“I see.”

“As you join the colonel, you will understand immediately that you could not have come at a worse moment. His regiment was located as anchor at the bottom of a loop the idiot Burrows had put out, against which Ayub Khan was supposed to dash his advance units and be scattered. Alas, the Khan had arrived with his main force, twenty-five thousand strong, many of them mounted, and they had the advantage of numbers as well as ammunition, rations, water, artillery, and familiarity with the territory. As for Burrows, it was his first battle, and it was enough to get him permanent placement in the British army hall of dunces, along with Cardigan at Balaclava and Chelmsford at Isandlwana.”

When the snatch of report that the colonel had removed for me begins, Colonel—then Captain—Woodruff has noted with alarm that the “loop” is collapsing and that men, both British and Indian, are fleeing, many having dropped their arms. He realizes his company, E of the 66th Foot, must stand strong to cover the retreaters, else they’ll be slashed down by the Khan’s cavalry before they make it a fiftieth of the way back to Kandahar. This he does until in danger of being overrun, and when no more retreaters can be seen, he orders a fighting withdrawal to the village of Khig, where better cover may be found. His surviving troops take up position to repel the charging Afghans, and although I can’t quote an extended passage from memory all these years later, I remember the extreme vividness with which the then-captain expressed himself, mostly its coolly precise language, so perfect for evoking a desolate and brutal day of death and slaughter in the baking sun and swirling dust of a far-off place not worth a tuppence and a crust of bread on any street corner in London. I think it went something like this, only much better:

I noted that Khig was overlooked by a hill immediately to its southern extreme, flanking our lines. Fearing the enemy in such placement would have angle advantage to bring fire, I determined to send a small unit to secure and then defend the hill until out of ammunition. I chose Color Sergeant Matthews to lead, not merely because he was sound and salty but because among my senior noncommissioned officers, he alone was ambulatory. He had only been wounded twice. He was also one of those hearty lads who enjoys a good brawl, and the more desperate the circumstances the more fun it is for him. He took twelve equally hearty lads and made his way to the top of what I privately christened “Little Round Top,” to make his stand, exactly as Chamberlain had done at Gettysburg, though I doubt the pious Chamberlain could fathom Mattuwes’s exquisite gift for expressive profanity, so common among the better class of our magnificent cockney warriors.

While we on the low ground turned back multiple direct charges until our Martini-Henrys were near to glow with the heat of the firing, and at one point were firing at ghosts so shrouded in dust you could only know a hit when you heard the slap of lead on meat, I noted much churn and drama atop Little Round Top. Fearing the loss of so many men and realizing that were they left up there as we retreated, they were doomed, I decided to withdraw them. I looked for an orderly to bear the message, but all were either dead or absorbed in bayonet work. I assigned myself to the task.

I had a brisk run up the slope. It is exhilarating to be shot at and missed, and it does provide energy where none had seemed available. I recognize that in the British army, officers in charge normally do not fight but merely lead, but alas, this noble tradition was not acknowledged by the Pathans. I felled four with my revolver, the last so close I could smell his stinky breath. Then, the gun being empty and my belt devoid of cartridges, I tossed it away and devolved huenceforth to Wilkinson. Again I was set upon by dervishes, each more colorful than the last, all armed with scimitars of great curve, sweep, and gleam. They slashed, I parried, attempting to rotate such that they were never able to put a front together and attack simueltaneously. In this way, one after another, I prevailed. Wilkinson should be commended for its excellent craftsmanship, as even when my grip grew slippery in the blood that close combat inevitably produces, at no time did the weapon loosen or turn in my hand or did its edge dull in all the cutting I was required to perform.

Making the crest, I saw that the situation was desperate. Of the twelve, but five remained alive, all wounded. Color Sergeant Mattuwes had taken many cuts and lost much blood. Another charge was brewing. Picking up a rifle, I organized the survivors into a ragged line, waited until the hordes were upon us, and commenced a volley, followed by rapid fire. I myself, again in violation of order and tradition, fired my rifle as quickly as I could, until it appeared the wooden forearm had been set afire by the heat of the barrel, and a tendril of smoke rose and drifted from my piece. I looked and it was the same for all the boys, their weapons leaking vapor into the dusty air. Oh, for a Gatling; it would have made such a difference. In any event, our sustained fire broke the charge, and it appeared we held once again.

In the lull, I ordered the survivors down the hill and off they went, spryly, happy to be sprung from Little Round Top’s death trap. I must say that however much our arms failed on the battleground that day, no man of Company E, 66th Foot, retreated before being ordered to do so, and when ordered, did so in good order, keeping fire discipline throughout the whole process and applying bayonet where necessary. What superb soldiers they were, and how privileged I was to command them!

As for me, I could not leave Mattuwes to the fate of the Afghan women and their cruel knives. Lord Jesus, how I hated what those vicious harpies did to our wounded boys, as I had seen far too much of it. I managed to get Mattuwes up and, with him leaning on me, the two of us made it down the hill. At one point, three more Pathans joined the scrap and I was forced to send them to their happy warrior’s paradise, although I took a bad cut on my arm. The last fighter was on me with his dagger when I managed to get the bayonet, grabbed off the desert floor where a retreating fellow had dropped it, thank heavens, into him. I saw no other place to enter but his neck, cutting arteries and veins and producing torrents of a blood as red as my own. To see a man die at such close range, nose to nose as it were, is a terrible thing, no matter how fiercely one hates the enemy. Somehow I got the sergeant back to our redoubt and immediately issued orders for a retreat under fire.

Game little bastard, our Huw, eh? He charges up the bloody hill, kills three men with pistol and three more with sword, commands a last volley to drive the beggars back, sends the other men off the hill in the lull, and then drags his wounded sergeant down the slope to safety. Halfway there, three brigands jump him, but he’s swift enough to cut them all down—I’ll bet that was, as we say in Ireland, one hell of a donnybrook—while nearly getting his arm chopped off. Having sent the enthusiasts with the scimitars straight to hell, he continues to drag the sergeant, who, though I don’t know because further adventures were contained on pages I did not have, I dearly hope survived. You may hate the soldier’s cause, but it is hard to hate the soldier.

Yet that is not why I was there, not to admire the guts of one Huw Pickering Woodruff, but instead to check his spelling. And so I looked carefully, hoping there would be no anomalies, and for a time, so it seemed. But then: for henceforth, “huenceforth.” And for Matthews “Mattuwes.” And “simueltaneously” from simultaneously. Under certain circumstances, perhaps fear, fatigue, confusion, or other battle pressures, he insisted upon inserting a “u” for “e” and moving the “e” into the next available vowel position, or if none was available, sticking it in or forgetting it altogether. What would make such a thing happen? He couldn’t even see it. It was some bizarre crick in the mind, brought on by who knew what, meaningless except as an identifier.