DASSPOORT,
OUTSIDE PRETORIA.
_Tuesday, July 31st._
"Good morning! Have you used Pears' soap?" No, nor any other for about a
fortnight, but in a few minutes I am going to have a most luxurious
shave and bath in a tin teacup. As you can see by the above, we are all
back at this historic town again after a very warm fortnight of marching
and fighting under General Mahon. We marched through the town past
Roberts yesterday, and are now camped awaiting remounts, in order to
proceed with the game in some other and unknown direction. I have not
much time for correspondence, but will do my best to give a little
sketch of some of our doings. To begin with, on Saturday, July 14th, the
remnants of the Dorset, Devon, Somerset and Sussex Yeomanry were formed
into a composite squadron[3] of three troops under Captain Sir Elliot
Lees, M.P., and served with fresh mounts--Argentines. Of course, I got a
lovely beast, a black horse, which would not permit anyone to place a
bit in his mouth under any circumstances. It generally takes our
sergeant-major, farrier-sergeant, an officer's groom, a corporal and
myself about an hour to get the aforesaid bit properly fixed. When I try
to fix it myself with the assistance of a comrade, the performance
usually concludes by tying him to a wheel of our ox waggon, and then,
after many struggles, I manage to achieve my object all sublime (though
there is not much sublimity about it). Not wanting opprobrious epithets,
my steed remained nameless for the first week. I casually thought of
calling him "Black Bess," but "he" is not a mare, and I thought it
would be inappropriate. At length I struck what I consider a good name.
_Bete Noire_, my _bete noire_, and so I called him, and as he is by no
means averse to eating through his head rope when picketed, I find that
the curtailment to "gnaw" is satisfactory enough as far as names go. Now
you know something about my friend the horse, so to proceed. We moved
out of our old camp on the Saturday afternoon in question, through
Pretoria to another on the other side, where we joined General Mahon's
crowd, amongst whom was the Imperial Light Horse, Australians, Lumsden's
Horse, New Zealanders, "M" Battery R.H.A., and a squadron or so of the
18th Hussars, sometimes known as "Kruger's Own," being the captured
warriors of Elandslaagte. On Sunday we had some good luck in the ration
line, the 72nd and 79th Squadrons of I.Y., the Roughriders, had just
come up and joined us, and had been served with innumerable delicacies,
with which they did not know what to do, as they had orders that they
could only take a certain quantity with them. No sooner did we hear of
their embarrassment than, as the wolf swept down on the fold, we swept
down upon them, and most sympathetically relieved them of tins of
condensed milk, jams, and such like, and what we could not eat we
managed to carry away with us for another day. On Monday our general
advance commenced. It was a grand sight, after marching a few miles, to
come on French's camp and see the lancers, mounted infantry and guns
moving out in the early morning. A few miles on and our friend the enemy
opened fire on us, or, rather, on a kopje on which we had just placed a
4.7. They sent a beautiful shot from their "Long Tom," which pitched
within a few yards of where the gun had just been placed and close by
Generals French and Mahon. We Mounted Infantry remained behind the kopje
and dozed and lunched while desultory shells now and again whizzed over
us. Beyond this, nothing occurred worth mentioning. On Tuesday morning
we went out a few miles and took up a position to prevent the Boers
retreating in our direction. We had to collect stones and form miniature
sangars. We waited there nearly all day, during which I perused "In
Memoriam," and posed for a libellous sketch done by our troop officer,
entitled "An Alert Vedette." The laughter which this occasioned caused
me to arise out of curiosity and ask to see the pictorial effort. The
subject represented was a tramp-like being asleep behind three or four
little stones. We returned in the evening to our camp and I had charge
of the stable guard, an every three or four night occurrence. The next
day--Wednesday, the 18th--we proceeded some miles further on, getting
well into the bush country. I do not know the name of the place we
halted at for the night; it was very picturesque but had far too many
kopjes (which required picketing). The next day we were off again
through the bush. _Apropos_ of the bush, it appears to me that every
tree and shrub in this land of promise produces thorns. On Friday, the
20th, we came in touch with the enemy. We were advancing in extended
order towards an innocent-looking kopje, had got close up to it, and
had just dismounted, when--rap! went a Mauser. Then another, and rap,
rap, rap, rap, rap, rap, and the whole show started. As there was
absolutely no cover to hand, we got the order to mount and clear, which
order was very promptly executed by all save one. The reports of the
Mausers and the whistling buzz of the bullets startled my noble steed,
_Bete Noire_, and after several ineffectual efforts to mount the brute,
he broke away from me, and I, tripping over a mound as the reins slipped
out of my hands, fell sprawling on my face. This, I believe, caused some
of our fellows to think I was hit. Of course, after hurling a choice
malediction after my horse, I was quickly on my feet and doubling after
the rest of the "Boys of the Bulldog Breed." An officer of the Dorsets,
Captain Kinderslie, seeing my plight, rode up amid the whistling bullets
and insisted on my holding his hand and running by the side of his
horse, till we came to Sergeant-Major Hunt, who had caught and was
holding _Bete Noire_. Naturally, the reins were entangled in his
forelegs, but I soon got them clear and mounted. Away flew my beautiful
Argentine, away like the wind, every whistling, buzzing bullet seeming
to help increase his bounds. At last we all got out of range, re-formed,
dismounted, and advanced to attack. Soon the order was changed, and we
mounted again and rode to flank the Boers, who had apparently left their
first position. We reached a neighbouring kopje and halted at the base.
An officer rode up, and I overheard him say that it would be advisable
to send a few men in such and such a direction to find out, _with as
small a loss as possible_, the position and strength of the enemy. Here
it may not be out of place to mention that acting as scouts and advance
parties, and drawing the fire of the enemy, has been the vocation of the
Imperial Yeomanry, also of the Colonial Mounted Troops. Then four of us
were ordered to ride slowly up the kopje, which was a wooded and very
rocky one, and find out if any of the enemy were there. This we did. It
is a peculiar feeling, not devoid of excitement, doing this sort of
thing, for our horses made much noise and very slow progress over the
boulders and rocks, and the possibility of a Brother Boer being behind
any of the stones in front of one with a gun, of course made one
reflect on the utter impossibility of shooting him or his friends, or of
beating a retreat. Still, the knowledge that the report of his Mauser
would warn one's comrades below was eminently satisfactory. There were
no Boers there, or I should hardly be inditing this letter. They had
built sangars and left them. We were posted on this kopje for the rest
of the day, and at night upon another.
[Footnote 3: From the first the mixture of cavalry and
infantry terms used in connection with the I.Y. has been most
amusing. As our officers from this date invariably referred
to us in cavalry terms, the words "squadron," "troop," etc.,
will be used to the end of the volume.]
[Illustration: "Stable Guard! There's a horse loose!"]
Our artillery had shelled them during the afternoon, and they did not
trouble us again. That night we were not allowed to have any fires and
our position being inaccessible to the waggons, we had no hot coffee or
tea, which by the way, is one, if not the greatest, of our treats--our
milkless and occasionally sugarless evening and morning coffee or tea.
On Saturday we advanced with the main body through a good deal of bush
country. Sunday was one of the hardest days we had during our little
fortnight's outing. We started early as advance to Ian Hamilton's
Division, and during the day covered a terrific amount of ground, got
well peppered on several occasions, once, during the afternoon, pushing
on rather too close to the enemy, the retreating Boers gave us some warm
rifle fire and then opened on us with a couple of field guns, and we had
to clear. The firing was excellent. A few of us got into a bunch, and a
shell whirred over our heads and struck the ground only a few yards away
on our right. That day several men were killed and wounded, but none of
our crowd, though one got a bullet in his rear pack, another had his
bandolier struck, and another his hand grazed. The annoying part of our
work was that we were repeatedly sniped at, but never had a chance to
retaliate, even when we saw the enemy, as we did on several occasions.
Certainly once we prepared a pretty little surprise for them in the way
of an ambush formed of our troop dismounted, but they did not come.
However, two or three of our fellows saw somebody by a Kaffir kraal, and
thinking it was a Boer, opened fire, and whoever it was dropped. It
proved only Kaffirs were there, and two men in our troop are still
quarrelling as to which bagged the inoffensive nigger, if bagged he was.
Monday, the eighth day out, the entire force rested, which means in
plain English that they washed, mended their clothes and performed
other domestic duties. Like the man in "The Mikado," I am a thing of
shreds and patches, though there is not much dreamy lullaby for me,
or any of us. The next day we marched on without opposition to
Bronkhorst Spruit, of fateful memory. We reached there at mid-day,
and camped, as we had to wait for our convoy to come up. As soon as
we had got our lines down we went to get wood--we like to have our
own fires when we can. Corrugated iron buildings there were, but
untenanted. Bronkhorst Spruit, of hated memory, was a deserted
village. Smash!--bang!--crash!--crack! "Far flashed the red
artillery," aye? No, it is merely Mr. Thomas Atkins and his brethren
of the Colonies and Imperial Yeomanry, who are overcoming
difficulties in the wood fatigue line. Considering that the average
Transvaal house is constructed with wood and corrugated iron, it can
be easily understood that neither its erection or demolition takes
much time. "So mind yer eye, there--crash!--bang! That door belongs
to the Sussex! Smash! Look out, the roof's coming down," etc.
The convoy came in during the night, so we were up and off at an early
hour, bound for Balmoral, the next station on the line towards
Middelburg. The country we had to traverse was very rough, and on our
left were ranges of suspicious-looking kopjes. Soon after we started my
horse funked a narrow dyke at about half-a-dozen places, and finally, on
my insisting and exhorting him with my one remaining spur, plunged
sideways in at the deepest part. He came out first, soaked. I followed
promptly, wet to the waist (nice black water and mud); his oats and my
day's biscuits, which were in his nosebag, were spoilt; and my feelings
towards him none of the best. Balmoral was reached at about noon. There,
I regret to state, we did not have Queen's weather. Soon after we
arrived clouds began to gather, and thoughtful men commenced carrying up
sheets of corrugated iron, of which there was a great quantity near the
station, and hastily constructing temporary shelters. Ours was a poor
concern, and as I had to wander about in the rain some time before I
turned in, I was sopping wet, and of course passed the night so. Our
waggon got stuck in a drift, as usual, and so we went coffee-less that
night. The next day we heard that during the night an officer and three
men of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders had died from exposure to
the severe weather. On that march from Bronkhorst Spruit to Balmoral we
lost hundreds of mules, oxen and horses. They simply strewed the
roadsides all the way. On Friday, the 27th, we returned to Bronkhorst
Spruit, _en route_ for Pretoria. Leaving Bronkhorst Spruit for
Pienaarspoort the next morning, we passed the graves of the massacred
94th (Connaught Rangers). First we passed three walled-in enclosures,
which the officers rode up to and looked over. They were the graves of
the rear guard. Then we came to a larger one, which contained the main
body. The Connaughts were marching with us; whatever their feelings
were, they must have felt a grim satisfaction in the knowledge that
"they came again." Yesterday (Monday, July 30th,) we marched into
Pretoria, past Lord Roberts, and on through the town to our present
camp, which we leave at four to-morrow morning with fresh horses. We
heard as we went through that one of our Sussex fellows, who was down
with enteric when we left, had since succumbed. Poor fellow! It may be
merely sentiment, but I must say the idea of being buried out here is
somewhat repugnant to me. His bereaved relatives and friends cannot have
the comforting feelings of Tennyson, expressed "In Memoriam."
"'Tis well; 'tis something; we may stand
Where he in English earth is laid,
And from his ashes may be made
The violet of his native land.
'Tis little; but it looks in truth
As if the quiet bones were blest
Among familiar names to rest,
And in the places of his youth."