Isegoria

The diary of Florentia Sale, wife of General Robert Sale, demonstrates a remarkably Victorian brand of feminism, during the First Anglo-Afghan War:

November 23 was an important day in which the already weakened garrison sustained heavy casualties in a series of engagements around a hill near the British cantonments. Lady Sale meticulously describes the order of battle, equipment, and formations of the committed forces along with a general narrative of events, thus providing a very thorough debriefing for her reading audience. She also explains how she was able to witness the battle:

I had taken up my post of observation, as usual, on the top of the house, whence I had a fine view of the field of action, and where, by keeping behind the chimneys, I escaped the bullets that continually whizzed past me.

A bit later, she recounts the climax of the morning actions when the Afghans and British collided over the possession of a light artillery piece that the British had brought along to the battle:

It was very like the scenes depicted in the battles of the Crusaders. The enemy rushed on: drove our men before them very like a flock of sheep with a wolf at their heels. They captured our gun. The artillerymen fought like heroes; two were killed at the gun; Sergeant Mulhall received three wounds; poor Laing was shot while waving his sword over the gun and cheering the men. It was an anxious sight, and made our hearts beat: it lasted but for a few minutes.

Shortly after this the British counter attacked, the Afghans retreated, and the fighting died down. Lady Sale thus decided it was time to get on with more important things:

All appearing to be over, I hastened home to get breakfast ready for Sturt, every one supposing that the enemy were routed and that Brigadier Shelton was coming back with the troops.

I want to make this imagery clear for the reader. In the small hours of morning, Lady Sale climbs to the roof of her house so she can watch as the British and Indian troops march out to claim a nearby hill that the enemy had been demonstrating upon in the days prior. Over the next several hours, using her chimney as cover from the occasional stray bullet, she watched hundreds of men die — some of whom were her acquaintances — while vividly recording the flow of the battle and the circumstances of the casualties. When the action begins to die down, she goes downstairs to make breakfast for her son-in-law, who was recovering from a major injury sustained in an assassination attempt.

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