Lord Roberts in his travelling headquarters waggon. The photograph was taken while the Field-Marshal was in the midst of the work of reorganisation.
Feb. 6, 1900.] Preparations at Capetown Completed.
Roberts and Kitchener leave Capetown.
Till the time came for striking, and striking hard, Lord Roberts' instructions to his commanders in the western field of war were to abstain from anything calculated to bring about a decisive battle; 30,000 men were already at sea or arriving in Cape Colony—among them the Sixth and Seventh Divisions, the City Imperial Volunteers, several Militia battalions, the first detachments of Yeomanry, and a large number of Australian and Canadian Mounted Rifles. Of the troops already on the spot, a considerable number were being converted into mounted infantry. Thus week after week passed in the most strenuous activity, till at last, on February 6, the Commander-in-Chief and his Chief-of-the-Staff stole off surreptitiously—for there were many thousands of Boer sympathisers in the Colony, and attempts to derail and wreck trains were of almost daily occurrence—to the far-away Modder River Camp, whence the great movement was to begin. To deceive would-be assassins, of whom, unfortunately, there were many in the Colony, a special train with fifty armed men on board was ostentatiously despatched. Lord Roberts, however, did not travel in it; instead, he boarded the ordinary train outside Capetown, and in this manner began his journey to the north.
[Photo by Lloyd, Pembridge Square.
Is about sixty years of age. He entered the 2nd Derby Militia as Ensign in 1855, but went abroad and joined the Cape Rifles a year later, rose to the rank of Captain, and retired in 1870. He was elected, in 1873, member of the Legislative Assembly for East London; Field-Commandant of Colonial (Cape) Forces, 1878; Col. of Cape Yeomanry, 1879; served in the Basuto War and was created C.M.G. in 1880; Brigadier-General, 1899.
[Dec. 13, 1899-Jan. 3, 1900.
At Modder River there had been inactivity since the disastrous day of Magersfontein—inactivity broken only by reconnaissances and demonstrations. As far back as December 13, a reconnaissance had been directed from Orange River Station to Zoutpan's Drift, some miles to the east of the great
bridge by which the railway from De Aar to Modder River crosses the Orange River. Seventy men of the mounted infantry and of Rimington's Guides were sent out under Captain Bradshaw; at Ramah, a farm just upon the Free State frontier, they were surprised by the enemy in some force, and lost four killed and eight wounded, including Captain Bradshaw, killed. The Boers, after inflicting this loss, fell back.