Natalie Harris Hammond

“ To confess at this juncture that the Reform Committee was short of guns would have demoralised the people, and placed Johannesburg entirely at the mercy of the Boers. These leaders played a losing game with splendid courage. Realising that all would be lost if the true situation were suspected, and feeling the fearful responsibility of their position, they kept their counsel, and turned bold faces to the world, continuing to treat with Government with the independence of well-armed men, and men ready to fight. ”

“ I have often been asked since if I did not realise that the Boers would never have dared execute my husband? And many dear friends who were thousands of miles away assure me now that they never had a moment's real apprehension for his safety. We however, who were in Pretoria, at the time, a helpless handful in the power of a primitive population of narrow experience, a people inflamed by long years of racial feud and recent victory, were by no means so sure that all would end well. ”

“ The sad side was poor Sam Jameson, crippled and broken with rheumatism—a seriously ill man—accompanied to the very prison gates by his ever-faithful wife; and the second lot of Reformers, sent to Pretoria the following morning, met with an experience which some of them have never since been able to speak of without turning white. By the hour of their arrival the whole country round about Pretoria knew of their coming, and a large and violent mob was gathered at the railroad station to receive them. Through some misadventure, an inadequate guard was detailed to march them to the gaol. ”

“ Pretoria was like a steam bath. Frequent thunderstorms were followed by a blazing sun. Vegetation grew inches in a day, and emitted a rank smell. People were sallow and languid, and went about with yellow-white lips. My husband was losing strength perceptibly.
I called upon Dr. Messum, and begged that he would summon Dr. Murray, our family physician, from Johannesburg, in consultation. He preferred a Hollander. I would have none of them! We haggled, and he gave in. Dr. Murray came to Pretoria. He was very grave when he came out of my husband's sick room. ”

“ But for poor impetuous Jameson and the newly dead and wounded of Doornkop, I could laugh again.
The women are going back to the mines. Many brave little men who have remained in the shade to comfort their wives now step boldly to the front and tell us what they would have done if it had really come to a question of fighting. There is so much talk of moral courage from these heroes, I fear it is the only kind of courage which they possess. ”

“ As arms for the Uitlander under the law of the Transvaal could only be obtained by a permit, guns and ammunition were smuggled into the country, hidden away in oil tanks and coal cars.
My husband had vast interests in his charge; many million pounds sterling had been invested at his instance in the mining industry of the country, and, actuated by a sense of duty and responsibility to those who had confided in him, he felt in honour bound to take an active part in the movement, for the protection and preservation of the property placed under his control. ”

“ The Reform Committee sits in perpetual session in the offices of the 'Gold Fields.' They are appointing sub-committees for the safeguard and comfort of the town; 51,000l. for the relief of the poor has already been raised. Messengers are sent out to call in all the women and children from the mines. Arrangements are being made for the housing and feeding of these. Nothing is forgotten, and everything goes on with the utmost method and precision. It is like a great, splendid piece of machinery.
The merchants have sent up a deputation to try to bring the President to reason. ”

“ K.B. Brown, an American just arrived in Cape Town from the Rand, took me aside and laid the case in all its bare brutality before me. To allow my husband to return to Pretoria was for him to meet certain death. If he were not lynched by the excited Boers, he was sure to get a death sentence. Mr. Brown showed feeling as he plead with me to use a wife's influence to save her husband's life. ”

“ So desperate was the extremity, these guns were smuggled in at great risk of being discovered by the Boer Custom House officials, under a thin covering of coke on ordinary coal cars. But for the bold courage of several men, who rushed the coke through, they would have fallen into the hands of the Boers. The leaders had taken as few men as was possible into their confidence, so as to reduce to a minimum all liability of their plans being discovered by the Government. They had made almost no organisation, and Jameson's sudden oncoming placed them in a terrible position. ”

“ A man more execrated than Dr. Leyds, I believe, does not live!
Three more weeks of cruel suspense followed.
Mr. Chamberlain continued to tumble down the Boer back stairs head over heels, yelling out excuses as he descended. He publicly denied on the 29th that Great Britain had promised to protect the Reformers, and added that they were not being unfairly treated. I will never make statesmen of my sons. I'd rather set them to ploughing.
Mark Twain came to the Rand. He visited the men at Pretoria. My husband did the honours of the prison, and introduced him to the Reformers. ”

“ Johannesburg had grown tired of sending petitions in to the Government to be answered by promises which were never redeemed. An appalling death-rate of fifty-six in each thousand, directly traceable to lack of proper sanitation, resulting from bad government, spurred the general discontent, and a number of representative citizens, unwilling longer to wait upon gods and Government, finding all attempts to obtain redress of their grievances by constitutional means ineffectual, determined to enforce their demands for right by arms if necessary. ”

“ Brought to my bedside, all he could say, and he said it over and over again in his embarrassment, was:
'Don't be unhappy; your husband won't be many years in prison.'
This did not bring the cheer intended. Playing the part of guest was irksome to Du Plessis. He went home to Pretoria the second day—leaving Mr. Hammond, who was not on parole, or even under bail, entirely free. No point in my husband's career has ever given me so entire a sense of gratification as the confidence in his honour thus manifested by the Boer Government. ”

“ Messum, the prison physician, called to tell me the four men had been moved into the Jameson Cottage, but I was asleep, and not allowed to be roused. There is comfort in being this much nearer to my poor prisoner. The hotel is full of Reformers' wives, and there is much excitement and coming and going. We are warned to be cautious in what we say in public places, because of spies. Every woman has a nervous look on her face, and some of them shut the windows and doors before uttering even the most commonplace remarks. ”

“ I can see that my husband is trying to prepare me for his possible arrest. 'It will merely be a matter of form.' Ah me! I can read in his grave face another truth. May God in His mercy grant us a happy issue out of all our afflictions.
At a quarter to ten on the night of January 9, my husband, with two dozen others of the Reform Committee, was arrested and thrown into jail on the charge of rebellion and high treason. ”

“ January 24.—I have been several times to the prison, and have seen my husband. He looks thin, but his face is much rested. He was greatly distressed on my first visit at the change in my appearance, which I declared was most ungrateful, as I had put on my best clothes for the occasion. His mouth showed a tendency to grow square at the corners; I had seen his children's do the same a thousand times in our nursery, and I turned away to conceal my emotion.
The leaders are still kept apart from the other Reformers, a chalked line showing the margin of their liberty. ”

“ It is wonderful to an American woman, who still retains a vivid recollection of Presidential Elections, to see two warring factions at the most critical point of dispute mutually agree to put down arms and wait over the Sabbath, and more wonderful yet seems the self-restraint of going without the daily paper. ”

“ Hennen Jennings and Perkins, to President Kruger. Mr. Jennings reported the President as having listened to them attentively while they conveyed to him what they believed to be the sentiment of the Americans on the Rand. They assured him that, although the Americans recognised the rights of the Boers as well as those of the Uitlanders, unless he could in some way meet the demand of the unenfranchised people of the Transvaal he could not expect their support when the revolution came. They also told him that the Americans wanted to see the Republic preserved, but on a truer basis. ”

“ First Week.—Petitions in favour of the Reformers are being signed all over the country. All feeling against the Reform Committee has veered round, and the strongest sympathy is now felt for them. Only the extreme of the Boer and Hollander factions chant the old story of their trying to subvert the Government—conniving with Jameson, and then deserting him, &c., &c.
Landdrost Schutte and Captain Shields quarrel over who shall have charge of the jail. ”

“ Mrs. George Farrar had come from Johannesburg, and together we went to see our husbands. Our visit was limited to five minutes. We found the four men haggard, but apparently cheerful. The condemned cell had an earthen floor. It had been newly whitewashed and reeked of antiseptics. Four canvas stretchers, a tin pail filled with water, and a dipper, furnished it. A negro murderer had been its last occupant. I sat on one of the canvas cots with an arm around my husband and holding Colonel Rhodes' hand. Mrs. Farrar was sitting on the opposite cot, locked in her husband's embrace. ”

“ February 23.—I am housed with my ill husband. Betty comes in and goes out in constant service to the sufferers from the dynamite explosion. We can think of nothing else. All the tragic stories we hear from friends and read in the papers fill our days with sadness.
A friend of my cook's was visiting a neighbour at Fordsburg. She stood on the threshold, an infant in her arms, and a three-year-old boy at her side. The explosion came. Her baby was killed outright, and the child clinging to her skirts dropped with one leg ripped entirely from the socket. ”

“ Some of these men had trekked for days in ox-wagons before reaching the railroad to take train for Pretoria. A large banquet was given in their honour. They insisted upon the liberated leaders being invited as guests—but those criminals, leaders, and instigators did not attend, deeming it injudicious under the circumstances.
My husband flew to me, who am still kept indoors. He came with a light in his face I had not seen for months. 'We are free!'
June 12.—This is a gala day in Johannesburg. Everybody is joyous—Kruger's name is cheered everywhere. ”

“ Not a bird's call, nor a chirp from the tiny creatures which hide in the grass. A white moon, a wide heaven filled with strange stars, and the tall moon-flowers at the gate lifting up their mute white trumpets to the night wind. ”

“ The protracted excitement has caused several deaths from heart failure, and I heard of two cases of acute mania. There would doubtless have been a far greater mortality but for the fact that Johannesburg is populated by young and, for the most part, vigorous men and women.
I hear that Dr. Jameson answered, when asked after his first night in the Pretoria jail if there was anything he would like to have, 'Nothing, thank you, but flea powder.'
I sat on the verandah with Sir Sydney Shippard and Betty this evening and watched the 'Zarps' [4] take control of the town. ”

“ It was a man's view; birth and death could never mean so little to a woman!
January 4.—The High Commissioner has arrived at Pretoria.
They say poor Dr. Jameson is greatly dejected, and never speaks to a soul.
January 5.—This beautiful Sunday, quiet and serene, dawns upon us free of the sounds of the past week. No cries of newspaper boys nor hurry of wheels. A couple of bands of recruits drilled for a while sedately on Government Square, and then marched away. ”

“ The Reform Committee, in obedience to Sir Jacobus de Wet's long and prolix solicitation, and the strong appeal of Sir Sydney Shippard, assuring them that Jameson's life was in imminent danger, and the Government had made Johannesburg's disarmament the one condition of his safety, laid down their arms to preserve the life of a man already protected by the terms of his own surrender. ”

“ A large mass meeting is called to receive these gentlemen on their return from Pretoria and to decide upon the Americans' future course of action.
The mail train to Cape Town was crowded with hundreds of terror-stricken women and children sent away by anxious husbands to a place of safety. The ordinary accommodation was far too inadequate to supply the sudden rush. They were crowded like sheep on cattle trucks. I fear the journey of a thousand miles will be one of great discomfort. [1]
There are many anxious souls in Johannesburg to-night. ”

“ These were times which proved men's natures. It distilled the very essence of a man, and if anywhere in his make-up was the salt of selfishness, it was pretty sure to appear. Many who before had appreciated Charlie Butter's open hospitality, realised now that it was more than kindliness which prompted him to give up his last swallow of whisky to a man who was older or weaker than himself. ”

“ A Committee of three is appointed to visit Pretoria to-morrow and again lay before the President a statement of the demands of the Uitlanders, the attitude of the Americans and their wish to preserve the integrity of the Republic, but also to warn him that, if the Government insists upon ignoring these just demands, and thus precipitates war, the Americans must array themselves on the side of the other Uitlanders. ”

“ The morning of January 10th, Johannesburg disarmed, and the Reformers in prison, the President of the Transvaal Republic issued a proclamation offering pardon to all who should lay down their arms, and declaring them to be exempt from prosecution on account of what had occurred at Johannesburg—'with the exception of all persons or bodies who may appear to be principal criminals, leaders, instigators, or perpetrators of the troubles at Johannesburg and suburbs. ”

“ He is intimate with the frequenters of the hotel bar, and on speaking terms with half the town. The day seems endless.
Things have gone so far, men want the issue settled, and perhaps the irresponsible are eager for a little blood-letting; there are certain primitive instincts which are latent in us all, and the thought of war is stimulating.
Mr. Lace returned this afternoon and reported that he had ridden through the lines to Jameson. He had had very little speech with the doctor, as the time was short, and the messenger bearing the proclamation of the High Commissioner was also present. ”

“ Feeling is strong and bitter against the leaders; they are held responsible for all the trouble brought about by the Jameson invasion.
Commandant Cronje's Burgher force paraded the street this morning—they are the men who captured Jameson. Jameson is the god of the hour, and Johannesburg resented the intrusion; but for the sake of their hero, still in the power of the Government, there was no indication of intolerance beyond a few audible sarcasms; remarks which were answered in kind by the Burghers.
Betty says they were an interesting-looking body of men ”

“ The four leaders are kept apart. After much ceremony my husband was allowed to see his sister at the door of the inner court where they are housed. Jameson and his men are in a tiny cottage by themselves, and no communication whatever is allowed between the prisoners. Arrangements have been made with the authorities to allow food to be served to the Reformers from the Pretoria Club at the prisoners' expense. The head jailer, Du Plessis, is a cousin of Kruger's. A ponderous man with a wild beard, a blood-shot eye, and a heavy voice. ”