As day dawned we could see that we had gained a footing in the town which was the immediate object of General Macdonald’s attack previous to the assault on the jong itself. What had happened was this: The Tibetans had opened an unexpectedly heavy fire before the assaulting columns could get close up under the walls of the outlying parts of the town, and our three columns were reorganized into two—that on the right under Colonel Campbell, of the 40th Pathans, a tried and experienced frontier officer, and that on the left under Major Murray, 8th Gurkhas. With Colonel Campbell was Captain Sheppard, R.E., who, with that dash and effectiveness which always characterized him, succeeded in laying and firing a charge under the walls of the most strongly held house, and blowing in it a breach, which, with the damage done by the fire of the 7-pounder gun, gave an opening for the assaulting column. On the left Lieutenants Gurdon and Burney also succeeded in blowing breaches in the walls of the houses; but, to the grief of all, Gurdon was killed—it is believed by the falling debris of the very wall which he had blown up. He had been with the Mission escort from the very first, and in many of these very dangerous assaults on villages had displayed most daring courage. He was a brother of the Captain (now Lieutenant-Colonel) Gurdon who had so distinguished himself in the Siege of Chitral, and who was one of my closest friends. When the news came in to me from the front, I felt how sad indeed it was that one so young and so full of promise, with a great and useful career most certainly before him, should have been thus in an instant cut off. But he did not fall in vain, for what he had done at the cost of his life enabled the assaulting columns to enter the town, which by 7 a.m. was in our possession.
The troops began to make good their position in the area thus won, but the real business had yet to be accomplished. The jong, with 5,000 or 6,000 Tibetans inside it, still had to be assaulted. During the morning there was a general lull in the proceedings while the troops rested. But about two o’clock Colonel Campbell, who was in command of all the advanced troops in the town, sent back word to General Macdonald, who was in the Palla village, recommending that an assault should be made on the extreme east of the jong. To him in his advanced position, immediately under the walls of the jong, it appeared that if our guns could make a breach in the wall itself an assault could be made, though the storming party would have a stiff, hazardous climb over the steepest part of the rock. General Macdonald adopted the proposal, and as the Tibetans now appeared somewhat exhausted, ordered the assault to be made at once.