Robert Elwes

Lieutenant Robert Hamond Elwes (1856 – 28 January 1881) was a British Army officer who was killed in action during the First Boer War.

As a junior officer in the Grenadier Guards regiment, Elwes fought in the Battle of Laing's Nek where he died while leading a cavalry charge against Boer forces.

[2] The next day Elwes left Pietermaritzburg with the British Natal Field Force led by Colley who took them into the Transvaal via Newcastle and Laing's Nek to Pretoria to relieve the garrisons in the besieged towns who were desperately short of food and ammunition.

Over-eager commanders drove their men so hard up the steep slope in their anxiety to get at the enemy that when the decisive charge was actually made, the exhausted infantrymen and cavalry came nowhere near the Boer defences before being mown down.

At around 11.00am, Colonel Deane along with Elwes and other members of General's staff were ordered to lead the 58th up the hill, riding to their certain death against the Boer bullets.