FOOTNOTES:
[8] Colonel Benson, who has died of the wounds received in the attack, had played an active part in the present campaign, and had accomplished much good work. He belonged to the Royal Artillery, served in the Soudan, and was present in the engagement of Hasheen, where he was slightly wounded, and at the destruction of Tamai. He also took part in the expedition to Ashanti under Sir Francis Scott in 1895, and went with the Dongola Expedition under Lord Kitchener in 1896 as brigade-major of the mounted corps. He was twice mentioned in despatches, and was granted several decorations.
[9] Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Davis Guinness, R.A., was the eldest son of the late Mr. Thomas Hosea Guinness, who married Mary, heiress of Mr. Charles Davis, of Coolmanna, county Carlow. He was educated at Eton, became lieutenant in the Royal Artillery February 18, 1880; captain on January 19, 1888; and major on September 23, 1897. He married in 1889 the Hon. Lucy Matilda, eldest daughter of the sixth Lord Massy, and leaves a son, Hugh Spencer, who was born in 1890.
CHAPTER XV
THE CLOSE OF 1901—PROGRESS IN NOVEMBER AND DECEMBER
The establishment of constabulary posts from the Valley of the Modder towards Bultfontein and Boshof was being carried out simultaneously with the completion of a blockhouse line from Kroonstad to Coal Mine Drift on the Vaal. A blockhouse line from Kroonstad by Lindley, Bethlehem to Harrismith, and another by Heilbron and Frankfort towards Tafel Kop (a favourite Boer haunt and signalling station) and beyond it by Botha’s Pass, promised to curtail the enemy’s scheme of operations and push him into remote corners whence he would be unable to interfere either with the proposed extension of the rail from Harrismith to Bethlehem, or with another line working from Bloemfontein to the Waterworks and thence to Ladybrand.