Brand and Niekerk took a strong patrol down to the mining camp in the Gwanda district, to find the miners had already safely got away south. On their return journey this patrol was attacked and very nearly cut off in passing through the eastern end of the Matopos. Out of their total of a hundred they lost five killed and fifteen wounded besides thirty horses killed; but with sheer hard fighting they got through in the end.
Then, when the enemy closed on Buluwayo, as if to swamp it, Bissett led the garrison out in a sortie on 22nd April. There was a stubborn fight, in which neither side gained any ultimate decisive advantage, but it was remarkable for the fact that perhaps in no fight in history have there been so many deeds of gallantry performed among so small a body of men. No less than three men have since been recommended for the Victoria Cross for separate acts of heroism in this fight.
Three days later, Captain “Mickey” MacFarlane—an old friend of ours in the 9th Lancers—again led out the Buluwayo Field Force, and this time dealt the enemy a very heavy blow, such as changed the aspect of affairs, and relieved Buluwayo from any immediate danger of being rushed.
In these early fights and patrols the Buluwayo Force had lost twenty men killed and fifty wounded, while over two hundred settlers in surrounding districts had been murdered. Meanwhile, a relief force was being organised at Salisbury in Mashonaland, three hundred miles to the north, under Colonel Beal, and another at Kimberley and Mafeking, nearly six hundred miles to the south, under Colonel Plumer of the York and Lancaster Regiment. In the last week in May these two forces appeared in the neighbourhood of Buluwayo from their opposite directions, Cecil Rhodes arriving with that from the north; Lord Grey arriving about the same time as Colonel Plumer’s from the south.
Going Out for a Fight
Grey’s Scouts riding out of Buluwayo to “have a shy” at the enemy.