Published in Windlesora 35
© WLHG 2019
On the face of it, the Zulu War of 1879 has very little connection with Windsor. The massacre at Isandhlwana and the heroic stand at Rorke’s Drift both happened thousands of miles away in a far-off country, and in another era when Britain had an Empire to defend. There is, however, in a corner of a Windsor church a poignant reminder of the tragic events of 140 years ago.
Captain Ronald Campbell was formerly Adjutant of the 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards and prior to his posting to South Africa he had been stationed at Victoria Barracks. He was killed leading an assault on the Hlobane Mountain in March 1879 during the Zulu War. Hlobane (sometimes spelt Zlobane) has long been overshadowed by events at Rorke’s Drift and Campbell has become merely a footnote to that brief and violent war.
In Holy Trinity Garrison Church in Windsor, there is a plaque in his memory. The church was built in the 1840s, and is full of memorials to the regiments and individual soldiers who were garrisoned at Windsor. What makes this plaque different however, is that Campbell was denied the Victoria Cross, the nation’s highest award for bravery, while the two soldiers with him each received the award.
The wording on the brass plaque reads:
SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF RONALD GEORGE ELIDOR CAMPBELL
LIEUTENANT AND CAPTAIN AND FOR SEVEN YEARS ADJUTANT OF THE 1st BATTN. COLDSTREAM GUARDS.
HE FELL ON 28th MARCH 1879
LEADING AN ASSAULT ON A STRONG POSITION ON THE ZLOBANE MOUNTAIN ZULULAND AND WAS BURIED UNDER FIRE BY HIS COMRADES. THE TWO MEN WHO FOLLOWED HIM RECEIVED THE VICTORIA CROSS.
The Honourable Ronald George Elidor Campbell was born in Pembrokeshire on 30 December 1848, son of John Frederick Vaughan Campbell, later 2nd Earl of Cawdor. He was educated at Eton College and joined the Coldstream Guards as an ensign (second lieutenant) in December 1867. In March 1871 he was promoted to lieutenant and then captain, and in August of the same year was appointed Adjutant of the 1st Battalion. The battalion was stationed at Windsor during the late 1870s the reason the plaque is in the Garrison Church. In December 1872 he married Katherine Susannah Claughton, daughter of the Bishop of Rochester. Campbell applied for ‘special service’ in South Africa and in November 1878 he was seconded to Colonel Sir Evelyn Wood VC’ as his Chief of Staff.
On 28 March 1879, during an assault on Zulu positions in the Hlobane Mountain, Colonel Wood ordered the dislodgement of Zulu warriors who were holding up the British advance. Captain Campbell, closely followed by Lt Lysons and Pte Fowler, charged the enemy position in the mouth of a cave in the rocks. Sir Evelyn Wood later wrote:
It being impossible for two men to walk abreast, the assailants were consequently obliged to keep in single file, and as Captain Campbell was leading, he arrived first at the mouth of the cave, from which the Zulus were firing, and there met his death. Lieutenant Lysons and Private Fowler, who were following close behind him, immediately dashed at the cave, from which led several subterranean passages, and firing into the chasm below, succeeded in forcing the occupants to forsake their stronghold. Lieutenant Lysons remained at the cave’s mouth for some minutes after the attack, during which time Captain Campbell’s body was carried down the slopes.
Still under fire, he was later buried by his comrades. The Windsor & Eton Express recorded his death in its edition of 19 April 1879. The obituary ended with the words: By his genial and thorough military spirit he had gained the respect and esteem of both the officers and men of his regiment.
It was not until October 1881, however, that Sir Evelyn Wood VC, by now a Major General, considered recommending Lt Henry Lysons and Pte Edmund Fowler for the Victoria Cross. It appears strange that Wood waited two and a half years before making his recommendations. A file in The National Archives (WO 32/7834) provides the reason for the delay. Wood explained that ‘I did not recommend them at the time the acts were performed, as they did not, in my opinion, come under the category of acts of valour included in the [VC] warrant‘. A Royal Warrant of 1881 removed the ambiguity concerning what constituted an act of bravery, leading Wood to add that ‘an explanatory interpretation, which has been made public, has changed my opinion‘. General Wood VC also made mention of Captain Campbell:
Without wishing to take away in the slightest degree from the bravery evinced by Lieutenant Lysons and Private Fowler, I should add that if Captain Ronald Campbell had survived I should have recommended him for the Victoria Cross before the others, as in the assault of such a cave as I have attempted to describe, the greatest danger is necessarily incurred by the leader.
It was not possible at the time for the Victoria Cross to be awarded posthumously. General Wood asked the War Office for a memorandum in The London Gazette stating that Captain Campbell would have been recommended for the VC had he survived, as was the standard practice. This was not done, for reasons which have never been explained. In 1907 King Edward VII decided to approve the posthumous award of the Victoria Cross to all the men who had previously been gazetted in memorandum form. If Campbell had been on this list, as General Wood had requested, he would have received a posthumous Victoria Cross, along with Zulu War heroes Lieutenants Melvill and Coghill. The two men who followed Captain Campbell into the cave, Lt Lysons and Pte Fowler, both received their VCs in 1882.
In the same National Archives file is an anonymous handwritten note referring to the proposed memorandum for Captain Campbell with the comment: ‘General W does not wish this question raised’. The identity of General W is not stated, but this is almost certainly General Lord Wolseley. As Adjutant General of the Army, bravery awards came within his remit. We may never know the real reason for this decision but can still feel the injustice of the situation. Had Captain Campbell survived the attack on Hlobane Mountain or had posthumous Victoria Cross awards been allowed at the time, there is no doubt that Campbell would have received one. (He was awarded a campaign medal, namely the South Africa Medal with 1879 clasp.)
Ronald Campbell left a widow and three children. His youngest son, John Vaughan Campbell, followed him into the Coldstream Guards and in September 1916 he won a Victoria Cross at Ginchy during the Battle of the Somme.
In 1999 (on the 120th anniversary of the Zulu War) the author wrote to the Secretary of State for Defence asking him to review the case. The eventual response, although not unexpected, was still a disappointment. The reply from the Ministry of Defence, while confirming Campbell’s bravery was beyond doubt, said that ‘the military authorities at the time for reasons known only to them concluded that his actions did not merit a recommendation for the award of the Victoria Cross… It is not the policy of the Ministry of Defence to interfere with previous decisions that were made in good faith and I regret, therefore, that the decision not to award Captain Campbell this award must stand’.
Following the MOD’s decision not to re-open this case, the plaque at Holy Trinity Church is the nearest thing to an official recognition of Captain Ronald Campbell’s bravery.
Derek Hunt
Notes
- Henry Evelyn Wood VC (1838-1919) had a distinguished military career, retiring with the rank of Field Marshal. He won the VC for actions in 1858/59 during the Indian Mu-tiny. Wood wrote about Campbell’s heroism in Pearson’s Magazine in February 1896, in an article titled ‘One of the bravest deeds I ever saw”
Sources
The National Archives
The London Gazette, various dates
Windsor & Eton Express, various dates
Bancroft, James, The Zulu War VCs, 1992