Natal Native Contingent

Instead, soldiers wore traditional tribal apparel with a red cloth bandanna around their foreheads,[5] the only item that distinguished them from Zulu warriors.

Primarily due to logistical and budget constraints, but also due to the European population's fear that arming the black population would create a severe security risk, initially fewer than one in ten NNC troopers were issued rifles; the rest made do with traditional assegais and cowhide shields.

Instead, the commander of the British forces, Lord Chelmsford, frequently assigned NNC troops to menial tasks, refusing to credit their fighting abilities.

At the Battle of Isandhlwana, NNC units fought alongside British counterparts and sustained heavy casualties.

The rest of the NNC, stripped of their command and armed only with spears, were posted outside the mealy bag and biscuit box barricade within the stone-walled cattle kraal.

Lieutenant Gert Adendorff and a Swiss corporal of the contingent, Christian Ferdinand Schiess, remained with the latter winning the Victoria Cross for his gallantry in the ensuing battle.

After Isandlwana and Rorke's Drift, British commanders in South Africa worried about the loyalty of their NNC detachments, and many were incorporated into the Natal Border Guard instead.

The NNH were much better-equipped than their infantry counterparts; they wore tan-colored European uniforms, rode horses with full equipment, and bore a rifled carbine in addition to traditional spears.

The NNH was finally disbanded during the 1899–1902 Second Anglo-Boer War, under a government initiative to disarm all-black units in South Africa out of fear that they could side with the Boers.