Howard C. Hillegas - With the Boer Forces

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The boy missed the rider but killed the horse, and the British force
quickly dismounted and sought shelter in a small ravine. The reports of
volley firing followed, and bullets cut the grass beside the burghers and
flattened themselves against the rocks. Another volley, and a third, in
rapid succession, and the burghers pressed more closely to the ground. An
interval of a minute, and they glanced over their tiny stockades to find a
British soldier. "They are coming up the kopje!" shouted a burgher, and
their rifles swept the hillside with bullets. More volleys came from below
and, while the leaden tongues sang above and around them, the burghers
turned and lay on their backs to refill the magazines of their rifles.
Another interval, and the attack was renewed. "They are running!" screamed
a youth exultingly, and burghers rose and fired at the men in brown at the
foot of the kopje. Marksmen had their opportunity then, and long aim was
taken before a shot was fired. Men knelt on the one knee and rested an
elbow on the other, while they held their rifles to their shoulders.
Reports of carbines became less frequent as the troops progressed farther
in an opposite direction, but increased again when the cavalrymen returned
for a second attack upon the kopje. "Lend me a handful of cartridges, Jan,"
asked one man of his neighbour, as they watched the oncoming force.

"They must want this kopje," remarked another burgher jocularly, as he
filled his pipe with tobacco and lighted it.

The British cannon in the east again became active, and the dust raised by
their shells was blown over the heads of the burghers on the kopje. The
reports of the big guns of the Boers reverberated among the hills, while
the regular volleys of the British rifles seemed to be beating time to the
minor notes and irregular reports of the Boer carbines. At a distance the
troops moving over the brown field of battle resembled huge ants more than
human beings; and the use of smokeless powder, causing the panorama to
remain perfectly clear and distinct, allowed every movement to be closely
followed by the observer. Cannon poured forth their tons of shells, but
there was nothing except the sound of the explosion to denote where the
guns were situated. Rifles cut down lines of men, but there was no smoke
to indicate where they were being operated, and unless the burghers or
soldiers displayed themselves to their enemy there was nothing to indicate
their positions. Shrapnel bursting in the air, the reports of rifles and
heavy guns and the little puffs of dust where shells and bullets struck
the ground were the only evidences of the battle's progress. The
hand-to-hand conflicts, the duels with bayonets and swords and the clouds
of smoke were probably heroic and picturesque before the age of rapid-fire
guns, modern rifles, and smokeless ammunition, but here the field of
battle resembled a country fox-chase with an exaggerated number of
hunters, more than a representation of a battle of twenty-five years ago.

On the summit of the kopje the burghers were firing leisurely but
accurately. One man aimed steadily at a soldier for fully twenty seconds,
then pressed the trigger, lowered his rifle and watched for the effect of
the shot. Bullets were flying high over him, and the shrapnel of the
enemy's guns exploded far behind him. There seemed to be no great danger,
and he fired again. "I missed that time," he remarked to a burgher who lay
behind another rock several yards distant. His neighbour then fired at the
same soldier, and both cried simultaneously: "He is hit!" The enemy again
disappeared in the little ravine, and the burghers ceased firing. Shells
continued to tear through the air, but none exploded in the vicinity of
the men, and they took advantage of the lull in the battle to light their
pipes. A swarm of yellow locusts passed overhead, and exploding shrapnel
tore them into myriads of pieces, their wings and limbs falling near the
burghers. "I am glad I am not a locust," remarked a burgher farther to the
left of the others, as he dropped a handful of torn fragments of the
insects. Shells and bullets suddenly splashed everywhere around the
burghers, and they crouched more closely behind the rocks. The enemy's
guns had secured an accurate range, and the air was filled with the
projectiles of iron and lead. Exploding shells splintered rocks into atoms
and sent them tearing through the grass. Puffs of smoke and dirt were
springing up from every square yard of ground, and a few men rose from
their retreats and ran to the rear where the Basuto servants were holding
their horses. More followed several minutes afterwards, and when those who
remained on the summit of the kopje saw that ten times their number of
soldiers were ascending the hill under cover of cannon fire they also fled
to their horses.

An open plain half a mile wide lay between the point where the burghers
mounted their horses, and another kopje in the north-east. The men lay
closely on their horses' backs, plunged their spurs in the animals' sides,
and dashed forward. The cavalrymen, who had gained the summit of the kopje
meanwhile, opened fire on the fleeing Boers, and their bullets cut open
the horses' sides and ploughed holes into the burgher's clothing. One
horse, a magnificent grey who had been leading the others, fell dead as he
was leaping over a small gully, and his rider was thrown headlong to the
ground. Another horseman turned in his course, assisted the horseless
rider to his own brown steed, and the two were borne rapidly through the
storm of bullets towards the kopje. Another horse was killed when he had
carried his rider almost to the goal of safety, and the Boer was compelled
to traverse the remainder of the distance on foot. Apparently all the
burghers had escaped across the plain, and their field-cornet was
preparing to lead them to another position when a solitary horseman, a
mere speck of black against a background of brown, lifeless grass, issued
from a rocky ravine below the kopje occupied by the enemy, and plunged
into the open space. Lee-Metfords cracked and cut open the ground around
him, but the rider bent forward and seemed to become a part of his
horse. Every rod of progress seemed to multiply the fountains of dust near
him; every leap of his horse seemed necessarily his last. On, on he
dashed, now using his stirrups, now beating his horse with his hands. It
seemed as if he were making no progress, yet his horse's legs were moving
so swiftly. "They will get him," sighed the field-cornet, looking through
his glasses. "He has a chance," replied a burgher. Seconds dragged
wearily, the firing increased in volume, and the dust of the horse's heels
mingled with that raised by the bullets. The sound of the hoofs beating
down on the solid earth came louder and louder over the veld, the firing
slackened and then ceased, and a foaming, panting horse brought his burden
to where the burghers stood. The exhausted rider sank to the ground, and
men patted the neck and forehead of the quivering beast.

Down in the valley, near the spruit, the foreign military attaches in
uniforms quite distinct were watching the effect of the British artillery
on the saddle belonging to one of their number. "They will never hit it,"
volunteered one, as a shell exploded ten yards distant from the leathern
mark.

"They must think it is a crowd of Boers," suggested another, when a dozen
shells had fallen without injuring the saddle. Fifteen, twenty tongues of
dust arose, but the leather remained unmarred by scratch or rent, and the
attaches became the target of the heavy guns. "I am hit," groaned
Lieutenant Nix, of the Netherlands-Indian army, and his companions caught
him in their arms. Blood gushed from a wound in the shoulder, but the
soldier spirit did not desert him. "Here, Demange!" he called to the
French attache, "Hold my head. And you, Thompson and Allen, see if you
cannot bind this shoulder." The Norwegian and Hollander bound the wound as
well as they were able. "Reichman!" the injured man whispered, "I am going
to die in a few minutes, and I wish you would write a letter to my wife."
The American attache hastily procured paper and pencil, and while shells
and shrapnel were bursting over and around them the wounded man dictated a
letter to his wife in Holland. Blood flowed copiously from the wound and
stained the grass upon which he lay. He was pale as the clouds above him,
and the pain was agonising, but the dying man's letter was filled with
nothing but expressions of love and tenderness.

In the south-eastern part of the field a large party of cavalrymen was
speeding in the direction of Thaba N'Chu. On two sides of them, a thousand
yards behind, small groups of horsemen were giving chase. At a distance,
the riders appeared like ants slowly climbing the hillside. Now and then a
Boer rider suddenly stopped his horse, leaped to the ground, and fired at
the fleeing cavalrymen. A second afterwards he was on his horse again,
bending to the chase. Shot followed shot, but the distance between the
forces grew greater, and one by one the burghers turned their animals'
heads and slowly retraced their steps. A startled buck bounded over the
veld, two rifles were turned upon it, and its flight was ended.

[Illustration: CALLING FOR VOLUNTEERS TO MAN CAPTURED CANNON AFTER
SANNASPOST]

The sound of firing had ceased, and the battle was concluded. Waggons with
Red Cross flags fluttering from the tall staffs above them, issued from
the mountains and rumbled through the valleys. Burghers dashed over the
field in search of the wounded and dying. Men who a few moments before
were straining every nerve to kill their fellow-beings became equally
energetic to preserve lives. Wounded soldiers and burghers were lifted out
of the grass and carried tenderly to the ambulance waggons. The dead were
placed side by side, and the same cloth covered the bodies of Boer and
Briton. Men with spades upturned the earth, and stood grimly by while a
man in black prayed over the bodies of those who died for their country.

Boer officers, with pencils and paper in their hands, sped over the
battlefield from a group of prisoners to a line of passing waggons, and
made calculations concerning the result of the day's battle. Three Boers
killed and nine wounded was one side of the account. On the credit sheet
were marked four hundred and eight British soldiers, seven cannon, one
hundred and fifty waggons, five hundred and fifty rifles, two thousand
horses and cattle, and vast stores of ammunition and provisions captured
during the day.

In among the north-eastern hills, where a farmer's daub-and-wattle cottage
stood, were the prisoners of war, chatting and joking with their captors.
The officers walked slowly back and forth, never raising their eyes from
the ground. Dejection was written on their faces. Near them were the
captured waggons, with groups of noisy soldiers climbing over them in
search of their luggage. On the ground others were playing cards and
matching coins. Young Boers walked amongst them and engaged them in
conversation. Near the farmhouse stood a tall Cape Colony Boer talking
with his former neighbour, who was a prisoner. Several Americans among the
captured disputed the merits of the war with a Yankee burgher, who had
readily distinguished his countrymen among the throng. Some one began to
whistle a popular tune, others joined, and soon almost every one was
participating. An officer gave the order for the prisoners to fall in
line, and shortly afterward the men in brown tramped forward, while the
burghers stepped aside and lined the path. A soldier commenced to sing
another popular song, British and Boer caught the refrain, and the noise
of tramping feet was drowned by the melody of the united voices of friend
and foe singing--

"It's the soldiers of the Queen, my lads,
Who've been, my lads--who've seen, my lads,
* * * * *
We'll proudly point to every one
Of England's soldiers of the Queen."

CHAPTER VII

THE GENERALS OF THE WAR

The names and deeds of the men who led thirty thousand of their
fellow-peasants against almost a quarter of a million of the trained
troops of the greatest empire in the world, and husbanded their men and
resources so that they were enabled to continue the unequal struggle for
the greater part of a year will live for ever in the history of the Dark
Continent. When racial hatred and the bitternesses of the war have been
forgotten, and South Africa has emerged from its long period of bloodshed
and disaster, then all Afrikanders will revere the memory of the valiant
deeds of Cronje, Joubert, Botha, Meyer, De Wet, and the others who fought
so gallantly in a cause which they considered just and holy. Such noble
examples of heroism as Cronje's stand at Paardeberg, Botha's defence of
the Tugela and the region east of Pretoria; De Wet's warfare in the Free
State, and Meyer's fighting in the Transvaal will shine in African history
as long as the Southern Cross illumes the path of civilised people in that
region. When future generations search the pages of history for deeds of
valour they will turn to the records of the Boer-British war of 1899-1900,
and find that the military leaders of the farmers of South Africa were not
less valorous than those of the untrained followers of Cromwell or William
of Orange, the peace-loving mountaineers of Switzerland, or the patriotic
countrymen of Washington.

The leaders of the Boer forces were not generals in the popular sense of
the word. Almost without exception, they were men who had no technical
knowledge of warfare; men who were utterly without military training of
any nature, and who would have been unable to pass an examination for the
rank of corporal in a European army. Among the entire list of generals who
fought in the armies of the two Republics there were not more than three
who had ever read military works, and Cronje was the only one who ever
studied the theory and practice of modern warfare, and made an attempt to
apply the principles of it to his army. Every one of the Boer generals was
a farmer who, before the war, paid more attention to his crops and cattle
than he did to evolving ideas for application in a campaign, and the
majority of them, in fact, never dreamed that they would be called upon to
be military leaders until they were nominated for the positions a short
time before hostilities were commenced. Joubert, Cronje, Ferreira, and
Meyer were about the only men in the two Republics who were certain that
they would be called upon to lead their countrymen, for all had had
experience in former wars; but men like Botha, De Wet, De la Rey, and
Snyman, who occupied responsible positions afterward, had no such
assurance, and naturally gave little or no attention to the study of
military matters. The men who became the Boer generals gained their
military knowledge in the wilds and on the veld of South Africa where they
were able to develop their natural genius in the hunting of lions and the
tracking of game. The Boer principle of hunting was precisely the same as
their method of warfare and consequently the man who, in times of peace,
was a successful leader of shooting expeditions was none the less adept
afterward as the leader of commandos.

When the Volksraad of the Transvaal determined to send an ultimatum to
Great Britain, it was with the knowledge that such an act would provoke
war, and consequently preparations for hostilities were immediately made.
One of the first acts was the appointment of five assistant
commandant-generals--Piet Cronje, Schalk Burgher, Lucas Meyer, Daniel
Erasmus, and Jan Kock--all of whom held high positions in the Government,
and were respected by the Boer people. After hostilities commenced, and it
became necessary to have more generals, six other names were added to the
list of assistants of Commandant-General Joubert--those chosen being Sarel
Du Toit, Hendrik Schoeman, John De la Rey, Hendrik Snyman, and Herman R.
Lemmer. The selections which were so promiscuously made were proved by
time to be wise, for almost without exception the men developed into
extraordinarily capable generals. In the early part of the campaign many
costly mistakes and errors of judgment were made by some of the
newly-appointed generals, but such misfortunes were only to be expected
from men who suddenly found themselves face to face with some of the
best-trained generals in the world. Later, when the campaign had been in
progress for several months, and the farmers had had opportunities of
learning the tactics of their opponents, they made no move unless they
were reasonably certain of the result.

One of the prime reasons for the great success which attended the Boer
army before the strength of the enemy's forces became overwhelming, was
the fact that the generals were allowed to operate in parts of the country
with which they were thoroughly acquainted. General Cronje operated along
the western frontiers of the Republics, where he knew the geographical
features of the country as well as he did those of his own farm. General
Meyer spent the greater part of his life in the neighbourhood of the
Biggarsberg and northern Natal, and there was hardly a rod of that
territory with which he was unfamiliar. General Botha was born near the
Tugela, and, in his boyhood days, pursued the buck where afterward he made
such a brave resistance against the forces of General Buller. General
Christian De Wet was a native of Dewetsdorp, and there was not a sluit or
donga in all the territory where he fought so valiantly that he had not
traversed scores of times before the war began. General De la Rey spent
the greater part of his life in Griqualand West, Cape Colony, and when he
was leading his men around Kimberley and the south-western part of the
Free State he was in familiar territory. General Snyman, who besieged
Mafeking, was a resident of the Marico district, and consequently was
acquainted with the formation of the country in the western part of the
Transvaal. In the majority of cases the generals did not need the services
of an intelligence department, except to determine the whereabouts of the
enemy, for no scouts or patrols could furnish a better account of the
nature of the country in which they were fighting than that which existed
in the minds of the leaders. Under these conditions there was not the
slightest chance for any of the generals falling into a trap laid by the
enemy, but there always were opportunities for leading the enemy into
ambush.

The Boer generals also had the advantage of having excellent maps of the
country in which they were fighting, and by means of these they were
enabled to explain proposed movements to the commandants and field-cornets
who were not familiar with the topography of the land. These maps were
made two years before the war by a corps of experts employed by the
Transvaal Government, and on them was a representation of every foot of
ground in the Transvaal, Free State, Natal, and Cape Colony. A small
elevation near Durban and a spruit near Cape Town were marked as plainly
as a kopje near Pretoria, while the British forts at Durban and Cape Town
were as accurately pictured as the roads that led to them. The Boers had a
map of the environs of Ladysmith which was a hundred times better than
that furnished by the British War Office, yet Ladysmith was the Natal base
of the British army for many years.

The greater part of the credit for the Boers' preparedness must be given
to the late Commandant-General Piet J. Joubert, who was the head of the
Transvaal War Department for many years. General Joubert, or "Old Piet,"
as he was called by the Boers, to distinguish him from the many other
Jouberts in the country, was undoubtedly a great military leader in his
younger days, but he was almost seventy years old when he was called upon
to lead his people against the army of Great Britain, and at that age very
few men are capable of great mental or physical exertion. There was no
greater patriot in the Transvaal than he, and no one who desired the
absolute independence of his country more sincerely than the old general;
yet his heart was not in the fighting. Like Kruger, he was a man of peace,
and to his dying day he believed that the war might have been avoided
easily. Unlike Kruger, he clung to the idea that the war, having been
forced upon them, should be ended as speedily as possible, and without
regard to the loss of national interests. Joubert valued the lives of the
burghers more highly than a clause in a treaty, and rather than see his
countrymen slain in battle he was willing to make concessions to those who
harassed his Government.

Joubert was one of the few public men in the Transvaal who firmly believed
that the differences between the two countries would be amicably adjusted,
and he constantly opposed the measures for arming the country which were
brought before him. The large armament was secured by him, it is true, but
the Volksraads compelled him to purchase the arms and ammunition. If
Joubert had been a man who loved war he would have secured three times as
great a quantity of war material as there was in the country when the war
was begun; but he was distinctly a man who loved peace. He constantly
allowed his sentiments to overrule his judgment of what was good for his
country, and the result of that line of action was that at the beginning
of hostilities there were more Boer guns in Europe and on the ocean than
there were in the Transvaal.

General Joubert was a grand old Boer in many respects, and no better, more
righteous, and more upright man ever lived. He worked long and faithfully
for his people, and he undoubtedly strove to do that which he believed to
be the best for his country, but he was incapable of performing the duties
of his office as a younger, more energetic, and a more warlike man would
have attended to them. Joubert was in his dotage, and none of his people
were aware of it until the crucial moment of the war was passed. When he
led the Boers at Majuba and Laing's Nek, in 1881, he was in the prime of
his life--energetic, resourceful, and undaunted by any reverses. In 1899,
when he followed the commandos into Natal, he was absolutely the
reverse--slow, wavering, and too timid to move from his tent. He
constantly remained many miles in the rear of the advance column, and only
once went into the danger zone, when he led a small commando south of the
Tugela. Then, instead of leading his victorious burghers against the
forces of the enemy, he retreated precipitately at the first sign of
danger, and established himself at Modderspruit, a day's journey from the
foremost commandos, where he remained with almost ten thousand of his men
for three months.

Joubert attempted to wage war without the shedding of blood, and he
failed. When General Meyer reported that about thirty Boers had been
killed and injured in the fight at Dundee, the Commandant-General censured
him harshly for making such a great sacrifice of blood, and forbade him
from following the fleeing enemy, as such a course would entail still
greater casualties. When Sir George White and his forces had been
imprisoned in Ladysmith, and there was almost a clear path to Durban,
Joubert held back and would not risk the lives of a few hundred burghers,
even when it was pointed out to him that the men themselves were eager to
assume the responsibility. He made only one effort to capture Ladysmith,
but the slight loss of life so appalled him that he would never sanction
another attack, although the town could easily have been taken on the
following day if an attempt had been made. Although he had a large army
round the besieged town he did not dig a yard of entrenchment in all the
time he was at Modderspruit, nor would he hearken to any plans for
capturing the starving garrison by means of progressive trenches. While
Generals Botha, Meyer, and Erasmus, with less than three thousand men,
were holding the enemy at the Tugela, Joubert, with three times that
number of men to guard impotent Ladysmith, declined to send any ammunition
for their big guns, voted to retreat, and finally fled northward to
Colenso, deserting the fighting men, destroying the bridges and railways
as he progressed, and even leaving his own tents and equipment behind.

There were extenuating circumstances in connection with Joubert's failure
in the campaign--his age, an illness, and an accident while he was in
laager--and it is but charitable to grant that these were fundamentally
responsible for his shortcomings, but it is undoubted that he was
primarily responsible for the failure of the Natal campaign. The army
which he commanded in Natal, although only twelve or thirteen thousand men
in strength, was the equal in fighting ability of seventy-five thousand
British troops, and the only thing it lacked was a man who would fight
with them and lead them after a fleeing enemy. If the Commandant-General
had pursued the British forces after all their defeats and had drawn the
burghers out of their laagers by the force of his own example, the major
part of the history of the Natal campaign would have been made near the
Indian Ocean instead of on the banks of the Tugela. The majority of the
Boers in Natal needed a commander-in-chief who would say to them "Come,"
but Joubert only said "Go."

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