My Commando of Seven Hundred Men
Towards the end of September Commandant F.E. Mentz had an engagement
with Colonel Byng's column near Heilbron. A portion of this officer's
force had held a ridge where there were some Kaffir kraals for cover;
and Commandant Mentz had with fifty burghers stormed this ridge,
shooting down from thirty to forty of the enemy, and taking twenty-five
prisoners. We lost two killed and three wounded. The Frankfort burghers
under Commandant Ross had also not been idle, for they had attacked a
division of Colonel Rimington's troops with the result that sixteen
killed and wounded fell into their hands--among these were seven of the
National Scouts.
Thus fighting was taking place all over the country. I do not give any
report of the various engagements, as I was not present at them, and, as
I have already said, I only wish to record my own experiences. But it
will be easily seen, even from the scanty information I can give of
these skirmishes, that our small commandos had a splendid record of
success.
It is my intention to ask all my Vice-Commanders-in-Chief to narrate
their experiences. And when the whole story is told I am convinced that
the world will be astonished at what we were able to accomplish.
But however well these small commandos had fought, I myself believed
that the time had now come to make a great stroke. With this object in
view I gave orders that a number of the burghers should come to
Blijdschap, in the district of Bethlehem, under the command of the
following officers:--General Michal Prinsloo with Commandants Olivier,
and Rautenbach of the Bethlehem Commando; Commandant David Van Coller,
who was in command of the Heilbron burghers in the place of Commandant
Steenekamp, who had resigned; Commandant Hermanus Botha of Vrede;
Commandant Roen of Ladybrand; and Commandant Jan Cilliers of Kroonstad.
By the beginning of November I had a force of seven hundred burghers
under me at Blijdschap.[101]
Although the spring was now far advanced, the veldt was in a very
backward condition. I therefore ordered the various subdivisions of my
commando to go and camp on the different farms in the neighbourhood. I
spread the horses over a large area, as they would thus find better
pasture and so the sooner recover their strength.
When November was drawing to a close I had an engagement with the
English to the south of Lindley. I had with me at that time General
Hattingh, General Wessel Wessels, and General Michal Prinsloo.
An English force had encamped two days previously on the farm of
Jagersrust, which lies some ten miles to the south-east of Heilbron, and
about the same distance from Blijdschap. I had wished to make an attack
on them the night they arrived, but they were too near to Heilbron for
me to venture on it.
The previous week three columns which came from Winburg and Kroonstad
had been operating near the Liebenbergsvlei, and driving a large laager
of women before them towards the north-east of the Liebenbergsvlei. But
they had now left the laager alone and returned to Kroonstad. The women
had arrived at Blijdschap at noon on November 28th on their way back to
Lindley.
The morning following, two hours after sunrise, I received a report from
General Hattingh, who with Commandant Cilliers and a hundred men was
stationed close to Blijdschap. The General reported that the English
from Jagersrust were hotly pursuing the women's laager. And it soon
appeared that the women were being driven to the west of Blijdschap.
When General Hattingh heard that the English were hard by, he was some
twenty minutes' ride from Blijdschap, but he mounted his horse at once
and rode there as quickly as he could. On his arrival he immediately
gave orders to up-saddle, and, having sent me a second report, he
started in pursuit of the enemy.
As soon as I had received General Hattingh's reports, I followed him
with General Wessels and a force of only a hundred men. I was at least
five miles from General Hattingh, and the English were twelve miles
ahead. General Michal Prinsloo was unfortunately a considerable distance
away; and thus it was that I could not at once get together my whole
force of six hundred burghers.
But General Michal Prinsloo had spent the time in attacking the English
force on their left front. Shortly after he had engaged the enemy I came
up behind them and delivered an attack on their right. But the veldt was
very uneven and high hills and intervening hollows made any co-operation
between us impossible, for one force could not tell where the other
force was.
Meanwhile General Hattingh had attacked the enemy in the rear and thus
compelled them to withdraw their vanguard, which was then not far from
the women's laager and had nearly succeeded in capturing it. But now
that the whole force of the enemy was opposed to General Hattingh, he
was forced to give way and leave his positions. We lost two killed and
three wounded. Among the dead was the valiant F.C. Klopper of Kroonstad.
When I, with General Wessels and Commandant Hermanus Botha hurried up,
Commandant Hattingh was just on the point of retreating.
The English I saw numbered about a thousand mounted men and they had
three guns with them. I determined to make a flank attack, and
accordingly marched round to their right, at the same time sending
orders to General Prinsloo to get in the rear, or if he preferred in
front of the enemy, so that we might make a united attack upon them as
they marched in the direction of Lindley.
It now began to rain and a little later a very heavy thunderstorm burst
on our heads. This forced the English to halt on the farm of
Victoriespruit.
The rain continued to fall in torrents and hindered General Prinsloo
carrying out my orders.
And now the sun went down.
As our horses were quite exhausted by the hot pursuit after the English,
and the burghers wet through to the skin, I decided to postpone the
attack to the following day. I was also influenced in my decision by the
consideration that as the English were so far from any point from which
reinforcements could come, it was quite safe to let them alone until the
morning. Nobody could have foreseen that they would escape that night.
We slept about five miles from them to the north-east, whilst General
Prinsloo and his men were not very far away to the south-east.
That night we placed the ordinary outposts, but no "brandwachten."
When on the next morning I sent my scouts out to discover the movements
of the enemy, what was my surprise when they reported that they had
fled. They had gone, my scouts informed me, towards Heilbron, which was
about eighteen miles off, and they had left behind them five laden
waggons and one cart; and where they had crossed Karoospruit they had,
very naturally, lightened their waggons, and flour, seed, oats,
tarpaulins, and tents marked the point where they had crossed the
spruit. The enemy were already so far ahead when I received this report
that it was quite out of the question to catch them before they reached
Heilbron; so all idea of pursuing them had to be abandoned.
So far as I was able to find out, this column was under the command of
Colonel Rimington.
As I was unable now to get in touch with the enemy, I set off with my
commando to what was once the town of Lindley. Alas! it could not any
more be called a town. Every house was burnt down; not even the church
and parsonage were spared.
We found the veldt in very good condition; the early spring rains and
the downpours of the previous day had quite revived the grass. And so I
decided to remain at Lindley as long as possible, to give our horses a
chance of recovering their condition. It was impossible to provide them
with forage, for the amount the English had left behind was entirely
insufficient as a supply for the large number of horses we had with us.
For ten or twelve days we remained at Lindley, and so the horses had a
short breathing time, but not long enough to give the poor animals time
fully to regain their strength. In addition to being overworked, some of
our horses were suffering from a skin disease which we were quite unable
to cure. This disease had never before been known in the Republics.
When I was at Lindley I sent Commandant Johannes Meijer, one of my
staff, with forty men, to Cape Colony. With him went that brave soldier,
Captain Willem Pretorius, of whom I have made mention previously. If
Commandant Meijer had had sufficient time to collect a commando in the
Colony, I am sure that he would have proved that the younger generation
of Free-Staters, to whom he and Willem Pretorius belonged, possess
qualities which were entirely unsuspected before the war began.
On the 8th of December three columns of the enemy appeared from
Kroonstad.
It had been my plan to remain at Lindley and wait my chance of dealing
with Colonel Baker, for he had under him a certain National Scout, who
constantly made raids from Winburg with a band of four or five hundred
Kaffirs. A few months previously a division of Commandant Hasebroek's
commando had been attacked at Doornberg by this man's Kaffirs, and four
burghers had been murdered in a horrible manner. More cases of this
nature had taken place, and I only mention this one in passing. I am not
in a position to give all the instances, but many of them were sworn to
in affidavits, of which copies were sent to Lord Kitchener. The original
affidavits fell into the hands of the English; but fresh ones shall be
drawn up on my return to South Africa, so that I may be able to prove
the statements I have made. The narration of these brutalities I prefer
to leave to persons more conversant With the facts than myself. I have
only alluded to the subject so as to make it clear why I like to keep my
eye on Colonel Baker's column.
I must now continue my story where I left it.
I took up my position to the north-west of Lindley, in front of the
columns which approached from Kroonstad. But after a few skirmishes with
them, I returned to the east till darkness came on. When night had
fallen I went round to the south, behind Kaffirskop, expecting to
receive the news that Colonel Baker was coming up from Winburg, for he
generally carried on his operations in conjunction with the forces at
Kroonstad.
On the following day the enemy marched to Liebenbergsvlei, between
Bethlehem and Reitz. Thence they took the road between Lindley and Reitz
to Kroonstad.
Piet de Wet, of the National Scouts, was with these columns.
After we had remained two days at Kaffirskop, we crossed the Valsch
River. The news then came that a column with a convoy was on the march
from Harrismith to Bethlehem.
I felt that it was my duty to attack this column, but, although I
advanced with all haste, I was not in time to catch the enemy before
they reached Bethlehem. When I saw this, I decided to wait, at a
distance of some fifteen miles to the north-east of Bethlehem, for I
expected that the column would return to Harrismith.
The troops remained in Bethlehem till the morning of the 18th of
December; they then marched out towards Harrismith.
I at once divided my commando into two parts, each consisting of two
hundred and fifty men. One of these divisions I posted behind the
eastern end of the Langberg, about forty miles from Bethlehem; the other
on the banks of the Tijgerkloofspruit, at the point where the road to
Harrismith crosses the stream.
I gave strict orders to both divisions that as soon as I opened fire on
the English with the Maxim-Nordenfeldt, they were to charge down on them
from both sides at the same time.
The enemy, I may mention, were about six or seven hundred men strong,
and had two guns.
I myself, with the Maxim-Nordenfeldt, was now on a high round hill, on
the eastern side of Tijgerkloof. I was very careful to be out of sight
of the English, so that they might get quite close to the burghers
before the gun disclosed my presence.
I succeeded in hiding my burghers so successfully that the English did
not observe them until they were within about twelve hundred paces of my
men in Tijgerkloof.
Some of the enemy's scouts rode on ahead, and when I judged that they
must almost immediately see the burghers, I ordered Captain Muller, who
was standing behind a rise, to come out of cover and open fire; then I
jumped on my horse, and down the hill I went, at full gallop, to my
burghers.
I had scarcely covered half the distance, when Captain Muller opened
fire on the enemy.
As the sound fell on my ears, it seemed to me that nothing now could
save them!
What was now my bitter disappointment when I saw that only one-third of
my burghers were charging. The others were keeping under cover, and do
what I would I could not drive them out.
Everything went wrong.
When the burghers who were charging the English discovered that the
greater part of their comrades had remained, they turned round and
retreated. But before this had happened they had attacked the English at
four different points.
It had been a short but a very hot engagement.
There was no possibility of inducing my men to charge, and so I thought
it wisest to retreat, swallowing my disappointment as best I could.
The burghers re-assembled to the south of the Langberg; and we found
that our loss was two killed and nine wounded, of whom two subsequently
died.
We could not ascertain the English losses, but we saw their ambulances
very busy. We heard afterwards that they had suffered much more severely
than we had done.
[Footnote 101: A court-martial was held at this place, and several
persons appeared before it. A certain De Lange was condemned to death
for high treason.]