Boer War

“ The nearer they drew the hotter became the enemy's fire, till it was wonderful to observers that any human being could live in it. And still the enemy was invisible, and the British troops had nothing to fire at. Men sobbed with rage at the fact that they were so helpless. The two field batteries, far too few for the work, could produce no impression whatever upon the dimly-seen Boer trenches, within which the enemy lay in almost perfect security, and the Boer guns left them alone, as if in derision, devoting all their energy to the advancing line of soldiery. ”

“ Whatever views may be held as to the origin of the Boer war—that it was forced on by mining magnates, or that it was the inevitable result of a reactionary system which threatened our hold on South Africa—it remains one of the very few examples of a war which, in the long run, left things better than they had been, and satisfied the aspirations of the majority of the conquered. ”

“ When morning dawned again—the morning of the Sabbath—the awful havoc wrought by our shell was for the first time seen. Down the slopes of the hill, and away across the flats, Boer and Briton lay cold and motionless, separately and in groups; sometimes huddled together as if still engaged in a deadly tussle, and sometimes side by side in seeming friendship. Farther away, near the long ridge which the enemy had held, scores of mangled bodies were found, and at once handed over to the Boers, while the poor wounded wretches were tended to by our surgeons. ”

“ Lord Methuen might at any time be cut off from his base; General Gatacre might be driven back to the sea; even General Buller, with 20,000 British troops on the line of the Tugela, might be in peril, if only the Boers were equal to their opportunities. And dangers even more terrible than these loomed upon the stormy horizon. How if the Cape burst into rebellion and the Dutch there threw in their lot with their victorious kinsmen? How if our enemies of the Continent seized upon the occasion to overthrow the Empire? Nowhere had Britain a friend. ”

“ No one who lived in Europe during the Boer war is ignorant of the immense desire of both France and Germany to intervene on behalf of the Boers, and they certainly would have intervened not only because it afforded them a good opportunity to crush England, which one of them openly and the other less openly desired to do, but because such a war would have been popular with the masses in both countries. ”

“ It has so happened, therefore, that the Boers, as the ruling and dominant class, have hopelessly failed to master or comprehend the new conditions with which they have been called upon to deal. They have not, as a body, shown either capacity or desire to treat the new developments with even a remote appreciation of their inherent value and inevitable trend. The Boer has simply set his back against the floodgates, apparently oblivious or indifferent to the fact that the hugely accumulating forces behind must one day burst every barrier he may choose to set up. ”

“ Then followed the din of the thirty British howitzers and field guns, bombarding the Boer trenches might and main to take the pressure off the Scotsmen. Their much-needed aid was not without effect. It was no longer possible for the Boers to fire with complete impunity, and though the Highlanders could not retreat or move without drawing a storm of bullets, they no longer lost heavily. Like the British troops at the Modder River, they lay flat on the ground behind what cover they could find. ”

“ Our Army, our generals, had become the slaves of routine, as a wise foreign officer wrote. They had failed to understand what the Boers had fully grasped—the need of high intelligence as well as brute courage in the fighting man, and the immense potentialities of modern weapons. It is not the least unsatisfactory reflection that the fighting men whom we recruited at the eleventh hour for war from the ranks of our Colonists, proved themselves as good as our professional soldiers. ”

“ The movement of the guns did not begin till darkness was closing down. The crackle of rifles still proceeded from the summit of Spion Kop, but the heavy, incessant bombardment had now abated. Truth to tell, the Boers were in the most grievous discouragement. If we had suffered, they had suffered too. All their artillery fire had failed visibly to shake our soldiers' grip on the hill; from the rear of their firing line, as from ours, there was a procession of unwounded but faint-hearted men. Their numbers were less than ours, and their men were worn out with incessant fighting. ”

“ All they wanted was a free home, conducted in their own gipsy fashion—their kraals by the river, their camp fires, their flocks and herds, and immunity from the vexation of monopolies and taxes. And here at once will be seen how the seeds sprang up of a rooted antagonism between Boer and Briton that nothing can ever remove, and no diplomacy can smooth away. The Boer nature naturally inclines to a sluggish content, while the British one invariably pants for advance. The temperamental tug of war, therefore, has been one that has grown stronger and stronger with the progress of years. ”

“ Lord Roberts arrived, and at the head of his troops made his entry. There was no looting or plundering. The British Army, always famous for its rigid discipline in war, filed in in perfect order, and paid for everything which it took. Military police patrolled the streets; sentries stood in front of every store. The hungry and thirsty khaki-clad men bought up all the bread and milk that they could get, and the Boers began almost to bless a war which had brought them such customers. ”

“ The ground traversed up to this point had been rough in the extreme, steep hillocks alternating with deep-cut watercourses and mimosa copses. Over these the men blundered in the dark, taking every precaution to hide their movements from the Boers. Smoking and talking were forbidden; the little force picked its way in silence. All was still but for the fitful sputtering of the rifle fire exchanged between the outposts, which echoed in the mountain hollows on the left. ”

“ The two British batteries on the field pushed in upon the centre of the Boer position, and at a range of about 2,000 yards began to deliver a storm of shrapnel upon the village and the Boer trenches. The whereabouts of these had to be guessed, for there was still no sign of the enemy. The battlefield appeared empty of men—the British soldiers prostrate on the ground, the Boers artfully concealed; and few who fought through that long day in our ranks saw even a single opponent. ”

“ A few of the naturalised Boers, who were most denunciatory of the British before the war and urged their fellow-countrymen to resort to arms, succeeded in evading the call to the field and were most energetic in supplying bread and supplies to the Government. Nor was their patriotism dimmed by many reverses of the army, and they selfishly demanded that the war should be continued indefinitely. Europeans and Americans who partook of the protection of the Government in times of peace, were transformed by war into grasping, insinuating contractors who revelled in the country’s misfortune. ”

“ From what we have experienced we do not consider ourselves too optimistic in anticipating a successful ending to the contest. For [Pg 22] the first time in the history of Boer warfare have the Boers been defeated at every turn by a force far inferior in point of numbers. Since the first attack on Saturday, October 14th, they fly directly our guns are heard. Safely out of range they fire into the town, but they do not appear to be pining for another attempt at storming Mafeking. ”

“ For the moment the Horse Artillery were ordered to silence the Boer gun—a task which it achieved with the greatest expedition. Then the general boldly determined to try a new kind of strategy, which was nothing more nor less than to walk his men round the Boers, and leave them disconsolately holding their kopje against no one, and reflecting sadly upon the fact that at last the "rooineks" could move as fast as or faster than themselves. ”

“ It was not from the ranks of the Boers that men came who were capable of making the Transvaal an arsenal of military power, a close corporation of clever financial government, the head of the great Afrikander movement of the past decade, a force of organized strength for the destruction of British rule in South Africa, and a diplomatic factor at the capitals of Europe. The Boers were, and are, simply the instruments of clever adventurers from Holland. ”

“ The Boers desire to gain nothing but their countries’ independence; the British have naught to lose except thousands of valuable lives if they continue in their determination to erase the two nations. Unless the Boers soon decide to end the war voluntarily, the real struggle will only begin when the Imperial forces enter the mountainous region in the north-eastern part of the Transvaal, and then General Lucas Meyer’s prophecy that the bones of one hundred thousand British soldiers will lay bleaching on the South African veld before the British are victorious may be more than realised. ”

“ The greatest difficulty with which the British had to contend was that there was no enemy to be seen, no clear target to fire at. The dancing blaze of the Boer Mausers was unaccompanied by smoke, and gave no object for the sights of rifle or field gun. The Boers themselves lay perdu in deep entrenchments, firing in almost complete security through loop-holes. Their most advanced position in the scrub near Colenso, not 300 yards from Colonel Long's guns, was hidden by the undergrowth. ”

“ Finally, the strength of the second Canadian contingent was raised to 1,300 men with six 12-pounder guns, but even so, it was far below the wishes of the people. The men who were picked were active and intelligent, accustomed to an outdoor life, sitting their horses like centaurs. They speedily showed in war that they were a full match for the Boers, man for man, in marksmanship, the art of taking cover, and stubborn courage, while they had that high spirit which preaches attack rather than defence, and which the Boers, among their many fine qualities, altogether lacked. ”

“ The Boer War has still some curious issues of which no notice has been taken by the public at large. One of the principal, perhaps indeed the most important of these, is that, though brought about by material ambitions of certain people, it ended by being fought against these very same people, and that its conclusion eliminated them from public life instead of adding to their influence and their power. ”

“ From the magazine rifles of the Boers poured a continuous stream of lead upon the struggling, confused mass of British soldiers, "packed like sardines." The disorder was terrible; in the darkness the men could not discern their officers or sergeants and knew not whom to obey or how and where to rally. All manner of cries and orders were heard: "Lie down!" "Extend!" "Fix bayonets!" "Charge!" "Retire!" "No, Forward!" Two companies did charge, but, stung by the hail of bullets from in front and fired into also by the excited men behind, had to fall back. ”

“ He has the guns and ammunition, the money lies in abundance beneath our feet, and the men he will obtain by harping on that independence for which all are sworn to lay down their lives. Once the fire is kindled, a gigantic and terrible blaze will sweep over the land, Englishmen who have married Boer wives and settled here will find themselves opposed to their own country, throughout Africa there will be treachery, the bad blood of the Dutch population will be roused, and many of Her Majesty’s subjects will go over to the Boers. ”

“ The Australians showed great steadiness and courage. A small party under Captain Cameron dismounted and covered the retreat of the others with a rapid and accurate fire. "They shot like lightning, not volley after volley straight in front of them, as do regular soldiers," said a Boer afterwards, "but every man picked his man and shot to kill. We dared not face them." The Boers endeavoured to work round them and cut them off, but at the right moment the colonials made a dash, mounted their horses, and rode off under a hail of bullets, with only one man slightly wounded. ”

“ It had gone into the war an efficient, hardened, "nineteenth" century machine. That sort of machine simply couldn't cope with Boer rifles, backed by the amazing Boer marksmanship. As the Cuban imbroglio put new life into the Army of the United States, the South African business rejuvenated, in every sense of the word, the British Army. The Spaniards and the Boers, therefore, at the turn of the century, played a great part in the defeat of the superb German Army of 1914-1918. ”

“ The Boers had Louis Botha—young, brave, active, a born leader of men—who had held a small band steady through the evening, and had even succeeded in bringing up reinforcements. The British troops had no one but Colonel Thorneycroft, and he, weary with twenty-four hours of terrible conflict, appalled by the manner in which the force on the summit had melted and suffered in the struggle, unconscious that the enemy was equally hard hit, and with no knowledge that help was at hand, was in no condition to reach a cool and balanced judgment. ”

“ An attack on a similar train three days earlier, at Kraaipan, near Mafeking, was the first overt act of war.
The Reserves mobilised.
Yet there was outward calm. The reservists answered the call like Englishmen; like men, that is to say, who know a painful duty lies before them and will do it. Scarcely one was missing when the time given them to rejoin had elapsed. Deserters, who had shipped for America, of their own free will came back to fight the Boers. Men rose from beds of sickness that they might serve with the old colours and not betray the confidence reposed in them. ”