And so it has come. The Breaker and Handcock have dozed off a little here and there through the night, always waking with a start as the realisation hits them anew – they are about to be shot dead at dawn, and the only thing that still protects them is that very darkness. That dull lustre in the east spells their doom, and now it has come they are hit as never before by the very bleakness of their situation, as the shocking realisation comes that the end of the road is nigh, and there is nothing that can be done.

It means that, just after footsteps ring out on the stone floor with the first streaks of dawn, the warder who has come to get them finds, as he opens the cell door, the Breaker quietly weeping while Handcock sits glumly.

Nevertheless, within less than a minute, Morant goes from open misery to extraordinary sang-froid. If these are to be his last minutes on life’s stage, let him, one more time for the road, put on a good show as his final audience gathers.

‘Are you ready?’ the warder asks.
‘Yes,’ the Breaker replies, having composed himself. ‘Where is your shooting party?’
Not far away.
By the riiiiight . . . quick march!

The tramp of boots on prison floors echoes down the corridor and off the stone walls as the condemned traipse outside. But as they go, Breaker pauses at the sight of someone he did not expect, the adjutant of Major Lenehan, one Lieutenant James Edwards.

‘Remember the Boers mutilated my friend Hunt,’ Morant instructs him as he passes. ‘I shot those who did it. We had our orders; I only obeyed them when Hunt was murdered. I did it. Witton and Picton had nothing to do with it; I told them so at the court-martial.’

Edwards nods in acknowledgement but the Breaker does not slow his stride. He can keep Edwards waiting, but not Death. Seeing the Cameron Highlanders for the first time, the Breaker hails them heartily. Good morning, gentlemen! It is a greeting that chills with its cheerfulness, and none will forget the gallantry of this man they are about to shoot. Say what you like about the Breaker, he knows how to die with panache.

And here now are the two chairs by the wall, some 20 yards in front of the Scots. Without hesitation, or reservation, the two men hold hands as they walk towards the chairs. It is a strangely intimate thing to know you are about to have your life ended within a split instant of each other, and holding hands somehow gives a shred of comfort.

Taking their place on the chairs – Morant on the right, Handcock on the left, as the squad faces them – the Sergeant begins to place blindfolds on both men, but the Breaker won’t have it.
‘Take this thing off,’ the Breaker barks, and his wish is immediately observed. Morant rubs the lucky penny hung about his neck for the last time, the talisman has failed him but the habit remains. And speaking of habits . . .
The other tradition of a last cigarette?

Of course. With great elan, Morant takes out his cigarette case from the inside pocket of his service jacket, removes a thin white stick, lights it, and makes a gift of his case to Major Souter with a cheery, ‘I shan’t be smoking any more of these!’

Dragging deeply on the cigarette several times, he now flicks it away with a practised flourish, to lie and smoke offended on the stones – though it is every chance to still have life in it longer than the man who just threw it.
Let us get on with this. Bring on your guns.
Crossing his arms, he stares straight at his executioners, as they stare nervously back at him.
(It is one thing to shoot a man in the hurly-burly of battle. And quite another to do it cold-bloodedly, like this.)
There is a moment’s pregnant pause. And now the order. ‘Firing party … aim.’
Now it is Major Thomas Souter who hesitates, but again the Breaker won’t have it, knowing he must break this impasse measured in microseconds. Still the firing party stare, clearly hesitant to follow each command, fearful of what they are about to do. Obviously, they need some encouragement.
‘If you don’t fire,’ Morant calls out mockingly, ‘I will look down the barrels of your rifles for the bullets!’
They squint down their barrels, aghast.
‘Shoot straight, you bastards!’ the Breaker orders. ‘Don’t make a mess of it!’
Another pause, and now one word is spoken softly but intensely: ‘Fire!’
The volley of shots echoes off the prison walls and instantly angry splotches of red appear on their chests and they slump backward.
‘Morant,’ John Morrow will recount, ‘got all in the left side, and died at once. With his arms folded and his eyes open you would have thought he was alive.’

At Pretoria railway station, just 500 yards away, George Witton hears the shots in the distance and shudders. It seems impossible to believe that they are gone. ‘I distinctly heard in the clear morning air the report of the volley of the firing party,’ he will recall, ‘the death knell of my late comrades, and I knew they had gone to that bourne from whence no traveller returns. So went out two brave and fearless soldiers, men that the Empire could ill afford to lose.’

This is an edited extract from Breaker Morant by Peter FitzSimons, published by Hachette Australia and available now through QBD (https://www.qbd.com.au/breaker-morant/peter-fitzsimons/9780733641305/).