Although the Cape government declared war almost immediately after the “palaver” at Block Drift, some considerable time elapsed before the troops received final orders to take the field and enter Caffreland; and the first week of April was nearly over when Captain Jamieson, accompanied by his eldest son, Tom Flinders, and Patrick Keown, and escorted by the Mounted Riflemen in charge of the horses, left Ralfontein to assume command of the volunteers.
In the interval between the captain’s return from Graham’s Town and his departure to join the army, Miss Janet and Mr Weston found time and opportunity to get married, at a Church of England mission chapel forty miles from the farm; so he bade farewell to his family with the consoling assurance that he was leaving them under care of one who now had a relation’s right to comfort them in adversity or defend them in peril.
On the thirty-second anniversary of the battle of Toulouse (Wellington defeated Soult at Toulouse on the 10th April, 1814. It was the final battle of the Peninsular war.) (in which action Donald Jamieson, then sergeant-major of the —th Foot, was severely wounded) the party from Ralfontein arrived at Graham’s Town and handed over the horses to the military authorities; and, having purchased a few articles likely to prove of service during the campaign, they proceeded to join Colonel H. Somerset’s column, encamped at Victoria—a military post which had been recently established on neutral territory between the Kat and Keiskamma Rivers.
The burgher force, of which Captain Jamieson now took command, consisted of about six-score well-armed, well-mounted men; for the most part farmers and their sons from the neighbouring settlements, with a sprinkling of storekeepers and clerks from Graham’s Town and Bathurst. They were hardy, active fellows enough, accustomed to the saddle and the use of the rifle; but—with the exception of a few of the older hands, who had served on “commandos” in former wars—they were as ignorant of drill or military discipline as any civilian in England before the “volunteer movement” had been thought of.
“Shure now, Masther Tom,” observed Patrick Keown, regarding his future comrades (who had mustered and formed up to receive their commandant) with a critical eye, “we have here fornint us the raw matherials for as foine a squadron of Light Horse as there is in Her Majesty’s service. But, bedad, sorr!” he added with a solemn shake of the head, “they’ll take a dale of mixing.”
“Mixing!” laughed Tom. “I should say they’re pretty well mixed as it is. Still, I wager a dollar they know how to ride, and they’ll fight well enough. After all, that’s the main point.”
“They are for work, not for show,” put in young Jamieson.
“True for ye, Misther Frank,” the old sergeant rejoined; “niver-the-less, with your father’s lave, I must tache them to pay attintion to their dhressing and intervals. A loine is a loine, you’ll be plased to remimber, sorr; not a sort of double semicircle.”
Of this irregular corps—which Captain Jamieson formed into two troops—Frank and Tom were appointed officers, with the local and temporary rank of ensign; the lieutenant-governor promising that after they had seen a little service he would recommend their transfer to the Cape Mounted Riflemen as provisional ensigns.
Much to his chagrin, Patrick Keown had scant opportunity of imparting the “ilimints” of drill and discipline to the Albany farmers and townsmen who rode in the ranks of “Jamieson’s Horse;” for three days after he was appointed sergeant-major of that corps the advance against the Caffres commenced.