The Africanders

by Le Roy Hooker

Hostile operations came on very slowly. Admiral Elphinstone seized three more Dutch merchant ships that were lying in Simon’s Bay on the 9th of July. On the 14th he landed four hundred and fifty soldiers, who occupied Simonstown, and strengthened the post a week later by adding four hundred marines.

Strangely enough, neither the English commanders nor Commissioner Sluysken chose to regard these movements as acts of war. The Commissioner had been careful to order that no attack should be made on the English, and that nothing whatever should be done that would provoke retaliation or furnish grounds for them to throw the blame of opening hostilities on the [[51]]Dutch. It was not until the 3d of August that any act was committed which was by either party construed into an act of war. On that day a Burgher officer fired at an English picket and wounded one of the men. For this he was reprimanded by the Commissioner. General Craig reported it in his dispatches as the beginning of hostilities.

The time soon came when the British officers thought an advance might be made. The Dutch had been remiss in not strengthening their earthwork defenses toward the sea. They had permitted English boats to take soundings off Muizenburg unmolested. And the English commanders had been encouraged to hope that the nationals in the colonial force did not intend to seriously oppose the British advance—that in all probability they would come over in a body to the British side as soon as the first engagement opened. On the other hand, the invading army was utterly without field guns and could not muster more than sixteen hundred men. Re-enforcements were on the way, but no one could foretell the time of their arrival. To advance any part of their military force beyond the range of the guns on the ships would expose the whole expedition to destruction in the event [[52]]of a French squadron appearing in Table Bay to co-operate with the Dutch colonists. In view of all the circumstances the British commanders determined to capture Muizenburg, to reopen negotiations with the Cape government from that position and to attempt no further aggressive movement until the arrival of the expected re-enforcements.

On the morning of the 7th of August it became evident to the Dutch officers at Muizenburg that the British were about to attack. A column of sixteen hundred infantry and marines was advancing from Simonstown. Two small gunboats, and the ships’ launches, carrying lighter guns, moved close in shore about five hundred yards in advance of the column, to keep the road open. The war vessels America, Stately, Echo and Rattlesnake were heading for Muizen Beach.

The Dutch camp was at the foot of the mountain facing False Bay on the west, the camp looking south and east, for it was at the northwest angle of the bay. They had planted eleven pieces of artillery so as to command the road from Simonstown, which ran along the west coast of False Bay. From Kalk Bay to Muizenburg the roadway was narrow, having the water [[53]]on one side and the steep mountain, only a few paces away, on the other. The mountain terminates abruptly at Muizenburg, where begin the Cape Flats, a sandy plain stretching across from False Bay to Table Bay. Near the north end of the mountain is a considerable sheet of shallow water called the Sandvlei, fed in the rainy season by an intermittent brook called Keyser’s River, emptying into the north side of the vlei.

As soon as they came within range of the post at Kalk Bay the British ships opened fire and the picket stationed there retired over the mountain. On coming abreast of Muizenburg the fleet came to anchor and delivered their broadsides at easy range upon the Dutch camp. The thunders of the first fire had hardly ceased when the national battalion of infantry, and a little later the main body thereof, led by Colonel De Lille, fled from the post through the Sandvlei. One company under Captain Warneke retired more slowly and in a little better order. Many of the artillerymen followed, leaving only a single company under Lieutenant Marnitz to work the two twenty-four pounders. These, being planted on loose soil, were thrown out of position by the recoil of every discharge and could not be fired again until they had been handled back [[54]]into place. The firing was, therefore, slow and with uncertain aim. Two men were killed, four wounded and one gun disabled on the America, and one man was wounded on the Stately, by Lieutenant Marnitz’s fire. Whether it was through bad marksmanship or by design one can hardly decide, but the English guns were aimed so high that the shot passed over the camp and lodged in the mountain behind it. Marnitz soon perceived that the post could not be held, and, first spiking the cannon, retired before the charge of the British column. Nothing was saved from the camp but five small field pieces.

The English followed the retreating burghers with a cheer. As soon as they were out of range of the British ships the Dutch endeavored to make a stand, but were quickly driven from it by a bayonet charge. After gaining the shelter of the mountain the Dutch again faced their pursuers, this time with the support of guns brought to bear on the English from the opposite side of the Sandvlei, and with such effect that they fell back to Muizenburg. In this second collision one English officer, one burgher and two Dutch artillerymen were killed and one pandour was wounded.

Instead of rallying his men and making a [[55]]stand behind the Sandvlei, as he might have done with a well-protected front, De Lille continued his flight to Diep River, where he arrived with a fragment of his command, not knowing what had become of his artillerymen and burghers.

As soon as news came that the English were advancing, a detachment of five hundred burgher horsemen was hastened forward from Cape Town to Muizenburg. On the way they learned from the fugitives that Muizenburg, the camp and everything in it had been taken by the British. Then they halted and encamped on the plain in small parties.

Next morning, the 8th of August, De Lille made some show of rallying and returned to the head of the Sandvlei leading a part of the infantry that had been discomfited the day before. The 8th became a day of general panic. The English advanced in column to attack De Lille at the head of the vlei—wading through water that, in places, came above their waists. Notwithstanding the advantage this gave him, De Lille and all his command fled precipitately on their approach. As the British issued from the water and pursued them across the plain they observed a party of burghers coming from behind some sandhills on their flank—the detachment [[56]]that had come from Cape Town and camped on the plain during the night. Assuming that the flight of De Lille and the movement of this body were in the carrying out of an ambuscade, the British fled, in their turn, and were pursued by the Dutch until they came under the fire of their own cannon, spiked and abandoned by Lieutenant Marnitz, but drilled and placed in service by General Craig. While the English were being driven in by the Cape Town detachment, De Lille and his command fled all day in the opposite direction, and in the evening camped within a mile of the camping ground of the night before, near Diep River.