Padre George Smith of Rorke's Drift

Lummis, William M. (William Murrell)

ISBN 10: 0903619210 / ISBN 13: 9780903619219

Published by Norwich : Published for W.M. Lummis by Wensum Books, 1978

About this Item

Fine cloth copy in an equally fine dust-wrapper, now mylar-sleeved. Particularly well-preserved overall; tight, bright, clean and strong. Physical description: 96p. ; 22cm. Notes: Includes bibliography and index. Subjects: Smith, George (1845-1918). Church of England Missions ; Biography. Missionaries South Africa, Zululand ; Biography. 1 Kg.

Seller Inventory # 286700

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Padre George Smith of Rorke's Drift
• Publisher: Norwich : Published for W.M. Lummis by Wensum Books
• Publication Date: 1978
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0903619210
• ISBN 13: 9780903619219
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First Edition.
• Weight: 1 kilogram

About this title

Synopsis

Sir H. Rider Haggard described him as a 'big red-bearded Norfolk giant'. Alphonse de Neuville showed him (cover) intrepidly handing out ammunition in the thick of fierce fighting. Donald R. Morris in 'The Washing of the Spears' imagined him '... exhorting the men with wild biblical phrases, sternly reproving every blasphemy and obscenity his ear caught.' The Victorian public knew him as one of the heroes of that great feat of military history, the defence of Rorke's Drift by a hundred British soldiers against nearly four thousand Zulus for which no less than eleven Victoria Crosses were awarded. Canon Lummis has painted a picture of a brave man who went into Africa as a missionary and built up a native Christian village. A man who saw his duty to his fellow man and rode as Chaplain to the Volunteers during the Zulu Wars, holding services on the march and all too often burying the dead. George Smith found himself on 22nd January 1879 at Rorke's Drift with Lieutenants Chard and Bromhead, the Zulu army having just wiped out the 1st and 2nd Battalions of the 24th Regiment in the Battle of Isandlhwana leaving 1329 dead, and from his diary we have an eye-witness account of the subsequent battle which made him famous.