A woman's wanderings and trials during the Anglo-Boer War

by Jacoba Elizabeth De la Rey

These were the hardest days of all for me. My flour had come to an end, and although the Boers had a small flour mill with them when they were fleeing, I was not able to get at it, so that I had to use my coffee mill for grinding. Having so many children with me made it very hard sometimes; but the children had also been through so much by this time that every difficulty gradually righted itself.

As they were still very young, and had always been used to go regularly to school, it was often very wearying for them. It is not very comfortable to be constantly wandering over the veldt, especially in this fashion.

As we were here to-day and in another place to-morrow, it often happened that we could not get a maid to do the washing. Then the children would have to do it themselves. They would take the clothes and put them in the tub, and then Janne and Hester would have to tread on them. But Janne was such a little monkey, he was always playing tricks on Hester, and then she would have to undo all his mischief, and by herself tread the clothes up and down till they were clean enough for the two little girls to finish washing them. Sometimes there was very little soap. They would make starch out of green “mealies” (Indian corn).

There were many burghers who had been schoolmasters before the war. When any of them were near my waggons they would keep school for the children. After the waggons had been outspanned they would all sit under a shady tree with the master and have lessons. People were often surprised to see how well we were getting on for fugitives. I said, “It does not all go as smoothly as you think;” but I often wondered myself when I thought of how we got through day after day.

We kept the calves close to the waggons, and while we were “trekking” they would be marched alongside of the oxen. The cows were sent on ahead, so that they could be milked in the evening; and as long as the children could have milk they were always content. Sometimes we would put the milk into a stone bottle, and thus be able to get butter[7] and sour milk as well. Our supply of coffee, though running short, was not yet quite finished. As we had so little left, I used to cut up petatas[8] into small dice and dry and burn them. These I would mix with the coffee beans—one-fourth of coffee to three-fourths of petatas—and grind it all up together. This mixture made quite good coffee.

[7] Butter.—Owing to the shaking of the waggon when “trekking,” the milk in the stone bottle would gradually be churned into butter.

[8] Petatas.—A species of potato.

We had all sorts of difficulties. The poor burghers were very badly off for clothes. They began tanning sheepskins and using them. We got quite clever at dressing the skins, and they were soft and clean. If a man had a pair of trousers almost worn out he would patch them up with skins. It was the same thing with boots. We called them “armoured” clothes. The women and children took “kombaarzen”[9] and made skirts and jackets out of them.

[9] Kombaarzen.—Blankets. In this case the blankets taken from the enemy.

I had always kept up through everything. If life grew too hard in one place I would move on to another; but when I had lost my cattle, and could not leave when I wanted, many a day fell heavily on me. However, thanks to the doctor and to a Frenchman who remained near us, things were better than they otherwise might have been.