To return to Dundee. It was maintained both by the Government and the people of Natal that the valuable coal supply should be protected, and an attempt was therefore made to guard it. The misfortune was that from the first Lieutenant-General Sir W. Penn Symons—who, before the arrival of Sir George White, commanded in Natal—seemed to be ill acquainted with the enormous forces that the Boers could bring to bear against him. It was true that he could not at that time be certain, any more than appeared to be the Government at home, that the Free Staters would join the Republicans; but to any one acquainted with the subject, the fact that President Steyn had pulled the strings of the Bloemfontein affair was sufficient evidence of a contemplated alliance. With the Free State neutral, the aspect of affairs might have been entirely changed, and Dundee, with Ladysmith to support it, might have held its own. As it was, these small places were from the first placed in the most unenviable quandary.
General Symons, on the arrival of Sir George White in Natal, took command of the forces in Dundee, and began active preparations for the reception of the Dutchmen.
The latter, immediately after the declaration of war, took possession of Newcastle, and our patrols soon came in touch with the enemy. In spite of their animated and aggressive movements, however, Sir W. Penn Symons was disinclined to believe that the enemy meant a serious attack upon Dundee, and though fully prepared for hostilities, he was somewhat amazed when really informed of the rapid advance of the united Republicans. But he lost no time. He made inquiries, and satisfied himself that he was in a position of some danger and that he must promptly leap to action. The chief difficulty of the situation lay in the number of passes through which the Boers with their easily mobilised forces could manage to pour in bodies of men, and the limited number of British troops at General Symons's disposal. From the movements of the Boers it was obvious that the plan of attack had long been cleverly and carefully arranged. The Free State Boers on the 12th of October seized Albertina Station, near the Natal frontier, and took possession of the key, the stationmaster having to make his way on a trolley to Ladysmith. There, as yet, all was externally peaceful, as though no enemy were near, but a suppressed anxiety to be "up and at 'em" prevailed among the troops. Their ardour was in nowise damped by the incessant rain that fell, and converted the surrounding country into a wide morass, nor by the snow that followed, which gave the Drakensberg Mountains an additionally impregnable aspect and rendered them at once picturesque and forbidding.
A steady increase of the commandoes in the neighbourhood of Doornberg continued, and an attack within a few days seemed imminent.
Thereupon a large number of troops left Ladysmith for Acton Homes, where a Boer commando of four miles long was reported to be laagered. But the Boers retreated, and the troops remained some ten miles from Ladysmith, the Dublin Fusiliers alone moving back to Glencoe, whence they had come by train by order of General Symons.
At Glencoe we had, as before stated, some 4000 men, but report said that General Viljeon had an enormous force, nearly double ours in number, which was lying at the foot of Botha's Pass, one and a half miles on the Natal side of the Border. Besides this, General Kock had a commando at Newcastle. The invasion of Natal by the Boers in three columns was formally announced by an official statement from the Governor:—
"Pietermaritzburg, October 16.
"Natal was invaded from the Transvaal early on the morning of the 12th inst., an advance being made by the enemy in three columns. On the right a mixed column of Transvaal and Free State Burghers with Hollander Volunteers marched through Botha's Pass. In the centre the main column, under General Joubert's personal command, crossed Lang's Nek and moved forward viâ Ingogo. On the left a large commando advanced from Wakkerstroom viâ Moll's Nek and Wool's Drift. The object of all three columns was Newcastle, which was occupied on the night of the 14th, the central column having slept the previous night at Mount Prospect, General Colley's old camping-place. On Sunday an advance party of 1500 Boers, with artillery, pushed south of Ingagane, but the greater portion of this commando retired later in the day on Newcastle. A Boer force which had been concentrating at De Jager's Drift captured six Natal policemen. A picket of the King's Royal Rifles Mounted Infantry has exchanged a few shots with the enemy. This has hitherto been the only fighting.