and 81 wounded. Private Beattie was one of those 81 casualties who was severely wounded.



Extract from the Tales of a Field Hospital :- Frederick Treves.

Reference Colenso - Saturday, the 16th, an armistice was declared for the burying of the dead. Very early on Saturday morning, while it was yet moonlight, the hospital train backed down from Chieveley and came to a stand as near the field hospitals as possible.  As soon as it was daylight (and at this time of the summer the sun rose before five) the loading of the train commenced.
The filling up of a hospital train is no easy business, and affords a somewhat depressing sight.
The worst cases are dealt with first, and a long line of stretchers soon began to pour from the hospital tents to the railway.  The stretchers are put down on the railroad close to the wheels of the train. On this particular morning it so happened that the carriages threw a shadow on the side of the line towards the hospital, so that the stretchers, if near the metals, were in the shade.
Many of the wounded had had no sleep, and many were developing some degree of fever.  A few had become delirious, and were difficult to control. With the stretcher parties would come a certain number of such of the wounded as could walk, and very soon a not inconsiderable crowd was gathered in the shade of the train.
But what a crowd!  The same sunburnt men with blistered faces, but now even a more motley gathering than filled the field hospitals the day before - a gathering made piteously picturesque by khaki rags, blue bandages, casual splints, arm slings, eye bandages, slit-up trousers, and dressings of all kinds.  Here they came crowding to the train, some limping, some hopping, some helped along between two stronger comrades, some staggering on alone.  A man with a damaged arm assisting a man with a bullet through his leg.  A man stopping on the way to be sick, cheered up by another with a bandaged eye.
An untidy, sorrowful crowd, with unbuttoned tunics and slovenly legs, with unlaced boots, with blood on their khaki jackets and on their blue shirts and on their stiffening dressings.  The gentle hand of the nurse had not as yet busied itself with this unkempt and unwashed throng. There had been no time for washing nor for changing of garments, and if the surgeon has had to cut the coat and the shirt into rags, the wearer must wear the rags or nothing; and as for washing, it is a sin to wash when water is priceless.





Unfortunately, I do not know how severe Beattie's wounding was and if he ever made it to the hospital train. He certainly didn't return to England, so I believe he was treated for his injuries in country. Timeline for his recuperation is not known. However, he must have recovered sufficiently enough to return to his unit to be present at the Relief of Ladysmith. He was finally discharged from the Army on the 30th September 1902. He had served over 12 years in the Inniskillings . His South Africa tour lasted 1,059 days for which he was awarded his Queens South Africa medal with clasps for Cape Colony, Tugela Heights, Relief of Ladysmith, Belfast & Orange Free State.

There is some confusion regarding rank, his QSA is inscribed as Pte J Beattie. His medal roll records Drummer Beattie, as does his KSA roll.
Natal Field Force casualty list has him down as a Private,along with his IGS papers regarding his time with the 2nd Battalion.

After his return from South Africa, John was living in Belfast. Sometime in 1904 he received a letter from the Adjutant 27th regimental district. Mr J Beattie, herewith clasp O F State for your Queens S. A. Medal, kindly acknowledge receipt on back hereof and return Omagh 21/12/04. This time John didn't sign his name with a cross. In shaky handwriting he replies.
Received, Orange River Colony clasp, all right , 3295 Drm John Beattie Belfast .



As to what happened to him after 1904 is rather sketchy. I have a few options to go at. I have narrowed down the J Bs down to a couple of contenders. I found a 1911 census which fits the profile and has John living at 53 Foyle Street with his wife Mary, sons James, John and Franklin. There is also a Isabella Harrison living with them and this could possibly be his sister. I believe that John died in 1939 aged 67.



As always, any errors or mistakes are down to myself. I would welcome any additional information or corrections from my fellow forummers. Thank you for reading the article it is always appreciated.


Best wishes

Dave.......

Hi Dave,

Great write-up and most enjoyable. It must have been awful to have been caught in the intense cross fire on that part of the Tugela. I'm sure there were many acts of heroism on that day that we may never know about.

I thought I would share my favourite picture from that part of the battle; it's from "Great Battlefields of the World" by John Macdonald:





An example of how the barbed wire may have been laid out.

Excellent posts. Than you both.

Sturgy wrote: Hi Dave,

Great write-up and most enjoyable. It must have been awful to have been caught in the intense cross fire on that part of the Tugela. I'm sure there were many acts of heroism on that day that we may never know about.

I thought I would share my favourite picture from that part of the battle; it's from "Great Battlefields of the World" by John Macdonald:

An example of how the barbed wire may have been laid out.

Many thanks Sturgy
I hadn't seen this 3d detailed map before.
Thank you for sharing.

Dave......