A West Pointer with the Boers /

by John Y. Fillmore Blake

The time came when the order was given to saddle up. Every one, with the enthusiasm of a true soldier hastened to make good the order. After a good two hours' struggle, every horse was ready for his rider. The men were told to mount, each in his own way, and to make every effort to hold the saddle after once he found it. As they were told to lay aside their rifles until they had become on friendly terms with their horses, they were not hampered with any impediment except their inexperience. Having mounted, I scarcely know what happened during the next five minutes, but I saw men in camp, on the veldt, in fact, all about me, picking themselves up, shaking the sand off them, and chasing here and there and everywhere a lot of horses from which they had just separated. Having caught their horses they were told to try again and keep trying again, until they and their horses became thoroughly acquainted with each other. For hours I sat and witnessed and enjoyed the best show I had ever seen or ever expect to see. But the men were Irish, and were not to be defeated as long as there was life in them. I kept no account of how many times each mounted his horse, and immediately thereafter turned a somersault, but, when, at the conclusion of the performance, each rode up and said he was ready for his rifle, I felt proud of them, for they showed the real Irish pluck and grit that are destined some day to free Ireland. Within one week from that day I could call each one of those Irish boys a truly good cavalryman. They learned to ride much sooner than they learned to know their horses.

A few of them, to be sure, would tie a piece of ribbon in the mane or tail, and would always hunt for their ribbons instead of their horses. This gave rise, months after, to some trouble in which Father Van Hecke, the Brigade Chaplain, was implicated. Father Van Hecke always tied a green rag into his horse's mane so that he could find him quickly. He rode a bay pony, and a good pony he was, that Father Van Hecke thoroughly appreciated.

One day one of the mischievous boys thought he would play a trick on the good Father. He went out, caught the Father's pony, removed the green rag and tied it into the mane of a sorrel pony, not half so good as the Father's. When the order was given to saddle-up, out went the Father, and the boys and Boers, each for his own horse. Father Van Hecke found the green rag, caught the sorrel pony and started to camp with him. At this moment up came the Boer who owned the pony, claimed him and accused the Father of trying to steal his horse. Father Van Hecke informed the Boer that he thought he had ridden that horse long enough to know him, and that the green rag was his mark. The Boer used rather strong language, but the Father would not surrender his pony to any one. Finally I was sent for to settle the matter.

About twenty feet from the two equally certain owners of that sorrel pony, stood the Father's pony. I pointed him out to the Father and told him I thought that some of the boys had played a trick on him by removing the green rag from his pony and transferring it to the Boer's. The Father smiled and gave the Boer his horse, but I think to-day that that Boer is convinced that Father Van Hecke was trying to steal his horse. Father Van Hecke is a noble, good man with a warm, sympathetic heart, and as such he will always be remembered by the boys of the Irish Brigade.

Already the last of the Boers had disappeared over Laing's Nek, when the boys reported that they were ready for their rifles, so each secured his piece, and off we started without further delay. All were worrying for fear the Boers would have a fight with the English before we arrived. After travelling about twenty minutes we began to feel the biting cold and I was asked to give them a gallop.

I told them the idea was a good one, but I had grave fears about the consequences. "Oh, that's all right. We are all right, Colonel, we have shown these horses what we can do." I started off on a slow gallop, and within two minutes at least one-third of the boys were deposited on the veldt, and it took the other two-thirds about half an hour to round up the loose horses and put matters into marching order again. After that I had no further delay, but I never repeated the gallop until near Dundee, where every man sat his horse in true cavalryman style. Late that night we overtook the Boers at Newcastle, the boys being very tired and stiff, but none complained, for they had, so far, not missed the first fight.

What an enthusiastic and patriotic body of men those Irish boys were! They seemed to feel that if they could give England one good blow, their happiness would be an assured fact. The very fact that the Irish, where ever you find them, so utterly despise the English, and so earnestly long to blow the whole English race into eternity, is in itself sufficient proof that the English rule in Ireland is cruel and brutal.

All had now passed over Laing's Nek and down the mountains into the valley. Here it was warm, but as disagreeable as ever, in fact more so, for it was rain, rain, rain, day and night, and the thick clouds of mist were actually rolling along the ground. At times we could not see twenty paces ahead of us, so it was necessary to move cautiously, because we knew that the English were falling back toward Dundee just ahead of us. Thoroughly soaked to the very skin, all plowed through the mud, felt their way through the mist and clouds, passed Danhausser, and camped about seven miles from Dundee. On the following day, the clouds were motionless, but resting heavily on the adjacent mountains and foothills, while the valleys were quite clear. It was apparent to all now, that a battle must take place, and that, too, in a very short time. Just as all horses were saddled and the artillery inspanned, and ready to move out, about two miles to our left and front we discovered a column of English emerging from a cloud on the foothills across the valley. Every Boer that happened to see them put spurs to his horse, and after them he went. Of course a lot of the Irish boys followed suit in great haste. The English whirled about and took refuge in a great stone cattle kraal. In five minutes the rifles began to speak on both sides—in another five minutes a French cannon was sent out, and fired a couple of shells, and five minutes later the white flag was waving above the heads of the English, and all was quiet again. Colonel Moller with his 196 well trained Eighteenth Hussars, had surrendered to forty untrained farmers. We now learned that Lucas Meyer, who had taken a road much to the east of us, had attacked Dundee, and been forced back because General Daniel Erasmus, who was to co-operate with him, had failed to show up. Colonel Moller had been sent out to follow up the Boers, and according to his own statement had lost himself, and hadn't the slightest idea where he was, although Dundee was only six miles away. Of the 196 Irishmen captured, eighty-five begged to join the Irish Brigade and fight with the Boers. I wanted to take them on the spot, but the Boer officers did not consider it right, because, they said, if any of them were afterwards captured, the English would surely shoot them. When first captured, all were half scared to death and the first thing they wished to know was whether the Boers would shoot them or not. When told that they would be sent to Pretoria, where they would probably spend most of their time in playing cricket and football, they were, one and all, positively delighted that they had surrendered. They said that their officers had told them in Natal, that the Boers were savages, worse than the Zulus, and that so sure as any of them were captured, just so sure they would be killed.

While the men scarcely believed all their officers had told them, yet they were uncertain, because they had never seen a Boer and didn't know just what kind of a ruffian he was. The men of the Eighteenth Hussars had now learned what a liar and a hypocrite the English officer is.

These are harsh words, but it requires just such words to bring out the naked truth about the English officer. There were very few officers who were not branded as liars by their men, after it was learned how the savage Boer treated the Eighteenth Hussars.