_Week ending 10th February, 1900_
The pen-ultimate Sunday of our captivity was notable for nothing but the
average crop of rumours which had characterised every day of our Siege
existence. The listlessness of the people stood out in marked contrast
to their sanguine outlook when the Siege was young, and when the folly
of prophesying unless one knew remained not only, as it were, unsmoked
but outside our pipes altogether. Still--to pursue the metaphor--our
pretensions in the role of prophet had clearly ended in smoke. Happily,
the disillusioning fog had come upon us by degrees. The cheerfulness
with which we had resigned ourselves to bear the first-class
misdemeanant's treatment of a cut and dry "three weeks'" imprisonment
but exemplified, we had thought in all seriousness, the traditional
sporting instincts of our race; and though it was not over-pleasing to
our traditional pride, the destruction of our dogmas had not been taken
to heart. Our faith in the invincibility of the British army had long
continued unshaken. The interval between the expiry of the period (of
three weeks) which with the collective wisdom of all the wizards we had
decreed to be a synonym for the Siege's duration, and the morning of the
pronouncement relative to the advance of the Column from Orange River,
had had its tedium neutralised by a cheerful vituperation of
Gladstone's defective statesmanship in the year of 'eighty-one and his
wicked efforts at a later date to "give Ireland away too." The move from
Orange River had occasioned general rejoicings. Unaccountable delay
ensued. One disappointment was followed by another. Anxiety began to
manifest itself. The dire stage of doubt was reached. Hunger, thirst,
and horseflesh succeeded in due order; until at last we saw:--
What shadows we are,
And what shadows we pursue.
We pursued them no longer--in the Siege sense. "All the pleasing
illusions, which make power gentle and obedience liberal," were gone.
The eating and the drinking were gone. Even the surreptitious read in
bed was but a relic of joy; the penalty of burning the candle at both
ends was being paid. To have a bath was a crime; a little water was
allowed for tea and soup _only_. Soda-water was the sole product of the
lemonade factories; but the quality of Adam's ale tasted worse and was
more suggestive of typhoid in that form than in any other. Made into tea
it was better, until the Military, with fears for the nerves of the
"Military Situation," indirectly curbed our excesses in the cup that
does _not_ inebriate. A proclamation was issued which actually went so
far as to establish by "Law" the number of ounces of fuel to be used by
householders! Expert landladies declared the number (six ounces)
insufficient; the cynical boarders said it was _too much_! The medical
men had been entreating us--vainly, for the most part--to boil the water
before drinking it in any form, and had proclaimed it inimical to
health in its raw state. But the "Military Situation," bless you! could
not be compromised by microbes, and if extravagance in fuel involved a
possibility so awful it had to be crushed with an uncompromising hand.
Such were the anomalies prevailing; taken in conjunction with the
ever-increasing seriousness of our position they were hard to bear with
patience. Our hopes of relief were at _zero_. "Three months more" would
sum up a fair consensus of opinion in regard to the further continuance
of the Siege. Oh, it was said, the food would not last so long. But it
had been undergoing such a process of stretching; who knew how much
farther it would not be carried. The authorities were capable of
anything. A death or two (or twenty-two!) from starvation would not
soften hearts obsessed by an elusive "Situation." Surrender, however,
was out of the question; having gone so far we could not turn back. The
Flag, too, whatever the Standard-bearers might be, was worth keeping
aloft. Exacting too much it was; but there was no alternative, save
surrender, to the lowering of it.
Our mental machinery being thus rusted for want of the oil of
contentment it is not incomprehensible that the bulk of the people
should have come to regard the Siege as a thing interminable; and faith
in miracles was not the average citizen's predominant characteristic.
The mere mention of the Column provoked a jeer. Numerous philosophers
came into being. Shakespeare was never so highly appreciated, nor so
famous; never reckoned so "clever," nor quoted so generally; scarcely
heard of before, indeed, by some of the new philosophers. His Hamlet's
soliloquy (which accorded with our mood) was considered very good.
Monday came and went quietly enough, the enemy's attention being given
entirely to Kenilworth. It made no difference to us whether the cattle
lived or died; we regarded the assault as a waste of energy. A few
horses--the irony of it!--were slaughtered by the shells intended for
the oxen. The mutilation of the latter would have been far more
advantageous to the _Civil_ "Situation," and--how nice if the Boers had
been better shots!
Throughout Tuesday a good many interchanges took place between the rival
artillerists. Long Cecil made some excellent practice, while the Boers
occupied themselves with Beaconsfield. A few raps were attempted at the
_Sanatorium_ hall-door, as an intimation that a special eye ogled the
visitors; and some projectiles which fell in the rear of the Kimberley
Club indicated that the same vigilant optic was alive to the fact that
Rhodes lunched there. It may here be mentioned that Mr. Rhodes often
brought his lunch--fresh eggs and the like!--to the hospital to give to
some wounded soldier with unimpaired digestive mechanism. Otto's Kopje
was assailed during the day, and havoc was played with a few
trucks--rusted with ease--at the railway station.
The inevitable calm which precedes a storm was felt on Wednesday. The
morning passed quietly. Whispers of imminent woe were painfully common.
Rumour, subordinating love, ruled "the Court, the camp, the grove." It
was not literally defined, this surpassing evil; its exact nature was
locked up in the breasts of the Authorities. Hours rolled by;
dinner-time (the _time_ for dinner) passed; sufficient for the day is
the evil thereof; we were beginning to think that we had received the
day's allotment, when a boom rang through the startled air! Now, a boom
(in warfare) is not an harmonious note; but one gets accustomed to
discord as to most other things. It was not the boom that was strange;
it was the loud, unearthly chord it seemed to strike; the dread whiz
which followed; which blanched faces, and sent the timid housemaid
diving beneath the bed out of harm's way. Was it an earthquake?--the
buildings shook. A fearful crash dissipated the notion. A fearful crash,
indeed; but a material sound--a relief from its weird, unnerving
prelude. Individuals living miles apart asserted that the missile had
seemed to shoot past their ears. Yet one shell had caused all the
tumult. The awful whiz was repeated again and again. The great six-inch
gun from Mafeking had started its work of destruction. The crisis had
come. The last and bloodiest act of the tragedy had begun--with no
knowledge on our side that it _was_ the last, to sustain us.
It had come without warning; when the heat was insufferable, and the
town a veritable Sahara as regards facilities for quenching thirst; when
the tension was at its worst; when sickness, disease, and death were
busiest. It had come, in fine, with a crown for the sorrows of
Kimberley.
From an artist's point of view a town with high stone buildings would
have offered better raw material for picturesque ruins. In Kimberley we
had but one substantial building that would meet the necessities of the
case, viz., the City Hall. It was the only imposing structure we could
boast of, and was by consequence the harder to hit, albeit some
creditable tries were made to hit it. Large holes were dug in the Market
Square, in which process of grave-digging by storm a little girl was
injured--not by a shell, but by the volley of small pebbles it
displaced. This class of buckshot--apart from the missiles
themselves--did a good deal of light skirmishing about the calves of
people's legs, and threw dust in their eyes with the force and fury of a
"south-easter." One gentleman, meandering in the Square, narrowly evaded
dismemberment, and was fortunate in getting off with a slight bruise.
Another hissing monster went tearing through the roof of the Buffalo
Club, upsetting a billiard table, and laying it out a disordered heap of
firewood on the floor. Fire-wood was worth something; and since chips of
his anatomy were not in the heap--perchance to be utilised in the
cooking of horseflesh for somebody else to eat--its grateful proprietor
conducted himself with resignation.
Meanwhile the scattered fragments of the same mischievous projectile
careered gaily through the air. One piece--no bigger than a Siege
loaf--with sardonic humour embedded itself in the stomach of a horse and
killed it instantaneously. This was pitiful, for the animal had been
fed, and was in the very act of being shod. The smith escaped unhurt.
Another missile tested the metal of a boiler, in a house in Belgravia,
by smashing it into scrap-iron. Whether the shell was intended for a
batch of bread in the adjoining oven is uncertain; the satisfactory fact
remained that the bread was unbroken. Buildings which had been but
imperfectly ventilated by the smaller shells had proper port-holes made
in them, and chimney-tops went down like nine-pins. We were, in short,
in a couple of hours afforded a grim conception of what modern munitions
can do. To that extent the assault was instructive. But that extent was
small and did not impress our common sense--which, by the way, was
small, too, and not at all common.
At six o'clock the firing ceased, and the "Mafeking terror" was allowed
to cool. I might as well explain here that our surmise was entirely
wrong. The gun came from--nobody knew where; but everybody _said_, from
Mafeking. We said more; the Cape Government (the Bond Ministry) had
purchased it in England for the Transvaal, in furtherance, as was
implied, of the projected sweeping of the English into the sea. This was
a hugged delusion until some fool dispelled it by discovering the gun to
be a "_creuzot_" which had been purchased in _France_ by the Transvaal.
But it mattered little where it had been purchased; it was a tangible
reality, a presage of sanguinary import. It was a time for action; and
maybe the picks and shovels did not rise to the occasion! Fort-making
was the rage; the men worked with a will--the women acting as
hod-carriers--to make the graves in which they hoped to live as deep as
possible. All over the city the navvies--amateur and
professional--sweated and panted, so successfully that unless the shells
were to levy _direct_ taxation on the people in the forts, well, the
pieces might skim their heads but they could not cut them off. The
little garden patches were pitilessly disembowelled of the vegetable
seeds so recently planted. We had lived to see them grow, but up they
had to come lest we should be planted ourselves.
In the meantime our friend the enemy--more intimate and candid than
ever--appeared to be fully sensible of the havoc the new weapon was
capable of causing. All ears were strained to catch the first sound of
the Kamfers Dam monster. It was sighted at low range, and the boom,
whiz, and crash seemed to jumble all together. The comparative corks
with which we had been assailed hitherto used to shoot high into the
air, whistling several bars of music before touching _terra firma_, and
by careful attention to time it had been to some extent possible to
dodge them. So at least it was stated. The day waned, and the attack was
not renewed. It was suggested that perhaps the gun had "bust"; but the
straw was too thin to be worth catching at.
It was quite four o'clock in the afternoon ere the first shell hurtled
through the air. The heat in the open was suffocating, and the rush to
the underground atmosphere was not the less brisk on that account. A
constant assault was maintained for two hours. Shops, boarding houses,
and private dwellings were battered indiscriminately. A studio in
Dutoitspan Road was broken up; the Central Hotel was struck; and two
little children were slightly hurt. But the saddest incident of the day
was the death of a young man--an employee of the Standard Hotel--who was
struck down at his work mortally wounded. One or two persons had their
shins kicked by passing fragments. Numerous wonderful escapes were heard
of. What with the vibrations of the demoralising water-melons and their
hap-hazard propensities in the choice of victims, it is difficult even
vaguely to convey an idea of the test to which the mettle of the people
was put.
The bombardment was to have a dramatic termination, for the last heavy
projectile hurled into Kimberley landed in the capacious premises of
Cuthbert's Boot Store. Nobody was hit; but not many minutes had passed
when dense volumes of smoke followed by flames issued through the
windows--until at last the building had developed into a mighty bonfire.
What everybody long feared had at length happened. The excitement was
intense; hundreds of men, women, and children flocked to the burning
pile. The Fire Brigade used the hose for what it was worth; but to no
avail; the house was doomed, and finally was completely gutted. When the
blaze was at its height a few small shells fell amid the gesticulating
throng of sight-seers. A stampede followed; but nobody was struck,
_mirabile dictu_; and there was a general alternative run away and sneak
back as each missile exhausted itself.
There was an element of romance, more startling than the fire itself, in
all this. It was thought that the building (Abraham's Store) adjacent to
the one in flames was in grave danger, and the united exertions of the
firemen were ultimately directed to the task of saving it. Within its
hallowed walls was collected the bulk of our confiscated food! It had
been stored away by order of the Czar, and was guarded day and night by
a strong detachment of well-armed Cossacks. This circumstance lent, it
need hardly be said, a piquant and absorbing interest to the progress of
the blaze. It was of supreme importance--to the "Military" as well as
minor "Situations"--that the supplies should be preserved. What a
glowing page it would be in the war's history that the enemy three miles
away had compelled surrender by burning our provisions! For ourselves,
we got so little of the provisions to eat that we should not have been
particularly broken-hearted by the _contretemps_. Familiarity breeds
contempt, and we Were familiar with the "Military Situation"; its
exactions were so absurdly impalpable. It was natural, therefore, that
the activity of the Military should have provoked a certain amount of
chaff from the multitude of hungry civilians. The chaff went round,
anyhow, whether it was natural or not. Officers tripped over officers in
the wildest confusion, ordering, shouting, swearing, and directing the
shop-boys, the soldiers, and the Kafirs who toiled like demons to throw
the threatened foodstuffs into the street in an impossible space of
time. The men tumbled and staggered in clusters, while the advantages of
being a native unencumbered by the collars of our celestial civilisation
were conspicuously apparent. We had our eyes wide open for all possible
pickings; but so also had the rascally Cossacks. Only one gentleman (a
most respected citizen) got off with a case of--candles! Barrels of oil
were rolled into the streets (between files of soldiers, lest anyone
should roll a barrel home), to the indignant surprise of the people thus
afforded ocular demonstration of the extent to which the commandeering
mania had been carried; it was worse even than they had thought--which
is saving a great deal! When everything had been finally heaped outside,
steps were taken forthwith--to carry them _in_ again. All danger of
their ignition had long since vanished; and the mob dispersed in a wild
rush as the clock chimed nine.
What a day Friday was! Beginning at six in the morning the firing was
kept up unceasingly until night-fall. All day long the death-dealing
projectiles swept like a hurricane through the city, terrorising,
killing, lacerating, surpassing previous visitations by odds that were
long indeed. We had had sufficient evidence to judge of what the great
gun at Kamfers Dam _alone_ could do. But on Friday we were pelted from
all directions with a fury unknown hitherto. The first bulletin to send
a thrill of horror through the people--huddled away in holes--contained
intelligence of the deaths of a well-known lady and her infant child;
they had been struck down as they emerged from their shelter for a
breath of fresh air. In Woodly Street a huge missile went clean through
the roof of a house, shot past the heads of a lady and gentleman seated
on the stoep, fell on a soft patch in front of the door, and burst with
a deafening thud five feet under ground. With the aid of a pick and
shovel the fragments were exhumed and pieced together in the presence of
the pallid spectators; and had the next shell fallen on or near the same
spot (as sometimes happened) the results would have been more
calamitous. Many persons had an idea that they were safer in the streets
than in houses where the additional danger of flying furniture was ever
present. Several exciting escapes were witnessed in the Market Square,
and shells fell thickly in the vicinity of the fire station. A telephone
pole had a semi-lunar lump neatly cut out by a passing missile. With
undiminished fury the bombardment proceeded, battering down walls and
gables, and filling hearts with a desire, a longing for vengeance, to be
duly indulged when the fates were propitious.
It was growing late on this tragic Friday when a profound sensation was
caused by a rumour which excited universal awe. George Labram had been
killed by a shell at the Grand Hotel. It sounded incredible, so
improbable and astounding, that he of all others, he who had achieved
greatness in adverse circumstances by constructing a large gun, the
famous Long Cecil--that he should be a victim. Labram dead! Was it a
fabrication? Alas! no; it was true; a sad, a lurid incident, hardly
needed to mark the day memorable. There was a pathetic strangeness in
the fatality that gave rise to philosophic reflections.
Emboldened by a conviction that we should presently be glad to
supplicate for food and quarter, the enemy relaxed not their energy. It
must not be supposed that our guns were idle all this time. Long Cecil
plied pluckily to hit back, and succeeded in frustrating the ambitious
efforts of the Boers to draw their guns still nearer. They were rather
too close as things were, however, and with the aid of the Maxims we
successfully besought the enemy to fling away ambition. To that limited
extent we defeated Boer designs. Lord Methuen's sympathetic coughs in
the bed of the Orange River were heard at intervals throughout the day,
the long, enervating day which did terminate at last. Worn out by its
trials though we were, sleep was not easily coaxed to weigh our eyelids
down; like other "necessaries," it was rare indeed.
Contrary to expectation, the ferocious assault was not resumed on
Saturday morning. It was a blessed interlude, too; there was so much to
whistle about with unbated breath. The prejudice against the Boers and
the arrogant gentlemen who led and fed us was at its fiercest. How was
it all going to end? A feeling of desperation, engendered by the
sufferings of their families, permeated men's hearts and filled them
with a readiness to dare much, to sacrifice a great deal. The situation
was critical, and many a reckless plan to ease it emanated from minds
normally prudent. The outcry against the Military rose to a high pitch;
the air was reeking with denunciations _apropos_ of their culpability
for--things in general. Their manipulation of the victuals, as I have
endeavoured to show, did not pre-possess many in their favour, and fresh
complaints in this connection were constantly forthcoming. Information
was being suppressed, we cried; our actual condition and circumstances
were being misrepresented; the notoriety of individuals was being
purchased at the expense of the "greater number!" Of course, these
charges had been in the air for a long while; but after Friday they,
though still much in the air, matured in intensity. Dissatisfaction was
expressed on all sides. We--some of us--were willing to admit the
necessity of Martial Law, its rigours, severity, and discipline; but it
was too much to expect us to stand mutely by while the Military gabbled
of the "Military Situation," and (as we suspected) inwardly built
temples of fame in the air, in which they would merit a prominent niche
when, say, half a year had passed; when the last horse-chop had frizzled
on the pan; and when incidentally numbers had been killed, maimed, or
starved!
The clamour developed. No fuel was needed to feed the spreading flame of
resentment. None was needed, but it was supplied all the same--and from
a most unexpected quarter, namely, the _Diamond Fields' Advertiser_! It
was a startling _denouement_. The chains that bound the "mighty engine"
were burst asunder. The spell of militarism was broken; the people's
paper was itself again, and the people took it to their hearts as the
champion of their rights and privileges. Its leading article on Saturday
summarised the situation in a nutshell. It is too good to pass.
Commenting on the version of our sorrows supplied by signal, the sturdy
organ in a manner after our own hearts let flow the following deluge of
consoling truths:--
"... What are the facts? We have stood a Siege which is rapidly
approaching the duration of the Siege of Paris; we have practically
defended ourselves with citizen soldiers; for, thankful as we are to
the Imperial garrison, their numbers have condemned them to play a
secondary role; we have raised a large body of mounted troops, who
have on two occasions attacked the enemy's strongholds with the most
magnificent gallantry; and through the genius of Mr. Labram--whose
tragic death yesterday has sent a thrill of sorrow through the whole
community--we have been able not merely to supply ammunition for the
pop-guns sent to Kimberley, but also to produce in our workshops the
only weapon capable of minimising the terrible havoc and destruction
caused by the enemy's six-inch gun, throwing a projectile weighing
100 pounds broadcast over the town at range of three miles. They
shout to us, 'Have patience!' Will they remember that we have fought
alone and unaided for four long months? Will they remember that we
are situated practically in the centre of a desert, 600 miles from
the coast, and have been compelled from the beginning to depend on
our own resources, and that our lives are daily and hourly exposed
to danger? Is it unreasonable, when our women and children are being
slaughtered and our buildings fired, to expect something better than
that a large British army should remain inactive in the presence of
eight or ten thousand peasant soldiers? Surely the time has come to
put in plain English the plain truths of the situation. We have been
influenced in the past by various considerations, notably a desire
to avoid compromising what is called the 'Military Situation.' We
have now come to the conclusion that respect for the 'Military
Situation' merely means deceiving our own people. The Press
correspondents cabling to the London papers are actually not
permitted to mention that Kimberley has been bombarded by a six-inch
gun! This is indeed the last straw, and if only for the sake of
future record we take this opportunity of placing the naked truth
before our readers."
Lively indeed was the satisfaction which greeted this unexpected change
of policy. But there was little time for jubilation, for after breakfast
the shells came whistling through the air. They were delivered in a
desultory fashion, and in the afternoon at still less frequent
intervals. Happily, little damage was done and firing ceased at sunset.
It was over for the week; the prospective respite of thirty-six hours
was a pleasing thought; the morrow would be Sunday, and Sunday was
sacred. Precedent and our sense of the fitness of things alike justified
the assumption. But it did not occur to us that the chimes of midnight
were yet many hours off, nor that from eight o'clock to twelve the
unkindest cut of all was to be administered.
There was something terribly unearthly in the sound of the whizzing
destroyers as they careered across the houses in the blackness of the
silent night. This was the hardest strain of all, and more trying to the
nerves than anything they had to endure in the clear light of day. It
was a never-to-be forgotten ordeal in the lives of the good folk of
Kimberley. From his high and dangerous perch on the conning tower the
bugler ever and anon blew his bugle, suggesting to the scared housemaid
the psychological moment for a plunge beneath the bed. On each
application of the fuse to Long Tom the bugle rang out in clarion tones
its warning to seek cover. It made plaintive melody in the nocturnal
stillness, bespeaking the death-knell perchance of many. Nobody was
abroad, excepting a solemn procession of men wending its way to the
cemetery with all that was mortal of George Labram. Cannon in front of
them volleyed and thundered--to avoid which the late hour had been
chosen for the burial.
Thus closed the long and dreadful week. Over-wrought women and children
emerged from their sodden refuges to court a long-deferred rest, if they
might, for after the events of the night anything might happen. Who was
to tell what the morning might not show?