Howdy again all you History buff's

Continuing on the success of the previous 'Armchair General' discussion, THE ALAMO, I am submitting for consideration the well known battle at ROURKE'S DRIFT. Or, for those potential history 'newbies', the engagement the 70's film " ZULU! " was based upon.

I shan't induldge in any fantasies of mine to second guess Lt. John Chard's decisions those two days in January, 1879. Asisted by his second in command, Lt. Gonville Bromhead, he obviously did a bang-up job of defending his position.
I must bring up the interesting comparision to the Alamo engagement though, because the number s on both sides of the event are quite close.
The British & Welsh soldiers at ROURKE"S DRIFT numbered 150, while the attacking Zulu's totaled approx. 4000. Very close to the numbers experienced at the Alamo {182 vs. 5000}.

I just wanted to toss on the table, some points of discussion. For example, the.......alternating volly of ranked rifle fire {I know there's a name for this method, but it escape's me at the moment }, could this have maybe been employed at longer distances considering the Zulu's were essentially a 'wave' of humanity? Or, could the surrounding bush have been set aflame to remove cover? Sharpshooters on the roof of the inner buildings? air dropped SMG's? Claymores? Particle beam weapons? :-) :-)

Just kiddin' fellas, I just wanted to start up a debate and see what, if anything, might have been done differently utilizing the 20/20 power of hindsight......

Reagrds,

Tread.

.............what, nobody like's ROURKE'S DRIFT

One big diffrence was the Rourke's Drifts defenders were well trained British Regulars while the Alamo's defenders were mostly untrained militia.Also the British had the benefit of the breech-loading cartridge firing Martini-Henry while at the Alamo the technology stiil was single shot muzzle loaders.Also the positionat Rourkes Drift was much better yhen the Alamo where there simply wasn't enough men to cover the frontage.Mexicans had Artillery at the Alamo,the Zulu had none.

"Zulu" was my first introduction to British fire disipline (the correct name eludes me, too). After years of American Civil War and WWII combat movies where everyone fired basically randomly, to see this was eye opening.

IIRC a well trained muzzle loader could get 3 rounds loaded and fired in 1 minute. But that made for a LONG 20 seconds where no rounds were firing. With the firing ranks, a 1/3 volley went out every 6-7 seconds, had to have the same effect on a body of running men as a machine gun. I can only imagine that breech loaders could have had a faster volley rate. Truly amazing to see.

As to the strategy and tactics, I'll learn from the real experts.

First of all the closest term I can come to to describe the type of firing done was "rolling volley." Technically I think that was to describe where one section of a line would fire, then while it was reloading the next section down would fire, and so on. It seems this would also describe how they fired their volleys by rank.

As far as tactics it seems to me it's hard to beat success. What is it they say, if it's not broke, don't fix it? Their tactics did seem to work fine, and they did survive the attack.

Maybe we should turn this around? What should the Zulus have done differently to take out the redcoats?

Attacked at night ...

I believe that the Zulus did keep attacking during the night, but they missed this in the film.

Maybe if the Zulus had attacked from all sides at once, which they could easily have done given their numerical superiority, they would have overcome the defenders, but they only tried the frontal assualt tactic, which proved inefficient.

Also they did 'give up' the attack out of respect to the defenders, so in effect the Redcoats won by default. This comment is not to be taken as a slur to any of the combatants, you don't get that many VC's awarded for nothing. Also remember that the commander of the station - Lt Chard, was not a line officer, but a Royal Engineer, this may have helped due to him not having been 'Brainwashed' into following the standard combat tactics, but instead thinking on his feet, and 'Out of the box'.

Andy

I have to wonder if the large number of VCs awarded to the defenders of Rorkes Drift was because that it wasn't possible to award posthumous medals at the time and the 2/24th got medals that otherwise would have gone to 1/24th. Some fo the earliest posthumous VC went to Lts Melville and Coghill, both killed at Isandlwana.

Rorkes Drift

This doesn't take anything away from the courage of the defenders of Rorkes Drift of course.

David

Howdy Guys,

Mucho, mucho thx fellas for taking a moment to respond to the "Rourke's Drift" thread......it's a real fav of mine and I am most grateful for your kind response's in this regard.

to tojo72: Your point about the defenders being British "Regulars" is at least half accurate. True, the men assigned as defenders of the station were proper British soldiers, and trained as such. But in an effort to be entirely correct about the 'lineage' of the men found with rifle-in-hand, the truth is, there were an assortment beyond that description on hand at the time. The fact that they could put aside that more immediate 'job' focus and almost subconciously revert back to that more basic, almost reptilian mental acumen is admirable indeed!

to md72: Your observations are most exceptionally clear, and your comparison of 'volley fire' to the modern machine gun is well explained and provokes thought. As most theorists{sp?} will tell you, MG fire is most effective in a crossfire situation, and not in a 'spraying' configuration.
The "volley" fire example we are speaking of is remarkably effective on a singularly dimensionally advancing enemy as the Zulu were at that time. Having your attackers coming at you from an almost predictable direction is most advantageous indeed. And having, in essence, a 'wall' of large caliber bullets advancing from your position to meet your incoming enemy at head/shoulder height is more effective than you might imagine.

to HalfYank: Your comment about "not fixing" something is well taken my friend And your taking the time to comment is appreciated.
Even more so is your 'turning it around' suggestion. The point I assume is to more widely dissect the strategm.
This point plays rather nicely into both our good MrMox and Bigskip's comments....and that is that the Zulu commited themselves to a tried and true battle strategy that they had employed successfully for hundreds of years. A strategy that they had won many previous battles with. But infortunately {for them}, a practice that never overtly challenged an enemy armed with firearms. The "strategy" I speak of is obviously the 'horned' approach. Sending a drawing attack into the center of advance while simultaneously moving your critical warriors into a compressing advance from the flanks to surprise and overwhelm your enemy's underprotected rear and sides....

I am really tired after a lomg day.....so I apologise for any incoherencies.......but I will most definiyrly ponder your points about the VC's Drader...

Tread.