By now, most of the men still on the cliff top were corpses. As the abaQulusi came ever closer, Mossop scrambled down again, dragging Warrior behind him. Although the pony lost his footing and rolled down to the ridge, on inspection he seemed to be all right.

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Mossop mounted once more just as the abaQulusi rushed him. Warrior bounded forward down the steep slopes that led to
the valley below. Once on the plain, Mossop came to a stream. Dismounting, he plunged his face into the cold water. Although somewhat revived, he now saw the exhausted Warrior was
in a bad way. Feeling weak himself, the boy lay down beside his faithful mount. No sooner had he done so than he was roused by the sharp cry ‘uSuthu!‘ The Zulus had seen him and were running toward him. Mossop frantically sprang onto Warrior’s back once again, and somehow the injured pony managed to outpace his Zulu pursuers.

Mossop arrived safely at Khambula late in the evening. But his gallant pony died the following morning.

Back on the plateau, Buller worked desperately to save as many of his men as he could. Many of them had fought their way down the deep rocky pass, and so long as there was one man left, Buller would not flee. Time and time again he plunged into the pass to rescue more of his men, take them to the safety of the lower plateau and send them on their way to Khambula. Others were similarly snatched from certain death by Major Leet and Captain Browne.

Most of the Boers had reached the lower plains. Finally, only Piet Uys and his two sons stood with Buller as the men in the pass below managed to make their escape. Unaware that a number of abaQulusi were closing in on him, Uys’ eldest son, Petrus, struggled to calm a frightened horse. Uys raced to his son’s assistance and had just extricated him from the trap when another abaQulusi sprang from some rocks onto Piet Uys’ horse and assegaied Uys in the back, killing him. Another Boer, Andries Rudolf, shot Piet Uys’ assailant and then fled to safety, along with both of Uys’ sons.

With all the men down from the pass, Buller finally made his way over the plateau on to the plains, back to Khambula. What had started as a straightforward raid against the abaQulusi that morning had turned into a bloody massacre of the British forces, thanks to the unexpected arrival of Cetshwayo’s main impi.

Some of the British units had fared better than others. Colonel Russell, whom Wood had expected to provide Buller with some support, had misconstrued a dispatch from his commander and evacuated his position, descending from the lower plateau at the western end of Hlobane onto the plain, and then proceeding in a northwesterly direction to Khambula. Some of the survivors of the Hlobane debacle later regarded Russell’s actions as bordering on cowardice. Russell’s friendship with the Prince of Wales, however, averted any possibility of a court-martial.

Wood and his escort had made their way along the foot of the mountain, also in a westerly direction. Once clear of Hlobane, Wood scaled some high ground and remained there until dusk, watching the retreat. He then made his way back to Khambula.

British casualties on Hlobane numbered 17 officers and 82 enlisted men killed, along with some 100 irregular and native troops. One officer and seven other ranks were wounded. Of the 750 black volunteers of Wood’s Irregulars, only 50 remained after the battle; of the rest, those who had not been killed had deserted. Precise Zulu statistics for the battle are unknown, but they described their own losses as ‘negligible.’

Following the battles of Isandlwana and the Ntombe River, Hlobane was the third and last major Zulu victory of the war. Never again would they be presented with the circumstances that made their victory possible–a British force caught and trapped while on the move and in the open–on so large a scale. Indeed, the very day after Hlobane would see those same victorious amabutho slaughtered in an unwise assault against Wood’s prepared defenses at Khambula.

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