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Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 10:07 am

Can anyone tell me what Columns the various Chaplains and acting Chaplains Served with during both invasions of Zululand (I believe there were about six or seven.
I can of course account for Smith and Senior Chaplain Coar is also mentioned but in 'Narrative of the...' there is a blank next to where their names should be and various other sources only mention the above also.

Justin

Posted: Tue Apr 25, 2006 10:38 am

Justin

I think I compiled a rough list of most of them some years ago (or tried to) but I'm not sure if I could lay my hands on it easily. As you have already seen, the Narrative is frustratingly rather vague and incomplete and of course there were changes between the appointments for the first & and then the second invasion.

Apart from the Narrative and sundry general accounts and memoirs of the war, I found The Red Book useful in tracking down mentions (and appointments) of the various chaplains and acting chaplains. Now that Keith Smith's Local General Orders is out it must, presumably, be technically possible to go through that systematically and extract them all - even without knowing any name in advance.

Peter

P.S. I'll have a dig around & if I find my rough notes I'll shout.

Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 8:42 am

Hi Peter

I had actually gone through the 'Red Book', there are numerous mentions of Chaplains but most are local or Military but only mentioning movements to Durban etc. I did check it again after getting your post and had missed appointments of Kirkwood to HQ and Bandrey to Wood's but both of these are second invasion time only. Saying that its more than I had yesterday!

I'll do the same with 'Local General Orders' (actually just went through it the other week looking for something else!)I have a list of names I'm looking for and they are not in the index but one or two might be in this very useful book

Thanks
Justin

Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 4:03 pm

Justin,

I've got a few more names:

Reverends Gerald Vandeleur; Thomas Foran; James Bellord & George Ritchie.

I have some of the service details from Hart's 1884, if that's any use?

John Y.

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 8:18 am

Hi John

I was going through the Army lists at our local library and medal rolls/'Local General..' yesterday and was able to find a little more information but anything you can add to this would be great.

Coar and Smith are still the only Chaplains I can find details of for the first invasion but I�d presume their would have been one appointed to each column?

I've found that the following served in Zululand or Sekukuni- * = British Army, others Local

*C.J Coar- Flying Column, HQ Second Division (served whole War)
*J.Bellord- Dundee
*R.A Corbett-HQ First Division from April then 2nd Division and after Clarke�s Column
*G.Kirkwood - First Division from April
*A.J.Raw - Sekukuni
A.Bandry - Wood's Column, after War back to Dundee
T.Goodwin - First Division from May
G.Smith - Three Column, 2nd Division (served whole War)
A.F.Walsh - First Division, Sekukuni, after War back to Pretoria

There are a couple more but they don't seem to have crossed into Zululand (Foran, Wilkes and Msctaggart..)

Justin

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 1:54 pm

Justin/John

Yes, Bellord was the RC chaplain who conducted the non-interment funeral service for the Prince Imperial on the evening of 2nd June, although Smith apparently had to begin the service as Bellord appeared a little late. (Travelling from 2nd Div to Flying Div or vic versa, perhaps?)

Ritchie is buried in Canterbury City cemetery (see Keynsham Light Horse site). I dug out an obit from The Guardian (1888) for Woodie & can provide you with a copy of the text if you'd like. Woolwich, Aldershot, Ft Napier etc. Mentions his active service in AZW but doesn't say which (if any) column he accompanied. Ritchie was involved in the main Isandlwana burial task after the war. Back in PMB, he was soon attached to the force which served in the 1ABW. (I think I must also have extracted an obit from the local Canterbury paper, as I distinctly recall mention of his experience at Ingogo, which isn't mentioned in The Guardian's piece). Then to the Curragh 1884-87, finally C'bury.

As you've no doubt seen, not all AZW memoirs are that helpful, in that the author often mentions "the chaplain" or "the parson" without giving his name. (Probably couldn't remember or never knew!) Grenfell, for example, gives a brief account of the recovery and burial of British bodies early on the morning of 4th July after the previous day's skirmish, but doesn't say which "parson" he refers to.

I'll check some of the above names in Crockford, which sometimes includes details of service such as this and occasionally whether a campaign medal was issued (among the usual biographical detail).

Peter

Posted: Thu Apr 27, 2006 2:22 pm

Hi Peter

Thanks for looking more into this.

I only had G.M Richie down as at Durban and entitled to a no Bar SAGS so its interesting to know He served during the 1st Boer War also- especially that He was at Ingogo River.

As you say these Chaplains don't seem to be mentioned by name too often - well apart from Smith and most of my information has come from the Medal Rolls (original not Forsyth) which actually give a little more info than is usual or from 'The red book' ,'Local General..'

All the named I have are entitled to the SAGS with bar and although in my past experience this isn't fail safe its problems are more with Colonial forces and I think these are the candidates most likley to have served in the various columns/Divisions for any length of time.

Thanks again
Justin

Posted: Mon May 08, 2006 9:49 am

Justin

Have now had a look in one or two editions of Crockford for the names John and you highlighted above, and seen no entries for Kirkwood, Bandry, Foran, Raw, Walsh or McTaggart (this last I also checked for Scottish Episcopal). The most likely reason for most of these is that they were of a non-Anglican denomination.

Gerald Ormsley Vandeleur became CF 1867; probably Irish as served in Ireland before and after AZW and had gone to Trinity College, Dublin. "Served in Kafir War 1879-80." (Later editions amended to "served in the Zulu War, 1879"). At the Curragh by '81.

Richard Alfred Corbett - CF 1871. Ashantee Medal 1874. SA Medal with clasp 1879. Egypt medal with Tel-e-Kebir clasp, 1882. Wellington Bks between SA and Egypt.

Thomas Goodwin was Priest-in-Charge of St Matthias-with-St John, Sydenham, Lower Umgeni, Natal at the time of the AZW. Previously in St Helena & Durban. No mention of a CF position, nor any campaign medal.

On their own, these notes won't provide any clues as to whether they accompanied any column in 1879 but I hope the odd biographical or career details might help a little.

Peter

P.S. Forgot to say - all the above three were Anglican of course.

Posted: Mon May 08, 2006 3:16 pm

Peter,

Hart's shows Kirkwood as Presb & Foran as R.C.

Page 224 of In Zululand with the British has Baudrey rather than Bandrey if that helps, I have possible initial of A.

Thanks for the card, by the way, date about right for the weapons shown!

Justin,

This query would have anything to do with a recent publication mentioning a padre as a casualty, would it?

John Y.

Posted: Mon May 08, 2006 4:02 pm

Justin,

There's an image of George Kirkwood in the well-known group photograph of the 91st Highlanders wearing his Asante campaign medal.

John Y.

Posted: Tue May 09, 2006 9:11 am

Hi Peter

Thanks for the extra information, it's especially interesting to see that Corbett had so much service - out of curiosity I might check out some of my Ashantee references just to see if He's mentioned at all.

No doubt at least a couple more of these Chaplains names will turn up in time in a source I can identify which column they were with.

John, I'll check the pic out of Kirkwood, always good to put a face to a name, also thanks for picking up on Baudrey.

As to the reason for looking into this, I actually hadn't picked up that a Padre was possibly a casualty, I'd noticed that in 'Narrative of...' their were spaces next to where most of the Chaplains names should be, so checked out the medal roll to see how many chaplains were entitled to the '79' for Zululand and as often happens this curiosity about these men has taken on a life of its own! Its not something I'd normally be interested in but probably just because I've never thought too much about the role of Chaplains but whenever possible I like to add notes to the medal rolls and keep notes that may be of use at some point. With the help I've had so far I've a good amount of basic information.

Cheers
Justin