First Boer War

“ 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. ”

“ As events turned out there was much of danger and death in these determined raids into native territory—conquered and partially cleared of population by the wars of Moselkatze and Tshaka—but at first the contempt of the Boers for all savages, their absolute belief in themselves as a chosen people and in their shotguns as invincible allies, made the movement an apparently simple matter. ”

“ The Transvaal commandoes had assembled, but transport and commissariat were so defective that the Boers were in danger of starvation. The want of rain, too, had left the veldt bare and dry, without grass or sustenance for horses and cattle. It would, therefore, be almost impossible without commissariat for men and beasts to subsist. Delay was thus forced upon the Boers. The transport arrangements were improved, while the commandoes watched eagerly for the first rains, due in early October, which were to be the signal of action for them, and of slaughter for the hapless British soldiery. ”

“ The hard work the Boers had to do in the first days of their appearance before completing the investment of Ladysmith, obstructed their plan of campaign, which was to beat back the British at all points in Natal and lock them up in Durban and Pietermaritzburg. The storm centers in the latest days of October, after three weeks of war, were Ladysmith, Kimberley and Mafeking; and the mobile masses of the Boers were held in check as the transports loaded with soldiers from England drew nigh. But the British were not the men to defend themselves in trenches only. ”

“ The effects of the increased range and destructive power of modern weapons have not been appreciated by them. Close formations are still the rule, and the history of the first few battles in the next European war will be a record of terrible slaughter. The lessons of the Boer campaign are ignored. They ascribe the failures and defeats of the British forces to the defective training and want of morale of our troops, and disdain to learn from a “nation of farmers.” ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ At once the Boers replied. Two shells, beautifully aimed, fell right amongst the British guns, putting one ammunition waggon out of action. Our weapons were old and feeble 7-pounders, the Boer guns long-range quick-firing 14-pounders—the weapons lost in the shameful Raid, and now by strange retribution pointed against the brave men who had to pay for the deplorable mistakes of the past. Nothing but withdrawal could have saved the Natal Artillery. The guns fell back and the British force hastened out of range, while General French telegraphed instantly for reinforcements. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Even if every allowance be made for the strategical advantages possessed by the Boers, of fighting in their own land on interior lines in a sparsely populated country peculiarly adopted for guerilla, it is difficult to account for their success if the tests by which the efficiency of a European army is measured are applied to them. It may be that war has hitherto been regarded too exclusively as a statical and dynamical problem and that the moral element has been overlooked. It certainly was overlooked in South Africa ”

“ Against these the Transvaal alone could put into the field 40,000 or 50,000 men with 70 or 80 guns. The Orange Free State could dispose of 10,000 to 15,000 men with 30 or more guns. Thus, if the Boer forces had advanced in the third week of September, they could unquestionably have swept the British out of Natal, and have made themselves masters of the whole of northern Cape Colony. With the fighting qualities which they have since displayed, they must have surrounded and captured the diminutive British detachments which kept vigil close to the frontiers of a formidable military power. ”

“ Commissary Departments kill more soldiers than are killed by bullets. When living on nothing but "mealie pap" and fresh meat, all are healthy, strong, energetic and full of fight. The Boer war has proved this; for during the last two years of the war we had nothing else to eat, and we lost but one man from sickness; and did the hardest work and best fighting, and in the end, when the general surrender came, the world had never seen 24,000 stronger, healthier and more dashing patriots than those who laid down their faithful rifles to save their women and children from extinction. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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 sent an ultimatum requiring the surrender of those weapons. Despite the protestation of the chief and his people that not more than eight guns had been bartered for hunting, which had later proved true, a commando was sent against them under Commandant Paul Krüger, now President Krüger. Many of the natives were slain, their villages burnt, their cattle seized, and great numbers of the tribe taken captive for distribution as servants among the Boer farmers in the Transvaal. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The chief care, concern and anxiety of the Boer is that a government of the people must not by any chance be established in Transvaal. It is the elementary principle of the Boer disposition and government, that there are no real "people" except Boers, who place the Hottentot, the Englishman, the Zulu and the Kaffir, the American, the German and the Frenchman on the same level. ”

“ They were ground down by an enormous taxation, towards which the Boers themselves contributed practically nothing, and the revenue drawn from them was spent in the purchase of munitions of war, artillery, and fortifications, so enormously beyond the needs of the country, that it was no secret that they were intended not only for the defence of the republic against invasion, but for a general rising of the Boer population and the establishment of Dutch supremacy throughout the whole of South Africa. ”