CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
I AM THANKED IN PRESENCE OF THE ARMY.
The Japanese loss, incurred in the struggle for possession of theNanshan Heights, amounted to over four thousand, killed and wounded.What the Russian loss in killed and wounded totalled up to I do notthink we ever knew, excepting that, by the evidence of the capturedtrenches alone, it must have been tremendously heavy. Their materiallosses, however, amounted to sixty-eight guns, many of which were of8-inch or 6-inch calibre, ten machine-guns, three searchlights, adynamo, and a considerable quantity of ammunition and food; while thevictory gave to the Japanese the complete command of the isthmus, byenabling General Nakamura to seize Linshiatun, and Fort Hoshangtao, inits immediate neighbourhood, thus opening the way to the occupation ofNan-kwang-ling and Dalny, and the advance of Oku's army upon PortArthur.
As soon as it became evident that fighting was over for the day--bywhich time it had become too dark for me to signal to our squadron inthe offing--I made my way down the hillside to the spot where theheadquarters staff was established and, seeking General Oku's tent,entered and reported myself. The General received me very kindly andcourteously, but I could see in a moment that he was tremendously busy,the tent being full of officers to whom he was rapidly issuing orders.Having therefore reported myself and received orders to remain in campfor the night, I withdrew and sought the hospitality of my hosts of theprevious night, who accorded me a very warm and cordial welcome. Butthere was none of that joyousness, that exaltation of spirits that I hadexpected to see as a result of the brilliant victory which we hadgained; our numbers were less than they had been on the previous night,the absentees were lying out under the stars, either dead or wounded,somewhere yonder upon those shot-scored, blood-drenched slopes ofNanshan, and the joy of victory was quenched in sorrow for the fallen.We snatched a hasty, almost silent meal, and then those of us who hadnot to go forth on duty rolled ourselves in our cloaks and sought therelief of sleep.
For my own part, I slept like a log, and only awoke when the buglessounded the reveille. Our little party turned out, tubbed, tookbreakfast, and then, at the sound of the "assembly," sallied forth tosee what was to be the next item on the programme.
Strong ambulance parties had been busily engaged all through the night,collecting the wounded and bringing them in to the hospital tents, butthat work was now practically finished, and the preparations for thedisposal of the dead had not yet been begun. The still weary troopswere falling in, under arms, and in the distance I recognised GeneralOku, surrounded by the members of his staff, already on the ground. Thecommanding officers were at their posts, the non-commissioned officerswere busily engaged in seeing that the troops were all in order forinspection, and a few minutes later the roll call was being gonethrough. This done, the troops were put through a few simple evolutionswhich terminated in their being drawn up in close formation constitutingthree sides of a hollow square, with the men all facing inward. GeneralOku then summoned an aide-de-camp to his side, gave him a brief order,and the aide, saluting, turned away and glanced rapidly about him,finally making his way toward where I now stood alone, at no greatdistance.
He halted within about six paces of me, saluted, and said:
"The Commander-in-Chief desires your immediate presence, most honourableCaptain. He stands yonder."
"Right!" I said. "I will join him at once. Have you any idea what hewants me for?"
"I think I can guess," replied my companion, as he fell into step besideme, "but I am sure that the General will prefer to make that known toyou himself."
I said no more, and a couple of minutes later we halted before thegeneral staff, and Oku took and returned my salute. Then he shook handswith me with much cordiality, and requested me to take up a positionalongside him, on his right hand. This done, he proceeded to make alittle speech to the closely packed troops. Shorn of the ratherstrange--to Western ears--flowery phraseology peculiar to the Japanese,his speech ran somewhat as follows:
"Soldiers of the Second Japanese Army, I gladly seize the firstavailable opportunity that presents itself to tender you, on behalf ofour august Emperor and the people of Japan, my most heartfelt thanks forthe glorious victory which, by your indomitable courage andself-sacrifice, you so nobly achieved yesterday. The difficulties whichyou were called upon to surmount were so stupendous and the valour ofthe enemy so great, that there was a moment when I almost becamepersuaded that the position which you were attacking was impregnable,and that all the courage and devotion which you had displayed had gonefor nothing. Yet I could not quite bring myself to believe thatsoldiers of Japan would ever permit themselves to be beaten, under anycircumstances, however adverse; I therefore called upon you again forone last, supreme effort, and the valour and devotion with which youresponded to my call is attested by the victorious presence of ourglorious flag upon the heights to-day."
Here the General was interrupted by a soul-stirring shout of "Banzai!"from the exultant troops. The echoes of the shout had not died awayamong the surrounding hills before the serried masses of infantry wereonce more silent and motionless as statues, and Oku resumed:
"I am proud, your officers are proud, and I am sure that you yourselvesare proud, of your glorious achievement. Yet we soldiers must notarrogate to ourselves the entire credit of so magnificent a victory.Without the assistance of the navy, that victory--I say it frankly--would have been impossible. The sailors therefore are entitled to anequal share of the glory which we yesterday reaped on the slopes ofthose terrible heights; and I rejoice that chance has afforded me soearly an opportunity as this to tender my personal thanks, the thanks ofmy officers, and the thanks of every soldier in the ranks, to the navy,here represented by the noble and gallant Captain Swinburne."
Here there were further shouts of "Banzai!" even more enthusiastic, ifthat were possible, than those which preceded them. The General raisedhis hand for silence, and presently proceeded:
"We are, however, indebted to Captain Swinburne, not only asrepresenting the navy, but also in a purely personal form. All throughthe trying hours of yesterday he stood on the slopes of those heights,alone save for the companionship of a solitary signaller, exposed,during some part of the time, to the pitiless fire of the enemy, and inconstant danger of being captured; and during the whole of that time hedevoted himself unsparingly to the task of directing the fire of ourships to the spots where from time to time it was most urgently needed;crowning this great service by sending a communication to the commanderof the 4th Division which enabled that officer to effect the diversionwhich resulted in our hard-won victory. I have, therefore, now in thepresence of you all, the honour to tender to Captain Swinburne, onbehalf of our august Emperor, thus publicly, heartfelt thanks for theinestimably valuable services which he yesterday rendered to the causeof Japan."
So saying, General Oku turned to me and gave me a hearty handshake, anexample which was immediately followed by the officers of the staff,while the troops put their caps upon their bayonets and waved thementhusiastically, yelling "Banzai!" until I am sure they must have feltas hoarse as crows.
This little ceremony over, I received the General's permission to rejoinmy ship as soon as he had penned a dispatch to Admiral Misamichi, whowas in command of the squadron, and which he requested me to deliver.This dispatch I received about half an hour later, from Oku's own hands,whereupon I bade him and the members of his staff farewell, wished themthe best of luck in their further encounters with the enemy, and thenhurried away to the little cove on the north side of the bay, which Ihad used on two or three previous occasions, and where I had a shrewdsuspicion that I should find my boat awaiting me. I was not mistaken,and shortly after six bells in the forenoon watch I was aboard the_Tsukushi_, handing over General Oku's dispatch to the Admiral. Thelatter at once read it, and seemed much gratified at its contents,which, however, he did not communicate to me. But I shrewdly surmisedthat it was a letter of thanks for the services rendered by the squadronand an intimation
that our presence was no longer needed. And, so faras the latter part of my assumption was concerned, I was doubtlessright, for after a little chat, during which I briefly related myexperiences of the previous day--learning in return that the _Chokai_had lost her commander and two men killed, with two lieutenants and fivemen wounded--I received instructions to return to my ship, as thesquadron would presently proceed to rejoin Admiral Togo at his base.And an hour later we were all steaming out of the bay.
Two days after our arrival at the base, the destroyer _Kagero_ arrivedwith mails for the fleet, and, to my great surprise, she brought for mea letter from my Uncle Bob, as well as one from my chum, young Gordon,and another from Sir Robert.
Naturally, I first opened the letter from Uncle Bob, for not only was itthe first letter which I had received from any of the family since my"disgrace," but also the envelope was deeply edged with black, and myfirst fear was that it might contain the announcement of the death ofdear Aunt Betsy. But upon extracting the contents of the envelope I wasat once reassured, for I saw that it really consisted of two letters,one from Uncle Bob, and the other from my aunt. There had been a deathin the family, however, that of Cousin Bob, the author of the troublewhich had resulted in my dismissal from the British Navy. It appearedthat while engaged in battle practice there had been a bad accident onboard the _Terrible_, one of her quick-firers having burst, killing twomen and wounding five others, one of the latter so seriously that he hadsubsequently died. That one was Bob; and when informed by the ship'ssurgeon that he had but a few hours to live, he had sent for thechaplain and to him had made a full confession of his crime, declaringthat he had been spurred to it by blind, unreasoning jealousy of me.The chaplain, horrified at what he heard, took down the confession inwriting, and poor Bob had signed it after the chaplain had added, at thedying lad's request, an expression of deep contrition for his misdeedand a prayer to me for forgiveness of the wrong which he had done me.The two letters were sad reading, for they had been penned byheart-broken people who had not only lost their only son, but hadlearned, at the very moment of their loss, that all their pride in himhad been misplaced, and that he had been guilty of a deliberate,despicable, cruel crime. Their shame and sorrow were patent in everysentence of the letters, indeed they made no effort to conceal them, andthey finished up by saying that, Bob being gone from them, and gone sotragically, they hoped I would forgive them for any hard thoughts theymay have had of me, and would be a son to them in place of the one theyhad lost. They further begged that, my innocence now being established,I would lose no time in hastening home to them, to comfort them in theirbitter bereavement, and to take steps to procure my reinstatement in theBritish Navy, which, they had been informed, might probably beaccomplished without much difficulty under the circumstances.
The letter from Sir Robert Gordon was also chiefly in reference to Bob'sdeath, the particulars of which, and of his confession, he had learnedfrom his son Ronald. He also was of opinion that, in view of Bob'sconfession, it ought not to be very difficult to secure the cancellationof my expulsion, whenever I might choose to return to England. But hesaid no word suggesting that I should return at once; on the contrary,he offered his own and Lady Gordon's very hearty congratulations uponthe frequency with which my name had been mentioned in the papers ashaving been specially referred to by Togo in his dispatches, and theyboth expressed the hope that before the end of the war I should havemany further opportunities to distinguish myself.
The letters from my aunt and uncle moved me profoundly; their grief forthe loss of their only son, and, even more, their shattered faith inhim, was pathetic in the extreme, while it was easy to see howyearningly their hearts turned to me for comfort and consolation intheir bitter bereavement. They were smarting with shame at the thoughtthat it was _their_ son, the lad of whom they had been so proud and uponwhose future they had built such high hopes, who was the author of myundeserved disgrace and ruin, so far as my career in the British Navywas concerned; and they wanted me at home in order that they might havethe comfort of doing what they could to make up to me for their son'streachery. And in the plenitude of my affection I was, for the moment,more than half inclined to yield to their entreaties, resign mycommission in the Japanese navy, and go home to them forthwith. But inthe course of an hour or two calm reflection came to my aid; I wouldcertainly return to England and endeavour to secure reinstatement in thenavy of my own country, but not until after the war was over, if I livedso long. I had put my hand to the plough, and I would not turn back,although, of course, I knew that there were plenty of Japanese officersquite as good and useful as myself, and quite ready to step into myplace, should I choose to vacate it. I came to the conclusion, however,that, let the authorities at home be ever so ready to remedy what hadproved to be a miscarriage of justice, I should in nowise help my casewith them by forsaking the cause which I had espoused, at the momentwhen the decisive events of the war were beginning, as we all thenbelieved, to loom faintly upon the horizon. No, I told myself, if Iwished for reinstatement--and I wished for nothing else half soardently--I must remain until the issues of the war were decided, when Icould go back home with a good grace, taking with me a fairly creditablerecord with which to back up my application. Meanwhile, I sat down andwrote a letter to my aunt and uncle, excusing myself for not at onceacceding to their request to forthwith return to England, explaining thereasons which had urged me to that decision, and pouring out in a long,passionate declaration all the pent-up affection of my heart for them,and my sympathy with them in their bitter sorrow. I also wrote to SirRobert Gordon, telling him that my aunt and uncle had expressed thedesire that I should return to them forthwith, and reiterating thereasons which impelled me to decline.
On the following day my signal was made from the flagship; and uponproceeding on board I was informed by the Admiral that General Oku'sreport as to the assistance rendered by the ships during the battle ofNanshan, and especially of the important services which I personally hadrendered on that particular day and those which immediately preceded it,had been particularly gratifying to him, and that it had afforded himthe utmost satisfaction and pleasure to forward that report to BaronYamamoto, the Minister of the Navy, with a covering letter from himselfwhich he hoped would be of service to me. Meanwhile, I was instructedto proceed forthwith to Port Arthur with my ship, to assist in theblockading of the port.
We filled our bunkers and replenished our stock of ammunition during theafternoon, and steamed out of Tashantau harbour, with all lights out, assoon as darkness fell, steaming dead slow all night, and keeping a sharplookout for enemy ships, as a rumour had reached the Admiral that theRussians were planning another raid upon the Japanese coast by theVladivostock fleet, which might be expected to put to sea at any moment.But we saw nothing, and arrived off Port Arthur at daybreak on thefollowing morning without adventure of any kind. Here we fell in withthe cruisers of the blockading fleet, to the admiral in command of whichI forthwith reported myself, and delivered over the mail bags for theblockading ships, with which I had been entrusted. My instructions wereto remain with the blockaders during the daytime, while at night the_Kasanumi_ was to take part in the mine-laying operations in theroadstead of the beleaguered fortress, which were nightly conducted withuntiring pertinacity. Shortly after my arrival, the destroyer flotillawhich had been engaged in these operations during the night camesteaming out, and among the approaching craft I recognised with pleasurethe _Akatsuki_, still commanded by my former lieutenant and staunchfriend, the enthusiastic Ito. That he had by no means forgotten me wasquickly made manifest, for no sooner was he near enough to identify the_Kasanumi_ than his semaphore started work, signalling that he wished tocommunicate, and upon my signalman responding, his first question waswhether I was still in command. Receiving a reply in the affirmative,he forthwith invited me to go on board his ship to take breakfast withhim, and when I moved an amendment to the effect that the process shouldbe reversed and that, instead, he should come and breakf
ast with me,upon the ground that, coming fresh from the rendezvous, my larder wasprobably better stocked than his, he at once joyously accepted theinvitation, and a quarter of an hour later I had the very great pleasureof welcoming him on my own quarter-deck. The dear chap was just asenthusiastic, just as keen, just as full of life as ever, and seemedunfeignedly glad to see me. Of course we had a tremendous lot to say toeach other, and I was most eager to learn what he had been doing sincewe parted company; but when he learned that I was fresh from Kinchau,and had actually assisted at the battle of the Nanshan Heights, hepositively refused to say a single word about himself until I had givenhim a full, true, and particular account of all the happenings of thatterrible yet glorious day. His enthusiasm and delight, as I endeavouredto describe the final irresistible rush of the Japanese up thoseheart-breaking, shot-swept slopes, were supreme; he seemed to literallyswell with pride; and when I spoke of the thrilling Japanese cheer ashis fellow-countrymen finally carried the last line of the Russiandefences and routed the defenders, he leaped to his feet and repeatedthe shout of "Banzai!" again and again, while his eyes shone like stars,and tears of joy and pride rolled down his cheeks.
It was some time before I could turn his mind away from the events ofthat strenuous day; and when at length I succeeded in doing so, andcould get him to talk about himself, it appeared that, stirring thoughthe events seemed to be which were nightly happening before Port Arthur,they were all flat, stale, and unprofitable, compared with such an eventas the storming of the Nanshan Heights. And so, as a matter of fact,they were, as I soon discovered for myself; for the duty of ourdestroyer flotilla consisted simply in steaming inshore every nightindustriously laying mines in the roadstead and at the harbour's mouth,which the Russians as industriously strove to remove next day. True,the sameness of this work was occasionally relieved by a more or lessexciting episode, as when, for instance, the Russians would suddenlyturn their searchlights upon us and all their batteries would open fire.Then we simply had to scuttle for our lives, for, of course, the shorebatteries mounted very much heavier and longer range guns than any thata destroyer could carry; and there was no sense in attempting, as ageneral rule, to oppose our 12-pounders and 6-pounders to their 6-inchand 11-inch guns.
Yet we by no means allowed the Russians to invariably have it all theirown way. There were times when, under cover of the darkness, one or twoof us would creep right into the harbour entrance and, getting so closeunder the cliff that it became impossible for the Russians to depresstheir heavy guns sufficiently to reach us, would boldly engage the fortswith our quick-firers, and even with rifle-fire, picking off any gunnersthat were foolhardy enough to expose themselves, and not unfrequentlydismounting or otherwise putting out of action a few of their lighterguns. It was the good fortune of the _Kasanumi_, on one occasion, veryshortly after our return, to strike one of the Russian 11-inch Canets,mounted in the fort between Golden Hill and the inner harbour, fair andsquare upon the muzzle and blow it clean off, with a shell from our12-pounder; but such successes as these were of course very rare. Theseengagements between our destroyers and the Russian forts were immenselyexciting, and afforded a most agreeable and welcome change from themonotony of mine-laying, for when we undertook such an adventure wenever knew whether or not we should emerge from it scatheless. Theoperation of getting in close under the cliffs, undetected, was ofcourse hazardous enough to make the attempt irresistibly fascinating;but it was the getting away again after the alarm had been given and allthe enemy's searchlights had been turned upon us, when the excitementreached its height; for, of course, the moment that we were far enoughaway from the shelter of the beetling cliffs to enable the Russians totrain their big guns upon us, they would open fire upon us for all thatthey were worth, and then it became a case of dodging the shells. Itwas then that our ingenuity was taxed to the very utmost, twisting andturning hither and thither as we ran at full speed into the offing,always endeavouring to make a turn in the most unexpected directionpossible at the precise moment when we anticipated that the guns werebeing brought to bear upon us. And that, on the whole, we were fairlysuccessful was pretty conclusively evidenced by the small amount ofdamage which we sustained. Indeed, our most serious mishap about thistime in those waters arose from a totally different cause. One of ourofficers, a certain Commander Oda, had invented a particularly deadlykind of mine, which the Japanese Government adopted, and which theynamed after the inventor. A few days after my return to the waters ofPort Arthur, Oda himself was engaged upon the task of laying some of hismines in the outer roadstead, when one of them somehow exploded, killingthe captain of the ship and eighteen men, and wounding Oda himself andseven others. Strangely enough, however, the ship herself was only veryslightly damaged. Less fortunate were the Russians; for, only a day ortwo later, two of their gunboats, while engaged in the attempt to removesome of our mines, came in contact with them, and both craft immediatelywent to the bottom, taking most of their men with them.