‘Fighting began yesterday. We were only a small party of Burghers at first, and could hardly expect to defeat Jameson on the open veld, so we harassed him as much as possible, to delay him until reinforcements arrived. But we had to remain at a distance most of the time, as we had only rifles to fight with, and they had Maxims, which carried much farther than our Martinis, not to speak of their field-pieces. But later on in the day we reached a strong position. We were directly in Jameson’s road. He had to conquer us before he could pass on towards Johannesburg via Krugersdorp. But we were quite confident that our position was inaccessible to the enemy. We had selected a rise, crested with rocks, offering good shelter against the enemy’s fire. Below the rise, and between us and the enemy, was a spruit, spreading out into a marsh. Through this marshy spruit the enemy had to pass before reaching our position. Beyond the marsh the enemy took up a position with their cannon and Maxims, sending out three detachments to charge us. One party of about eighty troopers charged our centre, through the usual drift of the spruit, while the other two detachments charged our left and right wings respectively. At this moment our ammunition was giving in. We had anxiously been awaiting an ammunition train, which we had been informed had been despatched from Pretoria for our use. Half-an-hour before the enemy prepared to charge, a messenger had arrived from Krugersdorp to inform us of the arrival of the ammunition train there, with a promise that a trolley loaded with the required ammunition would soon follow. Now, just at the moment when the enemy were leaving their own position to charge us, and when we most needed it, the much-longed-for ammunition trolley arrived upon the scene. An old man, with several others, was standing on the trolley handing packets of cartridges down, when a shell from the enemy fell right on top of the ammunition trolley between the group handing the cartridges down, and burst. Marvellous to relate, the shell did no injury to the ammunition, nor was anyone hurt.
‘“A miracle! a miracle, brothers!” cried the old man. “God is with us, let us fight and conquer; God has given them into our hands.” The face of the old patriarch glowed with faith as he spoke.
‘This seemed to give us all fresh courage and enthusiasm, and as the enemy came charging in their three divisions we repelled them with great loss to themselves. The right and left divisions of the enemy were simply forced to retire in disorder, leaving several of their comrades on the veld. The centre detachment of the enemy succeeded in reaching the drift of the spruit, but the Burgher fire was too hot for them; a part of them fled back and succeeded in rejoining their main force, but seven of them were left wounded on the road, and, as we afterwards ascertained, nineteen of them took cover amongst the tall grass of the marsh, and lay in the mud and water until their main force retired from the scene towards evening, when we took the above-mentioned nineteen troopers prisoners. Poor fellows, they were in a sorry plight; they had been lying under water and mud all the time, with only their noses and mouths out of water for breathing.
‘As I said, the main force saw that they could not force our position, and retired, cutting across the veld with the hope of avoiding us; but while the majority of us remained to guard the road at the drift, about one hundred of us kept abreast of Jameson’s force, so as to prevent them from slipping through.
‘We saw Jameson was heading towards the railway cutting, so we raced on ahead and took possession of the cutting, using the embankment as a breastwork, and again brought the invaders to a full stop. As it was getting dark now, Jameson encamped for the night, out of rifle shot from the embankment; but he was near enough to keep on shelling our position, off and on, during the night. But as we were well protected by our embankment, no harm was done.
‘During the night, a sad accident happened.
‘The son of Commandant Cronje, who was rather too venturesome, had crossed the railway cutting and was riding about on the other side. We could not recognise him in the dark. We thought it was a spy from the enemy. We called out three times, “Who goes there?” but received no reply. Whether he did not hear us, I cannot say; some of our men fired and he fell, severely wounded. It is a sad thing that, out of five of our Burghers who have been killed, two have been killed by our own men, besides the one wounded just now by that careless young man. And another, I hear, has been killed to-day by our own men. He was near to the enemy, and as his dress was somewhat similar to Jameson’s troopers, he was fired at and killed; and our men only found out their mistake when too late.
‘Well, to resume, when day broke, Jameson once more earnestly set to work, trying to beat us back from the embankment, but in vain. We drove him along the line, always keeping him back and preventing him from crossing. But while he kept us busy, he sent some of his heavy field-pieces on ahead, which crossed over before we saw their dodge, as we were busy repelling charge after charge from Jameson’s troopers. As he was able to sweep our side of the embankment now, we had to leave Jameson in possession of the line. We now resolved once more to retire, and go on ahead to cut Jameson off at some other convenient place. Jameson was now on the road to Doornkop, and in possession of the road. It was vain for us to attempt stopping him on the open road, as he had the advantage of numbers, as well as having cannon and Maxims against our rifles. We resolved to cut across the veld towards the drift at Brinks’ farm, which Jameson must cross to reach Krugersdorp, unless he took the other road, on which our commando was waiting for him. We raced across the veld and arrived here, finding you in possession already. The rest you know yourself.’
‘Yes, but you say one hundred of you left the main commando to watch Jameson as he was dodging about; what has become of those hundred men? There are only eighty-seven here on the battlefield, besides those who came after the battle was over. What has become of the rest?’
‘Well, you see, as we raced across the veld to cut Jameson off here, those who had the weakest horses were left behind, and they, in their turn, were again cut off by Jameson’s men, and they had to go a roundabout way to reach us. I see they have arrived now, but too late to take part in the fight.’