INCIDENTS OF THE WAR
In every battle, and even in a day's life in the laagers, there were
multitudes of interesting incidents as only such a war produces, and
although Sherman's saying that "War is hell" is as true now as it ever
was, there was always a plenitude of amusing spectacles and events to
lighten the burdens of the fighting burghers. There were the sad sides of
warfare, as naturally there would be, but to these the men in the armies
soon became hardened, and only the amusing scenes made any lasting
impression upon their minds. It was strange that when a burgher during a
battle saw one of his fellow-burghers killed in a horrible manner, and
witnessed an amusing runaway, that after the battle he should relate the
details of the latter and say nothing of the former, but such was usually
the case. Men came out of the bloody Spion Kop fight and related amusing
incidents of the struggle, and never touched upon the grave phases until
long afterward when their fund of laughable experiences was
exhausted. After the battle of Sannaspost the burghers would tell of
nothing but the amusing manner in which the drivers of the British
transport waggons acted when they found that they had fallen into the
hands of the Boers in the bed of the spruit and the fun they had in
pursuing the fleeing cavalrymen. At the ending of almost every battle
there was some conspicuous amusing incident which was told and retold and
laughed about until a new and fresh incident came to light to take its
place.
In one of the days' fighting at Magersfontein a number of youthful Boers,
who were in their first battle, allowed about one hundred Highlanders to
approach to within a hundred yards of the trench in which they were
concealed, and then sprang up and shouted: "Hands up!" The Highlanders
were completely surprised, promptly threw down their arms, and advanced
with arms above their heads. One of the young Boers approached them, then
called his friends, and, scratching his head, asked: "What shall we do
with them?" There was a brief consultation, and it was decided to allow
the Highlanders to return to their column. When the young burghers arrived
at the Boer laager with the captured rifles and bandoliers, General Cronje
asked them why they did not bring the men. The youths looked at each other
for a while; then one replied, rather sheepishly, "We did not know they
were wanted." In the same battle an old Boer had his first view of the
quaintly dressed Highlanders, and at a distance mistook them for a herd of
ostriches from a farm that was known to be in the neighbourhood, refused
to fire upon them, and persuaded all the burghers in his and the
neighbouring trenches that they were ostriches and not human beings.
During the second battle at Colenso a large number of Boers swam across
the river and captured thirty or forty British soldiers who had lost the
way and had taken refuge in a sluit. An old takhaar among the Boers had
discarded almost all his clothing before entering the river, and was an
amusing spectacle in shirt, bandolier, and rifle. One of the soldiers went
up to the takhaar, looked at him from head to foot, and, after saluting
most servilely, inquired, "To what regiment do you belong, sir?" The Boer
returned the salute, and, without smiling, replied, "I am one of Rhodes'
'uncivilised Boers,' sir." In the same fight an ammunition waggon, heavily
laden, and covered with a huge piece of duck, was in an exposed position,
and attracted the fire of the British artillery. General Meyer and a
number of burghers were near the waggon, and were waiting for a lull in
the bombardment in order to take the vehicle to a place of safety. They
counted thirty-five shells that fell around the waggon without striking
it, and then the firing ceased. Several men were sent forward to move the
vehicle, and when they were within several yards of it two Kafirs crept
from under the duck covering, shook themselves, and walked away as if
nothing had interrupted their sleep.
In the Pretoria commando there was a young professional photographer named
Reginald Shepperd who carried his camera and apparatus with him during the
greater part of the campaign, and took photographs whenever he had an
opportunity. On the morning of the Spion Kop fight, when the burghers were
preparing to make the attack on the enemy, Mr. Shepperd gathered all the
burghers of the Carolina laager and posed them for a photograph. He was on
the point of exposing the plate when a shrapnel shell exploded above the
group, and every one fled. The camera was left behind and all the men went
into the battle. In the afternoon when the engagement had ended it was
found that another shell had torn off one of the legs of the camera's
tripod and that forty-three of the men who were in the group in the
morning had been killed or wounded. Before the same battle, General Schalk
Burger asked Mr. Shepperd to photograph him, as he had had a premonition
of death, and stated that he desired that his family should have a good
likeness of him. The General was in the heat of the fight, but he was not
killed.
While Ladysmith was being besieged by the Boers there were many
interesting incidents in the laagers of the burghers, even if there was
little of exciting interest. In the Staats Artillery there were many young
Boers who were constantly inventing new forms of amusement for themselves
and the older burghers, and some of the games were as hazardous as they
seemed to be interesting to the participants.
The "Long Tom" on Bulwana Hill was fired only when the burghers were in
the mood, but occasionally the artillery youths desired to amuse
themselves, and then they operated the gun as rapidly as its mechanism
would allow. When the big gun had been discharged, the young Boers were
wont to climb on the top of the sandbags behind which it was concealed,
and watch for the explosion of the shell in Ladysmith. After each shot
from the Boer gun it was customary for the British to reply with one or
more of their cannon and attempt to dislodge "Long Tom." After seeing the
flash of the British guns the burghers on the sandbags waited until they
heard the report of the explosion, then called out, "I spy!" as a warning
that the shell would be coming along in two or three seconds, and quietly
jumped down behind the bags, while the missile passed over their retreats.
It was a dangerous game, and the old burghers frequently warned them
against playing it, but they continued it daily, and no one was ever
injured. The men who operated the British and Boer heliographs at the
Tugela were a witty lot, and they frequently held long conversations with
each other when there were no messages to be sent or received by their
respective officers. In February the Boer operator signalled to the
British operator on the other side of the river and asked: "When is
General Buller coming over here for that Christmas dinner? It is becoming
cold and tasteless." The good-natured Briton evaded the question and
questioned him concerning the date of Paul Kruger's coronation as King of
South Africa. The long-distance conversation continued in the same vein,
each operator trying to have amusement at the expense of the other. What
probably was the most mirth-provoking communication between the two
combatants in the early part of the campaign was the letter which Colonel
Baden-Powell sent to General Snyman, late in December, and the reply to
it. Colonel Baden-Powell, in his letter, which was several thousand words
in length, told his besieger that it was utter folly for the Boers to
continue fighting such a great power as Great Britain, that the British
army was invincible, that the Boers were fighting for an unjust cause, and
that the British had the sympathy of the American nation. General Snyman
made a brief reply, the gist of which was, "Come out and fight."
[Illustration: GENERAL SNYMAN]
A British nobleman, who was captured by the Boers at the Moester's Hoek
fight in the Free State in April, was the author of a large number of
communications which were almost as mirthful as Colonel Baden-Powell's
effort. When he was made a prisoner of war the Earl had a diary filled
with the most harrowing personal experiences ever penned, and it was
chiefly on that evidence that General De Wet sent him with the other
prisoners to Pretoria. The Earl protested against being sent to Pretoria,
asserting that he was a war correspondent and a non-combatant, and
dispatched most pitiful telegrams to Presidents Kruger and Steyn, State
Secretary Reitz and a host of other officials, demanding an instant
release from custody. In the telegrams he stated that he was a peer of the
realm; that all doubts on that point could be dispelled by a reference to
Burke's Peerage; that he was not a fighting-man; that it would be
disastrous to his reputation as a correspondent if he were not released in
order that he might cable an exclusive account of the Moester's Hoek
battle to his newspaper, and finally ended by demanding his instant
release and safe conduct to the British lines. The Boers installed the
Earl in the officers' prison, and printed his telegrams in the newspapers,
with the result that the Briton was the most laughed-at man that appeared
in the Boer countries during the whole course of the war.
Several days before Commandant-General Joubert died he related an amusing
story of an Irishman who was taken prisoner in one of the Natal battles.
The Irishman was slightly wounded in one of his hands and it was decided
to send him to the British lines together with all the other wounded
prisoners, but he refused to be sent back. After he had protested
strenuously to several other Boer officers, the soldier was taken before
General Joubert, who pointed out to him the advantages of being with his
own people and the discomforts of a military prison. The Irishman would
not waver in his determination and finally exclaimed: "I claim my rights
as a prisoner of war and refuse to allow myself to be sent back. I have a
wife and two children in Ireland, and I know what is good for my health."
The man was so obdurate, General Joubert said, that he could do nothing
but send him to the Pretoria military prison. An incident of an almost
similar nature occurred at the battle of Sannaspost, where the Boers
captured almost two hundred waggons.
Among the convoy was a Red Cross ambulance waggon filled with rifles and a
small quantity of ammunition. The Boers unloaded the waggon and then
informed the physician in charge of it that he might proceed and rejoin
the column to which he had been attached. The physician declined to move
and explained his action by saying that he had violated the rules of the
International Red Cross and would therefore consider himself and his
assistants prisoners of war. General Christian De Wet would not accept
them as prisoners and trekked southward, leaving them behind to rejoin the
British column several days afterward.
[Illustration: FIRST BRITISH PRISONERS OF WAR CAPTURED NEAR DUNDEE]
During the war it was continually charged by both combatants that dum-dum
bullets were being used, and undoubtedly there was ample foundation for
the charges. Both Boers and British used that particular kind of expansive
bullet notwithstanding all the denials that were made in newspapers and
orations. After the battle of Pieter's Hills, on February 28th, Dr.
Krieger, General Meyer's Staff Physician, went into General Sir Charles
Warren's camp for the purpose of exchanging wounded prisoners. After the
interchange of prisoners had been accomplished General Warren produced a
dum-dum bullet which had been found on a dead Boer's body and, showing it
to Dr. Krieger, asked him why the Boers used the variety of cartridge that
was not sanctioned by the rules of civilised warfare. Dr. Krieger took the
cartridge in his hand and, after examining it, returned it to Sir Charles
with the remark that it was a British Lee-Metford dum-dum. General Warren
seemed to be greatly nonplussed when several of his officers confirmed the
physician's statement and informed him that a large stock of dum-dum
cartridges had been captured by the Boers at Dundee. It is an undeniable
fact that the Boers captured thousands of rounds of dum-dum cartridges
which bore the "broad arrow" of the British army, and used them in
subsequent battles. It was stated in Pretoria that the Boers had a small
stock of dum-dum ammunition, which was not sent to the burghers at the
front at the request of President Kruger, who strongly opposed the use of
an expansive bullet in warfare. It was an easy matter, however, for the
Boers to convert their ordinary Mauser cartridges into dum-dum by simply
cutting off the point of the bullet, and this was occasionally done.
One of the pluckiest men in the Boer army was Arthur Donnelly, a young
Irish American from San Francisco, who served in the Pretoria detective
force for several years, and went to the war in one of the commandos under
General Cronje. At the battle of Koodoesberg Donnelly and Captain Higgins,
of the Duke of Cornwall's regiment, both lay behind ant-heaps, several
hundred yards apart, and engaged in a duel with carbines for almost an
hour. After Donnelly had fired seventeen shots Captain Higgins was fatally
wounded by a bullet, and lifted his handkerchief in token of surrender.
When the young Irish-American reached him the officer was bleeding
profusely, and started to say: "You were a better man than I," but he died
in Donnelly's arms before he could utter the last two words of the
sentence. At Magersfontein Donnelly was in a perilous position between the
two forces, and realised that he could not escape being captured by the
British. He saw a number of cavalrymen sweeping down upon him, and started
to run in an opposite direction. Before he had proceeded a long distance
he stumbled across the corpse of a Red Cross physician which lay partly
concealed under tall grass. In a moment Donnelly had exchanged his own
papers and credentials for those in the physician's pockets, and a minute
later the cavalrymen were upon him. He was sent to Cape Town, and confined
in the prison-ship _Manila_, from which he and two other Boers attempted
to escape on New Year's night. One of the men managed to reach the water
without being observed by the guards, and swam almost three miles to
shore, but Donnelly and the other prisoner did not succeed in their
project. Several days later he was released on account of his Red Cross
credentials, and was sent to the British front to be delivered to the Boer
commander. He was taken out under a flag of truce by several unarmed
British officers, and several armed Boers went to receive him. While the
transfer was being made a British horseman, with an order to the officers
to hold the prisoner, dashed up to the group and delivered his
message. The officers attempted to take Donnelly back to camp with them,
but he refused to go, and, taking one of the Boer's rifles, ordered them
to return without him--a command which they obeyed with alacrity in view
of the fact that all of them were unarmed, while the Boers had carbines.
When the British column under Colonel Broadwood left the village of Thaba
N'Chu on March 30th all the British inhabitants were invited to accompany
the force to Bloemfontein, where they might have the protection of a
stronger part of the army. Among those who accepted the invitation were
four ladies and four children, ranging in ages from sixteen months to
fifteen years. When the column was attacked by the Boers at Sannaspost the
following morning, the ladies and children were sent by the Boers to a
culvert in the incomplete railway line which crossed the battlefield, and
remained there during almost the entire battle. They were in perfect
safety, so far as being actually in the line of fire was concerned, but
bullets and shells swept over and exploded near them, and they were in
constant terror of being killed. The nervous tension was so great and
continued for such a long time that one of the children, a twelve-year-old
daughter of Mrs. J. Shaw McKinlay, became insane shortly after the battle
was ended.
An incident of the same fight was a duel between two captains of the
opposing forces. In the early parts of the engagement the burghers and the
soldiers were so close together that many hand-to-hand encounters took
place and many a casualty followed. Captain Scheppers, of the Boer
heliographers, desired to make a prisoner of a British captain and asked
him to surrender. The British officer said that he would not be captured
alive, drew his sword, and attempted to use it. The Boer grasped the
blade, wrenched the sword from the officer's hand, and knocked him off his
horse. The Briton fired several revolver shots at Scheppers while the Boer
was running a short distance for his carbine, but missed him. After
Scheppers had secured his rifle the two fired five or six shots at each
other at a range of about ten yards and, with equal lack of skill, missed.
Finally, Scheppers hit the officer in the chest and laid him low. At the
same time near the same spot two Boers called upon a recruit in Roberts's
Horse to surrender, but the young soldier was so thoroughly frightened
that he held his rifle perpendicularly in front of him and emptied the
magazine toward the clouds.
While the siege of Ladysmith was in progress, Piet Boueer, of the Pretoria
commando, made a remarkable shot which was considered as the record during
the Natal campaign. He and several other Boers were standing on one of the
hills near the laager when they observed three British soldiers emerging
from one of the small forts on the outskirts of the city. The distance was
about 1,400 yards, or almost one mile, but Boueer fired at the men, and
the one who was walking between the others fell. The two fled to the fort,
but returned to the spot a short time afterward, and the Boer fired at
them a second time. The bullet raised a small cloud of dust between the
men, sent them back again, and they did not return until night for their
companion, who had undoubtedly been killed by the first shot. There were
many other excellent marksmen in the Boer army, whose ability was often
demonstrated in the interims of battles. After 1897, shooting clubs were
organised at Pretoria, Potchefstroom, Krugersdorp, Klerksdorp,
Johannesburg and Heidelberg, and frequent contests were held between the
various organisations. In the last contest before the war E. Blignaut, of
Johannesburg, won the prize by making one hundred and three out of a
possible one hundred and five points, the weapon having been a Mauser at a
range of seven hundred yards. These contests, naturally, developed many
fine marksmen, and, in consequence, it was not considered an extraordinary
feat for a man to kill a running hare at five hundred yards. While the
Boers were waiting for Lord Roberts's advance from Bloemfontein,
Commandant Blignaut, of the Transvaal, killed three running springbok at a
range of more than 1,700 yards, a feat witnessed by a score of persons.
The Boers were not without their periods of depression during the war, but
when these had passed there was no one who laughed more heartily over
their actions during those times than they. The first deep gloom that the
Boers experienced was after the three great defeats at Paardeberg,
Kimberley and Ladysmith, and the minor reverses at Abraham's Kraal, Poplar
Grove and Bloemfontein. It was amusing, yet pitiful, to see an army lose
all control of itself and flee like a wild animal before a forest fire. As
soon as the fight at Poplar Grove was lost the burghers mounted their
horses and fled northward. President Kruger and the officers could do
nothing but follow them. They passed through Bloemfontein and excited the
population there; then, evading roads and despising railway
transportation, they rode straight across the veld and never drew rein
until they reached Brandfort, more than thirty miles from Poplar Grove.
Hundreds did not stop even at Brandfort, but continued over the veld until
they reached their homes in the north of the Free State and in the
Transvaal. In their alarm they destroyed all the railway bridges and
tracks as far north as Smaldeel, sixty miles from Bloemfontein, and made
their base at Kroonstad, almost forty miles farther north. A week later a
small number of the more daring burghers sallied toward Bloemfontein and
found that not a single British soldier was north of that city. So fearful
were they of the British army before the discovery of their foolish flight
that two thousand cavalrymen could have sent them all across the Vaal
river.
APPENDIX
THE STRENGTH OF THE BOER ARMY
The War Departments of the two Boer Governments never made any provision
for obtaining statistics concerning the strength of the armies in the
field, and consequently the exact number of burghers who bore arms at
different periods of the war will never be accurately known. A year before
the war was begun the official reports of the two Governments stated that
the Transvaal had thirty thousand and the Free State ten thousand men
between the ages of sixteen and sixty, capable of performing military
duties, but these figures proved to be far in excess of the number of men
who were actually bearing arms at any one period of the war. In the early
stages of the war men who claimed to have intimate knowledge of Boer
affairs estimated the strength of the Republican armies variously from
sixty thousand to more than one hundred thousand men. Major Laing, who had
years of South African military experience, and became a member of
Field-Marshal Lord Roberts's bodyguard, in December estimated the strength
of the Boer forces at more than one hundred thousand men, exclusive of the
foreigners who joined the fortunes of the Republican armies. Other men
proved, with wondrous arrays of figures and statistics, that the Boer army
could not possibly consist of less than eighty or ninety thousand men.
The real strength of the Boer armies at no time exceeded thirty thousand
armed men, and of that number more than one-half were never in the mood
for fighting. If it could be ascertained with any degree of accuracy it
would be found that not more than fifteen thousand Boers were ever engaged
in battles, while the other half of the army remained behind in the
laagers and allowed those who were moved by the spirit or by patriotism to
volunteer for waging battles. As has been pointed out in other chapters,
the officers had no power over their men, and consequently the armies were
divided into two classes of burghers: those who volunteered their services
whenever there was a battle, and those who remained in the laagers--the
"Bible-readers," as they were called by some of the more youthful
Boers. There were undoubtedly more than thirty thousand men in the
Republics capable of bearing arms, but it was never possible to compel all
of them to go to the front, nor was it less difficult to retain them there
when once they had reached the commando-laagers. Ten per cent. of the men
in the commandos were allowed to return to their homes on leave of
absence, and about an equal proportion left the laagers without
permission, so that the officers were never able to keep their forces at
their normal strength.
The War Departments at Pretoria and Bloemfontein and the officers of the
commandos at the front had no means of learning the exact strength of the
forces in the field except by making an actual enumeration of the men in
the various commandos, and this was never attempted. There were no
official lists in either of the capitals and none of the commandos had
even a roll-call, so that to obtain a really accurate number of burghers
in the field it was necessary to visit all the commandos and in that way
arrive at a conclusion.
Early in December the Transvaal War Department determined to make a
Christmas gift to all the burghers of the two Republics who were in the
field, and all the generals and commandants were requested to send
accurate lists of the number of men in their commands. Replies were
received from every commando, and the result showed that there were almost
twenty-eight thousand men in the field. That number of presents was
forwarded, and on Christmas day every burgher at the front received one
gift, but there were almost two thousand packages undistributed. This was
almost conclusive proof that the Boer armies in December did not exceed
twenty-six thousand men.
At various times during the campaign the foreign newspaper
correspondents--Mr. Douglas Story, of the London _Daily Mail_; Mr. John O.
Knight, of the _San Francisco Call_; Mr. Thomas F. Millard, of the _New
York Herald_, and the writer--made strenuous efforts to secure accurate
information concerning the Boers' strength, and the results invariably
showed that there were less than thirty thousand men in the field. The
correspondents visited all the principal commandos and had the admirable
assistance of the generals and commandants, as well as that of the
officers of the War Departments, but frequently the results did not rise
above the twenty-five thousand mark. According to the statement of the
late Commandant-General Joubert, made several days before his death, he
never had more than thirteen thousand men in Natal, and of that number
less than two thousand were engaged in the trek to Mooi River. After the
relief of Ladysmith the forces in Natal dwindled down, by reason of
desertions and withdrawals, to less than five thousand, and when General
Buller began his advance there were not more than four thousand five
hundred Boers in that Colony to oppose him.
The strength of the army in the field varied considerably, on account of
causes which are described elsewhere, and there is no doubt that it
frequently fell below twenty thousand men while the Boers were still on
their enemy's territory. The following table, prepared with great care and
with the assistance of the leading Boer commanders, gives as correct an
idea of the burghers' numerical strength actually in the field at various
stages of the campaign as will probably ever be formulated:--
-----------------+----------+------------+------------+-------
Date. | Natal. | Free State | Transvaal | Total.
| | and Border.| and Border.|
-----------------+----------+------------+------------+-------
November 1, 1899 | 12,000 | 12,000 | 5,000 | 29,000
December 1, 1899 | 13,000 | 12,000 | 5,000 | 30,000
January 1, 1900 | 13,000 | 12,000 | 3,000 | 28,000
February 1, 1900 | 12,000 | 10,000 | 3,000 | 25,000
March 1, 1900 | 8,000 | 8,000 | 7,000 | 23,000
April 1, 1900 | 5,000 | 10,000 | 10,000 | 25,000
May 1, 1900 | 4,500 | 9,000 | 9,000 | 22,500
June 1, 1900 | | 4,500 | 16,000 | 20,500
July 1, 1900 | | 4,000 | 15,000 | 19,000
-----------------+----------+------------+------------+-------
According to this table, the average strength of the Boer forces during
the nine months was considerably less than 25,000 men. In refutation of
these figures it may be found after the conclusion of hostilities that a
far greater number of men surrendered their guns to the British army, but
it must be remembered that not every Boer who owned a weapon was
continually in the field.
THE GRESHAM PRESS
UNWIN BROTHERS,
WOKING AND LONDON.
End of Project Gutenberg's With the Boer Forces, by Howard C. Hillegas