IN AFRIKANDER BONDS
Pretoria: December 3rd, 1899.
It was, as nearly as I can remember, midday when the train-load of
prisoners reached Pretoria. We pulled up in a sort of siding with an
earth platform on the right side which opened into the streets of the
town. The day was fine, and the sun shone brightly. There was a
considerable crowd of people to receive us; ugly women with bright
parasols, loafers and ragamuffins, fat burghers too heavy to ride at the
front, and a long line of untidy, white-helmeted policemen--'zarps' as
they were called--who looked like broken-down constabulary. Someone
opened--unlocked, that is, the point--the door of the railway carriage
and told us to come out; and out we came--a very ragged and tattered
group of officers--and waited under the sun blaze and the gloating of
many eyes. About a dozen cameras were clicking busily, establishing an
imperishable record of our shame. Then they loosed the men and bade them
form in rank. The soldiers came out of the dark vans, in which they had
been confined, with some eagerness, and began at once to chirp and joke,
which seemed to me most ill-timed good humour. We waited altogether for
about twenty minutes. Now for the first time since my capture I hated
the enemy. The simple, valiant burghers at the front, fighting bravely
as they had been told 'for their farms,' claimed respect, if not
sympathy. But here in Pretoria all was petty and contemptible. Slimy,
sleek officials of all nationalities--the red-faced, snub-nosed
Hollander, the oily Portuguese half-caste--thrust or wormed their way
through the crowd to look. I seemed to smell corruption in the air. Here
were the creatures who had fattened on the spoils. There in the field
were the heroes who won them. Tammany Hall was defended by the
Ironsides.
From these reflections I was recalled by a hand on my shoulder. A
lanky, unshaven police sergeant grasped my arm. 'You are not an
officer,' he said; 'you go this way with the common soldiers,' and he
led me across the open space to where the men were formed in a column of
fours. The crowd grinned: the cameras clicked again. I fell in with the
soldiers and seized the opportunity to tell them not to laugh or smile,
but to appear serious men who cared for the cause they fought for; and
when I saw how readily they took the hint, and what influence I
possessed with them, it seemed to me that perhaps with two thousand
prisoners something some day might be done. But presently a superior
official--superior in rank alone, for in other respects he looked a
miserable creature--came up and led me back to the officers. At last,
when the crowd had thoroughly satisfied their patriotic curiosity, we
were marched off; the soldiers to the enclosed camp on the racecourse,
the officers to the States Model Schools prison.
The distance was short, so far as we were concerned, and surrounded by
an escort of three armed policemen to each officer, we swiftly traversed
two sandy avenues with detached houses on either hand, and reached our
destination. We turned a corner; on the other side of the road stood a
long, low, red brick building with a slated verandah and a row of iron
railings before it. The verandah was crowded with bearded men in _khaki_
uniforms or brown suits of flannel--smoking, reading, or talking. They
looked up as we arrived. The iron gate was opened, and passing in we
joined sixty British officers 'held by the enemy;' and the iron gate was
then shut again.
'Hullo! How are you? Where did they catch you? What's the latest news of
Buller's advance? Are we going to be exchanged?' and a dozen other
questions were asked. It was the sort of reception accorded to a new boy
at a private school, or, as it seemed to me, to a new arrival in hell.
But after we had satisfied our friends in as much as we could,
suggestions of baths, clothes, and luncheon were made which were very
welcome. So we settled down to what promised to be a long and weary
waiting.
The States Model Schools is a one-storied building of considerable size
and solid structure, which occupies a corner formed by two roads through
Pretoria. It consists of twelve large class-rooms, seven or eight of
which were used by the British officers as dormitories and one as a
dining-room; a large lecture-hall, which served as an improvised
fives-court; and a well-fitted gymnasium. It stood in a quadrangular
playground about one hundred and twenty yards square, in which were a
dozen tents for the police guards, a cookhouse, two tents for the
soldier servants, and a newly set-up bath-shed. I do not know how the
arrival of other prisoners may have modified these arrangements, but at
the time of my coming into the prison, there was room enough for
everyone.
The Transvaal Government provided a daily ration of bully beef and
groceries, and the prisoners were allowed to purchase from the local
storekeeper, a Mr. Boshof, practically everything they cared to order,
except alcoholic liquors. During the first week of my detention we
requested that this last prohibition might be withdrawn, and after
profound reflection and much doubtings, the President consented to
countenance the buying of bottled beer. Until this concession was
obtained our liquid refreshment would have satisfied the most immoderate
advocate of temperance, and the only relief was found when the Secretary
of State for War, a kind-hearted Portuguese, would smuggle in a bottle
of whiskey hidden in his tail-coat pocket or amid a basket of fruit. A
very energetic and clever young officer of the Dublin Fusiliers,
Lieutenant Grimshaw, undertook the task of managing the mess, and when
he was assisted by another subaltern--Lieutenant Southey, of the Royal
Irish Fusiliers--this became an exceedingly well-conducted concern. In
spite of the high prices prevailing in Pretoria--prices which were
certainly not lowered for our benefit--the somewhat meagre rations which
the Government allowed were supplemented, until we lived, for three
shillings a day, quite as well as any regiment on service.
On arrival, every officer was given a new suit of clothes, bedding,
towels, and toilet necessaries, and the indispensable Mr, Boshof was
prepared to add to this wardrobe whatever might be required on payment
either in money or by a cheque on Messrs. Cox & Co., whose accommodating
fame had spread even to this distant hostile town. I took an early
opportunity to buy a suit of tweeds of a dark neutral colour, and as
unlike the suits of clothes issued by the Government as possible. I
would also have purchased a hat, but another officer told me that he had
asked for one and had been refused. After all, what use could I find for
a hat, when there were plenty of helmets to spare if I wanted to Walk in
the courtyard? And yet my taste ran towards a slouch hat.
The case of the soldiers was less comfortable than ours. Their rations
were very scanty: only one pound of bully beef once a week and two
pounds of bread; the rest was made up with mealies, potatoes, and
such-like--and not very much of them. Moreover, since they had no
money of their own, and since prisoners of war received no pay, they
were unable to buy even so much as a pound of tobacco. In consequence
they complained a good deal, and were, I think, sufficiently
discontented to require nothing but leading to make them rise against
their guards.
The custody and regulating of the officers were entrusted to a board of
management, four of whose members visited us frequently and listened to
any complaints or requests. M. de Souza, the Secretary of War, was
perhaps the most friendly and obliging of these, and I think we owed
most of the indulgences to his representations. He was a far-seeing
little man who had travelled to Europe, and had a very clear conception
of the relative strengths of Britain and the Transvaal. He enjoyed a
lucrative and influential position under the Government, and was
therefore devoted to its interests, but he was nevertheless suspected by
the Inner Ring of Hollanders and the Relations of the President of
having some sympathy for the British. He had therefore to be very
careful. Commandant Opperman, who was directly responsible for our safe
custody, was in times of peace a Landrost or Justice. He was too fat to
go and fight, but he was an honest and patriotic Boer, who would have
gladly taken an active part in the war. He firmly believed that the
Republics would win, and when, as sometimes happened, bad news reached
Pretoria, Opperman looked a picture of misery, and would come to us and
speak of his resolve to shoot his wife and children and perish in the
defence of the capital. Dr. Gunning was an amiable little Hollander,
fat, rubicund, and well educated. He was a keen politician, and much
attached to the Boer Government, which paid him an excellent salary for
looking after the State Museum. He had a wonderful collection of postage
stamps, and was also engaged in forming a Zoological Garden. This last
ambition had just before the war led him into most serious trouble, for
he was unable to resist the lion which Mr. Rhodes had offered him. He
confided to me that the President had spoken 'most harshly' to him in
consequence, and had peremptorily ordered the immediate return of the
beast under threats of instant dismissal. Gunning said that he could not
have borne such treatment, but that after all a man must live. My
private impression is that he will acquiesce in any political settlement
which leaves him to enlarge his museum undisturbed. But whether the
Transvaal will be able to indulge in such luxuries, after blowing up
many of other people's railway bridges, is a question which I cannot
answer.
The fourth member of the Board, Mr. Malan, was a foul and objectionable
brute. His personal courage was better suited to insulting the prisoners
in Pretoria than to fighting the enemy at the front. He was closely
related to the President, but not even this advantage could altogether
protect him from taunts of cowardice, which were made even in the
Executive Council, and somehow filtered down to us. On one occasion he
favoured me with some of his impertinence; but I reminded him that in
war either side may win, and asked whether he was wise to place himself
in a separate category as regards behaviour to the prisoners. 'Because,'
quoth I, 'it might be so convenient to the British Government to be able
to make one or two examples.' He was a great gross man, and his colour
came and went on a large over-fed face; so that his uneasiness was
obvious. He never came near me again, but some days later the news of a
Boer success arrived, and on the strength of this he came to the prison
and abused a subaltern in the Dublin Fusiliers, telling him that he was
no gentleman, and other things which it is not right to say to a
prisoner. The subaltern happens to be exceedingly handy with his fists,
so that after the war is over Mr. Malan is going to get his head punched
quite independently of the general settlement.
Although, as I have frequently stated, there were no legitimate grounds
of complaint against the treatment of British regular officers while
prisoners of war, the days I passed at Pretoria were the most monotonous
and among the most miserable of my life. Early in the sultry mornings,
for the heat at this season of the year was great, the soldier
servants--prisoners like ourselves--would bring us a cup of coffee, and
sitting up in bed we began to smoke the cigarettes and cigars of another
idle, aimless day. Breakfast was at nine: a nasty uncomfortable meal.
The room was stuffy, and there are more enlivening spectacles than
seventy British officers caught by Dutch farmers and penned together in
confinement. Then came the long morning, to be killed somehow by
reading, chess, or cards--and perpetual cigarettes. Luncheon at one: the
same as breakfast, only more so; and then a longer afternoon to follow a
long morning. Often some of the officers used to play rounders in the
small yard which we had for exercise. But the rest walked moodily up and
down, or lounged over the railings and returned the stares of the
occasional passers-by. Later would come the 'Volksstem'--permitted by
special indulgence--with its budget of lies.
Sometimes we get a little fillip of excitement. One evening, as I was
leaning over the railings, more than forty yards from the nearest
sentry, a short man with a red moustache walked quickly down the street,
followed by two colley dogs. As he passed, but without altering his pace
in the slightest, or even looking towards me, he said quite distinctly
'Methuen beat the Boers to hell at Belmont.' That night the air seemed
cooler and the courtyard larger. Already we imagined the Republics
collapsing and the bayonets of the Queen's Guards in the streets of
Pretoria. Next day I talked to the War Secretary. I had made a large map
upon the wall and followed the course of the war as far as possible by
making squares of red and green paper to represent the various columns.
I said: 'What about Methuen? He has beaten you at Belmont. Now he should
be across the Modder. In a few days he will relieve Kimberley.' De Souza
shrugged his shoulders. 'Who can tell?' he replied; 'but,' he put his
finger on the map, 'there stands old Piet Cronje in a position called
Scholz Nek, and we don't think Methuen will ever get past him.' The
event justified his words, and the battle which we call Magersfontein
(and ought to call 'Maasfontayne') the Boers call Scholz Nek.
Long, dull, and profitless were the days. I could not write, for the ink
seemed to dry upon the pen. I could not read with any perseverance, and
during the whole month I was locked up, I only completed Carlyle's
'History of Frederick the Great' and Mill's 'Essay on Liberty,' neither
of which satisfied my peevish expectations. When at last the sun sank
behind the fort upon the hill and twilight marked the end of another
wretched day, I used to walk up and down the courtyard looking
reflectively at the dirty, unkempt 'zarps' who stood on guard, racking
my brains to find some way, by force or fraud, by steel or gold, of
regaining my freedom. Little did these Transvaal Policemen think, as
they leaned on their rifles, smoking and watching the 'tame officers,'
of the dark schemes of which they were the object, or of the peril in
which they would stand but for the difficulties that lay _beyond_ the
wall. For we would have made short work of them and their weapons any
misty night could we but have seen our way clear after that.
As the darkness thickened, the electric lamps were switched on and the
whole courtyard turned blue-white with black velvet shadows. Then the
bell clanged, and we crowded again into the stifling dining hall for the
last tasteless meal of the barren day. The same miserable stories were
told again and again--Colonel Moller's surrender after Talana Hill, and
the white flag at Nicholson's Nek--until I knew how the others came to
Pretoria as well as I knew my own story.
'We never realised what had happened until we were actually prisoners,'
said the officers of the Dublin Fusiliers Mounted Infantry, who had been
captured with Colonel Moller on October 20. 'The "cease fire" sounded:
no one knew what had happened. Then we were ordered to form up at the
farmhouse, and there we found Boers, who told us to lay down our arms:
we were delivered into their hands and never even allowed to have a
gallop for freedom. But wait for the Court of Inquiry.'
I used always to sit next to Colonel Carleton at dinner, and from him
and from the others learned the story of Nicholson's Nek, which it is
not necessary to repeat here, but which filled me with sympathy for the
gallant commander and soldiers who were betrayed by the act of an
irresponsible subordinate. The officers of the Irish Fusiliers told me
of the amazement with which they had seen the white flag flying. 'We had
still some ammunition,' they said; 'it is true the position was
indefensible--but we only wanted to fight it out.'
'My company was scarcely engaged,' said one poor captain, with tears of
vexation in his eyes at the memory; and the Gloucesters told the same
tale.
'We saw the hateful thing flying. The firing stopped. No one knew by
whose orders the flag had been hoisted. While we doubted the Boers were
all among us disarming the men.'
I will write no more upon these painful subjects except to say this,
that the hoisting of a white flag in token of surrender is an act which
can be justified only by clear proof that there was no prospect of
gaining the slightest military advantage by going on fighting; and that
the raising of a white flag in any case by an unauthorised person--i.e.
not the officer in chief command--in such a manner as to compromise the
resistance of a force, deserves sentence of death, though in view of the
high standard of discipline and honour prevailing in her Majesty's army,
it might not be necessary to carry the sentence into effect. I earnestly
trust that in justice to gallant officers and soldiers, who have
languished these weary months in Pretoria, there will be a strict
inquiry into the circumstances under which they became prisoners of war.
I have no doubt we shall be told that it is a foolish thing to wash
dirty linen in public; but much better wash it in public than wear it
foul.
One day shortly after I had arrived I had an interesting visit, for de
Souza, wishing to have an argument brought Mr. Grobelaar to see me. This
gentleman was the Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs, and had just
returned from Mafeking, whither he had been conducting a 6-inch gun. He
was a very well-educated person, and so far as I could tell, honest and
capable besides. With him came Reuter's Agent, Mr. Mackay, and the
odious Malan. I received them sitting on my bed in the dormitory, and
when they had lighted cigars, of which I always kept a stock, we had a
regular _durbar_. I began:
'Well, Mr. Grobelaar, you see how your Government treats representatives
of the Press.'
_Grobelaar_. 'I hope you have nothing to complain of
_Self_. 'Look at the sentries with loaded rifles on every side. I might
be a wild beast instead of a special correspondent.'
_Grobelaar_. 'Ah, but putting aside the sentries with loaded rifles, you
do not, I trust, Mr. Churchill, make any complaint.'
_Self_. 'My chief objection to this place is that I am in it.'
_Grobelaar_. 'That of course is your misfortune, and Mr. Chamberlain's
fault.
_Self_. 'Not at all. We are a peace-loving people, but we had no choice
but to fight or be--what was it your burghers told me in the
camps?--"driven into the sea." The responsibility of the war is upon you
and your President.'
_Grobelaar_. 'Don't you believe that. We did not want to fight. We only
wanted to be left alone.'
_Self_. 'You never wanted war?'
_de Souza_. 'Ah, my God, no! Do you think we would fight Great Britain
for amusement?'
_Self_. 'Then why did you make every preparation--turn the Republics
into armed camps--prepare deep-laid plans for the invasion of our
Colonies?'
_Grobelaar_. 'Why, what could we do after the Jameson Raid? We had to be
ready to protect ourselves.'
_Self_. 'Surely less extensive armaments would have been sufficient to
guard against another similar inroad.'
_Grobelaar_. 'But we knew your Government was behind the Raiders.
Jameson was in front, but Rhodes and your Colonial Office were at his
elbow.'
_Self_. 'As a matter of fact no two people were more disconcerted by the
Raid than Chamberlain and Rhodes. Besides, the British Government
disavowed the Raiders' action and punished the Raiders, who, I am quite
prepared to admit, got no more than they deserved.'
_de Souza_. 'I don't complain about the British Government's action at
the time of the Raid. Chamberlain behaved very honourably then. But it
was afterwards, when Rhodes was not punished, that we knew it was all a
farce, and that the British Government was bent on our destruction. When
the burghers knew that Rhodes was not punished they lost all trust in
England.'
_Malan_. 'Ya, ya. That Rhodes, he is the ... at the bottom of it all.
You wait and see what we will do to Rhodes when we take Kimberley.'
_Self_. 'Then you maintain, de Souza, that the distrust caused in this
country by the fact that Rhodes was not punished--though how you can
punish a man who breaks no law I cannot tell--was the sole cause of your
Government making these gigantic military preparations, because it is
certain that these preparations were the actual cause of war.'
_Grobelaar_. 'Why should they be a cause of war? We would never have
attacked you.'
_Self_. 'But at this moment you are invading Cape Colony and Natal,
while no British soldier has set foot on Republican soil. Moreover, it
was you who declared war upon us.'
_Grobelaar_. 'Naturally we were not such fools as to wait till your army
was here. As soon as you began to send your army, we were bound to
declare war. If you had sent it earlier we should have fought earlier.
Really, Mr. Churchill, you must see that is only common sense.'
_Self_. 'I am not criticising your policy or tactics. You hated us
bitterly--I dare say you had cause to. You made tremendous
preparations--I don't say you were wrong--but look at it from our point
of view. We saw a declared enemy armed and arming. Against us, and
against us alone, could his preparations be directed. It was time we
took some precautions: indeed, we were already too late. Surely what has
happened at the front proves that we had no designs against you. You
were ready. We were unready. It is the wolf and lamb if you like; but
the wolf was asleep and never before was a lamb with such teeth and
claws.'
_Grobelaar_. 'Do you really mean to say that we forced this war on you,
that you did not want to fight us?'
_Self_. 'The country did not wish for war with the Boers. Personally, I
have always done so. I saw that you had six rifles to every burgher in
the Republic. I knew what that meant. It meant that you were going to
raise a great Afrikander revolt against us. One does not set extra
places at table unless one expects company to dinner. On the other
hand, we have affairs all over the world, and at any moment may become
embroiled with a European power. At this time things are very quiet. The
board is clear in other directions. We can give you our undivided
attention. Armed and ambitious as you were, the war had to come sooner
or later. I have always said "sooner." Therefore, I rejoiced when you
sent your ultimatum and roused the whole nation.'
_Malan_. 'You don't rejoice quite so much now.'
_Self_. 'My opinion is unaltered, except that the necessity for settling
the matter has become more apparent. As for the result, that, as I think
Mr. Grobelaar knows, is only a question of time and money expressed in
terms of blood and tears.'
_Grobelaar_. 'No: our opinion is quite unchanged. We prepared for the
war. We have always thought we could beat you. We do not doubt our
calculations now. We have done better even than we expected. The
President is extremely pleased.'
_Self_. 'There is no good arguing on that point. We shall have to fight
it out. But if you had tried to keep on friendly terms with us, the war
would not have come for a long time; and the delay was all on your
side.'
_Grobelaar_. 'We have tried till we are sick of it. This Government was
badgered out of its life with Chamberlain's despatches--such despatches.
And then look how we have been lied about in your papers, and called
barbarians and savages.'
_Self_. 'I think you have certainly been abused unjustly. Indeed, when I
was taken prisoner the other day, I thought it quite possible I should
be put to death, although I was a correspondent' (great laughter, 'Fancy
that!' etc.). 'At the best I expected to be held in prison as a kind of
hostage. See how I have been mistaken.'
I pointed at the sentry who stood in the doorway, for even members of
the Government could not visit us alone. Grobelaar flushed. 'Oh, well,
we will hope that the captivity will not impair your spirits. Besides,
it will not last long. The President expects peace before the New Year.'
'I shall hope to be free by then.'
And with this the interview came to an end, and my visitors withdrew.
The actual conversation had lasted more than an hour, but the dialogue
above is not an inaccurate summary.
About ten days after my arrival at Pretoria I received a visit from the
American Consul, Mr. Macrum. It seems that some uncertainty prevailed at
home as to whether I was alive, wounded or unwounded, and in what light
I was regarded by the Transvaal authorities. Mr. Bourke Cockran, an
American Senator who had long been a friend of mine, telegraphed from
New York to the United States representative in Pretoria, hoping by this
neutral channel to learn how the case stood. I had not, however, talked
with Mr. Macrum for very long before I realised that neither I nor any
other British prisoner was likely to be the better for any efforts which
he might make on our behalf. His sympathies were plainly so much with
the Transvaal Government that he even found it difficult to discharge
his diplomatic duties. However, he so far sank his political opinions
as to telegraph to Mr. Bourke Cockran, and the anxiety which my
relations were suffering on my account was thereby terminated.
I had one other visitor in these dull days, whom I should like to
notice. During the afternoon which I spent among the Boers in their camp
behind Bulwana Hill I had exchanged a few words with an Englishman whose
name is of no consequence, but who was the gunner entrusted with the
aiming of the big 6-inch gun. He was a light-hearted jocular fellow
outwardly, but I was not long in discovering that his anxieties among
the Boers were grave and numerous. He had been drawn into the war, so
far as I could make out, more by the desire of sticking to his own
friends and neighbours than even of preserving his property. But besides
this local spirit, which counterbalanced the racial and patriotic
feelings, there was a very strong desire to be upon the winning side,
and I think that he regarded the Boers with an aversion which increased
in proportion as their successes fell short of their early
anticipations. One afternoon he called at the States Model Schools
prison and, being duly authorised to visit the prisoners, asked to see
me. In the presence of Dr. Gunning, I had an interesting interview. At
first our conversation was confined to generalities, but gradually, as
the other officers in the room, with ready tact, drew the little
Hollander Professor into an argument, my renegade and I were able to
exchange confidences.
I was of course above all things anxious to get true news from the outer
world, and whenever Dr. Gunning's attention was distracted by his
discussion with the officers, I managed to get a little.
'Well, you know,' said the gunner, 'you English don't play fair at
Ladysmith at all. We have allowed you to have a camp at Intombi Spruit
for your wounded, and yet we see red cross flags flying in the town, and
we have heard that in the Church there is a magazine of ammunition
protected by the red cross flag. Major Erasmus, he says to me "John, you
smash up that building," and so when I go back I am going to fire into
the church.' Gunning broke out into panegyrics on the virtues of the
Afrikanders: my companion dropped his voice. 'The Boers have had a
terrible beating at Belmont; the Free Staters have lost more than 200
killed; much discouraged; if your people keep on like this the Free
State will break up.' He raised his voice, 'Ladysmith hold out a month?
Not possible; we shall give it a fortnight's more bombardment, and then
you will just see how the burghers will scramble into their trenches.
Plenty of whisky then, ha, ha, ha!' Then lower, 'I wish to God I could
get away from this, but I don't know what to do; they are always
suspecting me and watching me, and I have to keep on pretending I want
them to win. This is a terrible position for a man to be in: curse the
filthy Dutchmen!'
I said, 'Will Methuen get to Kimberley?'
'I don't know, but he gave them hell at Belmont and at Graspan, and they
say they are fighting again to-day at Modder River. Major Erasmus is
very down-hearted about it. But the ordinary burghers hear nothing but
lies; all lies, I tell you. _(Crescendo)_ Look at the lies that have
been told about us! Barbarians! savages! every name your papers have
called us, but you know better than that now; you know how well we have
treated you since you have been a prisoner; and look at the way your
people have treated our prisoners--put them on board ship to make them
sea-sick! Don't you call that cruel?' Here Gunning broke in that it was
time for visitors to leave the prison. And so my strange guest, a
feather blown along by the wind, without character or stability, a
renegade, a traitor to his blood and birthplace, a time-server, had to
hurry away. I took his measure; nor did his protestations of alarm
excite my sympathy, and yet somehow I did not feel unkindly towards him;
a weak man is a pitiful object in times of trouble. Some of our
countrymen who were living in the Transvaal and the Orange Free State at
the outbreak of the war have been placed in such difficult positions and
torn by so many conflicting emotions that they must be judged very
tolerantly. How few men are strong enough to stand against the
prevailing currents of opinion! Nor, after the desertion of the British
residents in the Transvaal in 1881, have we the right to judge their
successors harshly if they have failed us, for it was Great and Mighty
Britain who was the renegade and traitor then.
No sooner had I reached Pretoria than I demanded my release from the
Government, on the grounds that I was a Press correspondent and a
non-combatant. So many people have found it difficult to reconcile this
position with the accounts which have been published of what transpired
during the defence of the armoured train, that I am compelled to
explain. Besides the soldiers of the Dublin Fusiliers and Durban Light
Infantry who had been captured, there were also eight or ten civilians,
including a fireman, a telegraphist, and several men of the breakdown
gang. Now it seems to me that according to international practice and
the customs of war, the Transvaal Government were perfectly justified in
regarding all persons connected with a military train as actual
combatants; indeed, the fact that they were not soldiers was, if
anything, an aggravation of their case. But the Boers were at that time
overstocked with prisoners whom they had to feed and guard, and they
therefore announced that the civilians would be released as soon as
their identity was established, and only the military retained as
prisoners.
In my case, however, an exception was to be made, and General Joubert,
who had read the gushing accounts of my conduct which appeared in the
Natal newspapers, directed that since I had taken part in the fighting I
was to be treated as a combatant officer.
Now, as it happened, I had confined myself strictly to the business of
clearing the line, which was entrusted to me, and although I do not
pretend that I considered the matter in its legal aspect at the time,
the fact remains that I did not give a shot, nor was I armed when
captured. I therefore claimed to be included in the same category as the
civilian railway officials and men of the breakdown gang, whose
declared duty it was to clear the line, pointing out that though my
action might differ in degree from theirs, it was of precisely the same
character, and that if they were regarded as non-combatants I had a
right to be considered a non-combatant too.
To this effect I wrote two letters, one to the Secretary of War and one
to General Joubert; but, needless to say, I did not indulge in much hope
of the result, for I was firmly convinced that the Boer authorities
regarded me as a kind of hostage, who would make a pleasing addition to
the collection of prisoners they were forming against a change of
fortune. I therefore continued to search for a path of escape; and
indeed it was just as well that I did so, for I never received any
answer to either of my applications while I was a prisoner, although I
have since heard that one arrived by a curious coincidence the very day
_after_ I had departed.
While I was looking about for means, and awaiting an opportunity to
break out of the Model Schools, I made every preparation to make a
graceful exit when the moment should arrive. I gave full instructions to
my friends as to what was to be done with my clothes and the effects I
had accumulated during my stay; I paid my account to date with the
excellent Boshof; cashed a cheque on him for 20_l_.; changed some of the
notes I had always concealed on my person since my capture into gold;
and lastly, that there might be no unnecessary unpleasantness, I wrote
the following letter to the Secretary of State:
States Model Schools Prison: December 10, 1899.
Sir,--I have the honour to inform you that as I do not
consider that your Government have any right to detain me as a
military prisoner, I have decided to escape from your custody.
I have every confidence in the arrangements I have made with
my friends outside, and I do not therefore expect to have
another opportunity of seeing you. I therefore take this
occasion to observe that I consider your treatment of
prisoners is correct and humane, and that I see no grounds
for complaint. When I return to the British lines I will make
a public statement to this effect. I have also to thank you
personally for your civility to me, and to express the hope
that we may meet again at Pretoria before very long, and under
different circumstances. Regretting that I am unable to bid
you a more ceremonious or a personal farewell,
I have the honour, to be, Sir,
Your most obedient servant,
WINSTON CHURCHILL.
To Mr. de Souza,
Secretary of War, South African Republic.
I arranged that this letter, which I took great pleasure in writing,
should be left on my bed, and discovered so soon as my flight was known.
It only remained now to find a hat. Luckily for me Mr. Adrian Hofmeyr, a
Dutch clergyman and pastor of Zeerust, had ventured before the war to
express opinions contrary to those which the Boers thought befitting
for a Dutchman to hold. They had therefore seized him on the outbreak of
hostilities, and after much ill-treatment and many indignities on the
Western border, brought him to the States Schools. He knew most of the
officials, and could, I think, easily have obtained his liberty had he
pretended to be in sympathy with the Republics. He was, however, a true
man, and after the clergyman of the Church of England, who was rather a
poor creature, omitted to read the prayer for the Queen one Sunday, it
was to Hofmeyr's evening services alone that most of the officers would
go. I borrowed his hat.