A West Pointer with the Boers /

by John Y. Fillmore Blake

Armed Kaffirs were stationed all along the Pretoria-Pietersburg railway line and did all the work that Joe Chamberlain told the British Parliament the English soldiers were doing.

Northeast of Pretoria, north of Middleburg and all about Lydenburg and Pilgrims' Rest, were thousands of England's savage allies who murdered hundreds of men, women and children. In the east, about Komati Poort and along the Swazie-land border, the same conditions prevailed and the outrages committed are too sickening to put in print. Nearly sixty men were attacked, murdered and cut into pieces at one place.

All the blockhouses along the eastern border were manned with armed Kaffirs. About thirty women and children who had their homes burnt on the Piet-Retief border by the English and were left to starve to death, started out on foot to find some Boer commando, and get food and relief. They had to pass through this line of blockhouses manned by the armed Kaffirs. The savages seized and outraged all of them, and then drove them into the high veldt, where they were abandoned. They were found by the Boers, and a more sickening sight or characteristic picture of English brutality and savage outrage could not be imagined. In the face of all this, Lord Kitchener, Lord Milner and Joe Chamberlain swore to the world that no armed Kaffirs were employed by the English troops!

There were between 30,000 and 40,000 Kaffirs armed by the English, and instructed to kill off the Boers. The Kaffirs had always been friendly to the Boers but the English went to them, and told them that if they did not take up arms against the Boers, they would destroy all their food and not allow them to grow any more as long as the war lasted. The Kaffirs in the mountains near Lydenburg were not to be so threatened because the English knew them and were afraid of them. In order to get them to fight the Boers, the English promised to give them all the Boer farms in their section at the end of the war. Many of my good friends were murdered in cold blood by these same Kaffirs.

At the town of Lydenburg, the English had more than 1000 armed Kaffirs side by side with them. At Middleburg they had about 600. In all the blockhouses and forts along the railway lines there were armed Kaffirs, with the English soldiers, and the Kaffirs were generally in the majority.

After the war came to an end, the English sent wagons and carts out to bring in the rifles, but the Kaffirs refused to give them up until the English had made good their agreement. The Kaffirs fairly drove out the English, who then came to the Boers and asked them to join with them and help them disarm the Kaffirs. The Boers refused to a man, and told them since they had armed the blacks, they must now disarm them. The Kaffirs took possession of the Boer farms which the English had promised to give them, and would not let the Boers return.

At this time, I do not know how the affairs were settled, but I think all Kaffir claims were paid for, but the rifles were not given up.

Now that the war is over and hundreds of men, women and children have been murdered by these savages, Lord Kitchener, Lord Milner and Joe Chamberlain are ready to admit that they armed thousands of Kaffirs and used them against the Boers. They now admit it because they have to, for if there was any possible way to lie out of it, it is certain they would take advantage of it.

The English officers, English soldiers and Kaffirs all tell you now that they were armed by the English, to fight the Boers, and the savages do not hesitate to tell why they turned against the Boers. It is hard for Joe Chamberlain, and Milner and Kitchener to lie out of it. They can't do it, and they are too smart to try it.

For eighteen months we had the Kaffirs on one side and the English on the other, and the narrow belt between was not more than twenty-five to thirty-five miles wide, and here it was that we must live and fight and try to protect ourselves. Sometimes we were fighting the English, and sometimes the Kaffirs, and sometimes both at once. How we managed to hold our own and escape what the English call sure death, I can not explain, but I do know that nearly all escaped.