South Africa and the Transvaal War, Vol. 7 (of 8) / The Guerilla War, from February 1901 to the Conclusion of Hostilities

by Louis Creswicke

THE SITUATION—AUGUST

In May Sir Alfred Milner paid a visit to England, and his reception in Great Britain left no doubt in the mind of people at home and abroad regarding the determination of the Government to adhere to their South African policy. The King conferred on him the dignity of a Baron, and both in the City of London and in that of Cape Town there were rejoicings at the honour done to one who had served the cause of Great Britain with such skill and unswerving devotion. In August Lord Milner returned to his duties as High Commissioner for South Africa and Administrator of the Transvaal and Orange River Colony, much benefited by the brief rest from his labours.

As it was found necessary to adopt sterner measures to crush the lingering guerilla warfare, Lord Kitchener issued, on the 7th of August, the following Proclamation:—

“Whereas the late Orange Free State and the late South African Republic have been annexed to his Majesty’s dominions;

“And whereas his Majesty’s forces are and have for some considerable time been in complete possession of the seats of Government of both the aforesaid territories, with their public offices, and the whole machinery of administration, as well as of all the principal towns and the whole of the railway lines;

“And whereas the great majority of the Burghers of the two late Republics, to the number of thirty-five thousand, exclusive of those who have fallen in the war, are now either prisoners or have submitted to his Majesty’s Government, and are living peaceably in towns or camps under the control of his Majesty’s forces;

“And whereas the Burghers of the late Republics still in arms against his Majesty are not only few in numbers, but have lost almost all their guns and munitions of war, and are devoid of regular military organisation, and are therefore unable to carry on regular warfare or to offer any organised resistance to his Majesty’s forces in any part of the country;

“And whereas those Burghers who are still in arms, though unable to carry on regular warfare, continue to make isolated attacks upon small posts and detachments of his Majesty’s forces, to plunder or destroy property, and to damage the railway and telegraph lines, both in the Orange River Colony and the Transvaal and in other portions of his Majesty’s South African Dominions;

“And whereas the country is thus kept in a state of disturbance, checking the resumption of agricultural and industrial pursuits;

“And whereas his Majesty’s Government is determined to put an end to a state of things which is aimlessly prolonging bloodshed and destruction and inflicting ruin upon the great majority of the inhabitants, who are anxious to live in peace and to earn a livelihood for themselves and their families;

“And whereas it is just to proceed against those still resisting, and especially against those persons who, being in a position of authority, are responsible for the continuance of the present state of lawlessness, and are instigating their fellow-Burghers to continue their hopeless resistance to his Majesty’s Government;

“Now therefore I, Lord Kitchener, &c., under instructions from his Majesty’s Government, proclaim and make known as follows:

“All commandants, field cornets, and leaders of armed bands, being Burghers of the late Republics, still engaged in resisting his Majesty’s forces, whether in the Orange River Colony and the Transvaal or in any other portion of his Majesty’s South African Dominions, and all members of the Governments of the late Orange Free State and the late South African Republic, shall, unless they surrender before the 15th of September next, be permanently banished from South Africa; the cost of the maintenance of the families of all Burghers in the field who shall not have surrendered by 15th September shall be recoverable from such Burghers, and shall be a charge upon their property movable and immovable in the two Colonies.”

The Proclamation was the result of correspondence which had taken place between Sir H. E. M’Callum, Governor of Natal, and Mr. Chamberlain. The Governor’s telegram, dated 24th July, ran thus:—

“I sent you by last mail long minute submitted to Ministers containing following suggestions:

“Protracted continuance of hostilities vitally affecting interests of Natal is viewed with grave concern. Raids into the Colony frequently render it impossible for loyalists to return to farms and avocations. Feeling of unrest among natives created by raids, revenue suffering, trade paralysed, railways monopolised by military, towns overcrowded with refugees and persons awaiting return to Transvaal, stock being affected with disease due to introduction of captured stock from the new Colonies, famine prices prevailing, Colony still subject to censorship and martial law.

“Under these circumstances Ministers advocate sterner measures to crush present guerilla warfare. They point out that Boers still fighting have little to lose, that their women and children are protected and well treated, and that their farms are safe from confiscation, therefore Boers free from anxiety and encouraged to continue in the field, growing accustomed to life of pillaging and looting, and communicate frequently with refugee camps which thus are source of danger. Those who are not rebels know that if captured they will be treated as prisoners of war and released at the conclusion of hostilities.

“Ministers believe that excellent effect would be produced if it were made generally known that if Burghers now in the field do not surrender by given date, say, within one month, cost of maintenance of all women and children will be chargeable against immovable property of Burghers in the field; also that Boer generals and leaders in the field should be informed that unless they and their commandos surrender by date specified they will be banished from South Africa for life when captured.

“In making these observations and recommendations Ministers disclaim intention of appearing to reflect on military operations, of which they realise the immense difficulties. They will continue to render the Imperial Government every assistance to secure settlement and pacification.”

A telegram followed from Mr. Chamberlain to Lord Kitchener containing the draft of the Proclamation, which was to be issued with the least possible delay. Lord Kitchener was desired before issuing it, however, to communicate its terms to the Governors of Cape Colony and Natal, and ascertain whether their governments agreed to them. The proposal was approved by the Colonial governors, the document received a few emendations, and was issued as above.

There was, naturally, an outcry at all sterner measures that were proposed, by what may be called the “Prolong-the-War Party”—the pro-Boer orators who were daily, by their excited utterances, betraying the Boers into the belief that their showy sympathy would bring about practical results. But in reality the stern measure was intended as a merciful measure to save desperate men from a suicidal policy of resistance to the inevitable, the country from devastation, and women and children from suffering. Their territories were annexed, their leaders, most of them, were exiles or prisoners, hostilities had developed from guerilla warfare to simple brigandage and outrage, and the British were keeping up the supply of troops with the determination of “fighting to a finish.” Indeed, by the middle of 1901, there were 138,000 regulars, 58,000 Colonials, 23,000 yeomen, 20,000 militia, and 10,000 volunteers—a total of 250,000 men under arms in South Africa. With this ever-increasing multitude bearing down upon them, the days of the belligerents were numbered, but this they doggedly refused to believe, or, even if they believed the worst, they decided—like the wasp who parts with his sting only to die—on leaving behind them the largest legacy of pain and trouble the circumstances would admit.

The South African Constabulary by the middle of the year had grown into an effective force, and were operating from the vicinity of the railways and occupying fortified posts, and thus rendering themselves exceedingly valuable in checking the efforts of the enemy to pass through the cordon around the cleared districts. The Boers, by the loss of their ox-waggons, were seriously impeded in regard to their supply arrangements, and the series of captures which took place in all parts of the country made a considerable drain on their numbers in the field. Still, small gangs of three to four hundred men roving loosely over the country could, in cases of emergency, concentrate and cause vast trouble and annoyance and even danger to the small mobile columns, broken up as they were, in order to operate over vast areas in search of the scattered hordes.

Viewing the intense labour and increasing strain suffered by the Commander-in-Chief at this time, it is pleasing to quote the letter of an officer competent to speak regarding the magnificence of the steady if slow work that was being accomplished:—

“We are eleven hours a day in the saddle on patrol duty, and good solid work is being done by mobile columns. You will not get much of our movements through the Press, as the policy of secrecy is really the only safe one with the Cape Colony now undermined by rebels from north to south. It would be difficult to over-praise Lord Kitchener for his remarkable power of self-control and ability to keep his own counsel. His ceaseless efforts to get the right men into the higher and brigade commands are recognised by all of us who have suffered in the past from incompetent leaders. In spite of the clap-trap that is being talked in Parliament by ignorant and vain knights of the shires, I can assure you that a more humane and pacific general never directed a force on active service, and this testimony is from Boer and British alike.”

Considerable stir was created in England among the so-called humanitarians regarding the mortality of children in the concentration camps, where the Boer families had of necessity to be housed and cared for. The mortality was certainly high, but on strict inquiry it was found that mainly through the ignorance, listlessness, and idleness of the Boer mothers the sick infants were treated wrongly or neglected. Dr. Jane Waterston, late President of the Women’s Rand Relief Committee, in a letter to the Cape Times, with level-headed brevity discussed some points which the Boer sympathisers had carefully ignored. She pointed out that—

“Ordinary colonial women who have been through the stress and strain of the last two years are not very favourably impressed by the present stir in England over the assumed privations of the Boer women and children. If looting, flogging, ruining, and train-wrecking can be dignified by such a name as war, they hold that in all matters of supply our fighting men, who, as well as fighting our battles, guard our women-folk or our sick men, injured by wounds or disease in our service, come first and foremost; after them come our own civilian population; and lastly come our prisoners, or those Boers who have surrendered or been brought in.”

Again she said:—

“Large as was the sum collected in Great Britain by voluntary subscriptions, at no time did the women and children of the loyal colonial refugees of the poorer classes receive more than mere sustenance. Judging, however, by some of the hysterical whining going on in England at the present time it would seem as if we might neglect or half starve our faithful soldiers, and keep our civilian population eating their hearts out here as long as we fed and pampered people who have not even the grace to say ‘thank you’ for the care bestowed on them.

“As we see it, the problem before our military men is, how to manage, feed, and care for large numbers of women and children, and yet not feed the enemy and so prolong the war, or rather existing brigandage. If the women are left on the farms with food, that food will be promptly handed over to the commandos, who would lightly take it all, and trust to British soft-heartedness not to let their women and children die of starvation, but to replenish all the empty larders by means of scattered convoys, which would give them at the same time grand chances of loot and first-rate practice in sniping. To obviate this the military have had to make up their minds either to let the women and children starve on their farms or else gather them into large concentration camps. This war has been remarkable for two things: first, the small regard that the Boers, from the highest to the lowest, have had for their womankind; and secondly, the great care and consideration the victors have had for the same, very often ungrateful, women.

“It is the fault of the Boer men, not ours, that their women and children are in concentration camps. The task of our pro tem. rulers is not made easier by the fact that no consideration of the stuff on a supply train being partly meant for their own wives and children would hinder Boer husbands and fathers from wrecking the train and destroying the food. They comfort themselves with the thought that the soldiers may have to go on half rations and tighten their belts, but ‘these fools of English will serve out as usual the daily ration to the refugee camps.’ At present there is the danger that the Boers will waken up to have a care for their womenfolk, and will go on fighting for some time so as to keep them in comfortable winter quarters at our expense, and thus our women and children will lose a few more of their husbands and fathers.”

In corroboration of Dr. Waterston’s statements it may also be noted that the Government, while spending hundreds of thousands of pounds monthly on the Boer refugees, had devoted only £50,000 towards the Imperial Relief fund for helping the loyalists.

Naturally, among the British sufferers, the continual attempts to propitiate an irreconcilable enemy were looked upon with disgust and even suspicion, and very rejoiced were they to find that steps were taken to arrest and remove Boer sympathisers in Johannesburg and elsewhere, who were known to be assisting in a widening conspiracy to get surrendered burghers to return to their commandos, and so reproduce a recrudescence of hostilities. On all sides the lying tongues of the Boer party, who had declared war and quitted the field, strove to urge the remnants towards further resistance by declaring that Great Britain was divided against itself, and that it had not sufficient endurance to see the matter through.

CHURCH SQUARE, PRETORIA.
Drawing by Donald E. M’Cracken.

CHAPTER XII

ORANGE RIVER COLONY—AUGUST

At this time, as we know, the troops of Generals Bruce-Hamilton and C. Knox were engaged in clearing operations to the south of the Riet River, but, in consequence of a recrudescence of activity in the south-eastern districts of the Orange Colony, the operations were somewhat curtailed, and attention was directed to the offending quarter. The activity showed itself firstly on the 12th of August, when some 250 Boers under Boshoff, fleeing from the trap that Elliot had prepared for them, burst through the line of blockhouses near Sanna’s Post. Secondly, another marauding gang of the same size, under Kruitzinger, in evading French’s hunters, east of Norval’s Pont, had penetrated the Springfontein-Bethulie line near Providence Siding, on their way to Boesmans Kop—an old and favourite haunt. Finally, a similar party under Smuts and Dreyer, on the 15th, had succeeded in squeezing past the line of police posts on the Modder, to the north of Petrusburg. These three movements suggested the possible concentration of the raiders in the now clear area between Wepener, Rouxville, and Smithfield, and consequently General Knox at once directed his attention to this quarter, in order to prevent any fresh junction of forces, and the entry of swelled commandos into Cape Colony. He therefore moved his troops from west to east of the railway, so as to interpose them between the enemy and the river line. Major Damant’s column was detached from General Bruce-Hamilton’s command, and the Royal Dragoons, under Lord Basing, were brought by rail from the Transvaal to Springfontein, while Colonel Western moved from Bloemfontein to Bethulie to join General Hart, who with Col. the Hon. H. D. Murray’s column, the Connaught Rangers, was guarding the river west and east of Aliwal North.

Nor was this all. Colonel Sir Henry Rawlinson was ordered to pursue Boshoff’s guerillas, who were scurrying through the Bloemfontein-Ladybrand line, but these nimble ones, bent rather on flight than fight, knowingly avoided contact with the pursuers. Kruitzinger, gathering the bedraggled remnants of commandos as he went, veered towards the Basuto border, hugged it gingerly, and stealthily crept towards the river, so that, on the morning of the 4th of September, he succeeded with 300 men, despite the vigilance of our troops, in effecting a crossing into Cape Colony at Kiba Drift. The Boers did not, however, escape Major Damant, who was hunting for them in the neighbourhood of Spitzkop. He scented them out at Oudam, to the west of Boesmanskop, and was off with 300 mounted men, 2 guns, and a pom-pom to attack them. The marauders were on the alert, and they, on the 14th, galloped off as fast as their mounts would carry them. For a good ten miles galloped hunters and hunted, till at last the quarry, dispersing, sought almost inaccessible refuge in the Marsfontein Hills. But 4 prisoners, 20 horses, 6 mules, 5 rifles, a heliograph, and the Commandant’s despatch-box fell into Major Damant’s hands. From the prisoners it was discovered that they formed part of Delarey’s gang, who were moving under Dreyer to reinforce Kruitzinger at the Cape. Meanwhile, Lord Basing was hunting around Boesmanskop, and Colonel Thorneycroft’s two columns, under Colonel Minchin and Major Copeman, were working their way (from Reddersburg and Smithfield respectively) towards Zandfontein, twelve miles east of Rouxville, where they met at the end of August. The enemy, ensconced in the kloofs, crannies, and kopjes between Zastron and the Orange River, succeeded in evading them, not a very marvellous feat considering their intimate acquaintanceship with the geographical features of this locality.

Colonel Pilcher’s two columns of General Knox’s force, under Colonel Taylor and Major Lean, now marched from the west into Bloemfontein and Edenburg, and from thence south to Bethulie, while Colonel Pilcher pushed up the valley of the Caledon towards Smithfield, thus freeing the troops of Colonel Thorneycroft and Lord Basing, who were able to scour further east. About this time, 25th of August, Colonel Sir Henry Rawlinson, marching south from Dewetsdorp, encountered a detached bunch of Smuts’ men scuttling east of Reddersburg. A brilliant chase to the north-east followed, the mounted troops under Major Gosset pursuing with such dash that 25 prisoners out of the party of 120 were secured, and 30 of their horses captured. In September, after the column had obtained supplies at Edenburg, further activities all along the Basuto border were engaged in, and, on the 8th the mischievous hordes were driven north from a position they had taken up in the vicinity of Elandsberg. But Smuts and his following, despite the close proximity of Colonel Thorneycroft, were successful in finding a loophole at Kiba Drift, and escaped into Cape Colony on the 4th. There he was quickly “spotted” by General Hart, who pursued him towards Ladygrey. Both General Hart and General French had now their hands full. Kruitzinger’s and Smuts’ men, who had effected a crossing, required to be dealt with, so, in order to reinforce General French, Colonel Pilcher moved from the Caledon Valley to Burghersdorp on the 7th of September.