I did not know how to pacify my children; they wept bitterly, and could not find words for their indignation. And yet it was peace all the same. I said to them, “Let us keep silence; later on we shall understand it all.”
I stayed there till Monday morning. As Liebenberg had come to take me to Klerksdorp, and as from there I should be able to go on to Pretoria, I soon thought to myself, “What a joy it will be when I can meet my children again, after having been separated from them for nearly two years.”
But this peace was so distasteful that I could not get over the thought of it.
When everything was packed we made ready to start. While I was driving I took my day-book. The text for that morning was Gen. xxii. 7: “And Abraham said God will provide....”
Now we went on quickly. I met on that road none but sorrowing women and children. I said sometimes, “Where can the poor burghers be that we do not meet them?”
After having travelled for a couple of days we came to Mr D. van der Merwe’s place. There I met several burghers. Van der Merwe was a good and clever man and I was glad to be able to talk with him. He told me that, however incomprehensible it might all seem, he was sure that the officers after having struggled so long and so bitterly would now also do their best.
As they had first gone to the Zwartruggens and Marico to see that the arms were all given up, I had not seen any of them yet.
We were now in the Lichtenburg district. I waited at Mr van der Merwe’s place. It was bitterly cold. It snowed for three days, and during all my wanderings this was the worst cold I had experienced. And there was no house to shelter us. There were plenty of buildings there, but all were more or less in ruins. It was dreadful to see them. Now came the time when the burghers in this neighbourhood also had to give up their arms.
On the 12th of June the last gun had been given up in the Lichtenburg district. That evening my people came for the first time to my tent. I thought how bitter it was to meet them in this way. My husband came to me and my son, little Coos. Little Coos cried, “Mamma, I have still got my gun.”
It was very hard for him; he could stand the war better than the peace. I did not want to speak about it with his father. The terrible shedding of blood was at end. We had offered up our property and our blood for Freedom and Justice.... Where was this freedom? where was this justice?