William Allen (VC 1879) (later The South Wales Borderers), British Army during the Zulu War when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the VC. On 22 and 23 January 1879 at Rorke's Drift, Natal, South Africa, Corporal Allan and another man (Frederick Hitch) kept communication with the hospital open, despite being severely wounded. Their determined conduct enabled the patients to be withdrawn from the hospital, and when incapacitated by their wounds from fighting, they continued, as soon as their wounds were dressed, to serve out ammunition to their comrades during the night. He later achieved the rank of sergeant for
Jan Smuts in the South African Republic of the Witwatersrand were far in the future, they were also under attack from several of the Native tribes, particularly from the Zulus. The British government judged it an opportune moment to add it to the Empire. The annexation itself proceeded with little difficulty and the British army were able to destroy the Zulus as a military power in the 1879 Zulu war. However, in 1880 the Boers, led by Kruger, arose, inflicting a number of relatively minor defeats upon the British army, culminating in the British defeat at the battle of Majuba; so ended what later became known as