On Tuesday, the 27th, the 1st Derbyshire Regiment and the 11th Brigade Division of the Royal Field Artillery were called up to complete a Division at headquarters, thus reducing Gatacre's small force by about 1,000 men.
On the same day Sir William telegraphed to Headquarters reporting a rumoured concentration of the enemy at Modder Poort, expressing his anxiety for the detachment that was marching on Wepener, and suggesting that he should reinforce the column. In reply he was informed that the Field-Marshal did not anticipate danger at Wepener, but that he concurred in the strengthening of the party there.
On March 28 the following telegram was received from Headquarters:
"If you have enough troops at your disposal, I should wish you to occupy Dewetsdorp will make road from here to Maseru safe preventing enemy's forces from using telegraph lines to the south let me know what you can do to this ends."[[7]]
[[7]] From True Copy, furnished by D.A.A.G. in 1900.
Now there are two versions of this telegram. The above is the version as it was received by General Gatacre at 9.40 a.m. on March 28. Between the words "Dewetsdorp" and "will" he mentally supplied the word "I" to fill in the sense. When, however, this important telegram was quoted by Lord Roberts in a despatch to the War Office (dated April 16, 1900), the following verbal variations occur. We find "I should like" for "I should wish"; the words "it would" take the place of "will"; "and prevent enemy" stands for "preventing enemy's forces"; and the last word "ends" appears in the singular, thus bringing it into the body of the message.[[8]] These differences will seem trifling to the reader, but the meaning of this telegram has since been questioned. Gatacre read it as an order to send a detachment to Dewetsdorp similar to the one already ordered to Wepener, and the writer of the Official History so reads it, even in the secondary form.[[9]]
[[8]] See Official History, vol. ii. app. vii. p. 614.
[[9]] See marginal note, Official History, vol. ii. p. 302.
Detachments
Dewetsdorp lies on the main road that runs from Bloemfontein south-east through Wepener into Basutoland; the distance from the capital to Dewetsdorp is forty miles, and it is twenty-five miles on to Wepener. A detachment sent there was therefore in far less danger than the post at Wepener, and was a source of strength to the latter. It was also known to Gatacre that General French was operating with a mounted force at Thaba'Nchu, so that he naturally concluded that the road Bloemfontein—Thaba'Nchu—Ladybrand, or Maseru, was strongly held. As he himself said in evidence before the Royal Commission, he "never sent them [the troops] there as an outpost, nor expected them to act as such, but merely to hold a post on an interior road."[[10]]