Great disaster as was the battle of Stormberg, it was in no way dishonourable to the private soldier or subaltern officer. These had fought gallantly and stubbornly; they failed not from any want of courage or devotion, but because the task set them was beyond the strength of man. Brave in the advance, they were cool and deliberate in the retreat. In the military qualities of the common Englishman there had been no decline since the great days of the past, and this battle proved it.
[Dec. 10, 1899.
British losses.
The losses were heavy. Besides one gun which stuck in a bog, another weapon overturned and fell into a watercourse, where it was captured by the enemy. The killed were thirty-one and the wounded fifty-eight, almost all taken prisoners, while 633 unwounded men were also captured by the enemy. A few wounded officers and men were brought into Molteno from the battlefield by the troops. The British loss in officers was lighter than usual; but Lieutenant-Colonel Eager, of the Royal Irish Rifles, was mortally wounded, and both the majors of this battalion were wounded. The enormous total of prisoners taken was due simply and solely to the exhaustion of the men.
DETRAINING ARTILLERY AT NAAUWPOORT.
AN AWKWARD ACCIDENT.
The capsizing of a waggon on any of the South African coach-roads is by no means an unusual sight. It is usually caused by careless driving, as, for example, by attempting to drive straight across a watercourse or "sluit" on the road instead of taking the waggon diagonally over it, so as to lessen the strain. On more than one occasion, as on the road to Stormberg, a like accident has occurred to our guns.
The Boer force which inflicted this grievous punishment was said, by the enemy, to have been only 800 strong. It certainly did not exceed 1,500. It was composed of very indifferent material, a fact which heightened the deplorable nature of the reverse. It displayed neither vigour nor enterprise, and this though its losses were absurdly small—five killed and sixteen wounded. At this low cost it had completely paralysed General Gatacre's column and cut up two of the finest battalions in the British Army.