Two Years on Trek: Being Some Account of the Royal Sussex Regiment in South Africa

by Louis Eugène Du Moulin

On our way we passed close to the spot where the train had been destroyed at night when we were at Ventersburg Road: the débris was still lying about, although, of course, the trucks had been removed. Most of the contents of the train were Hospital and Ordnance stores, so the ground was littered with the burnt fragments of iron bedsteads and other hospital fittings, with camp kettles, canteens, water bottles, drums which had contained rifle oil and dubbin, and all sorts of other articles. No trace had been left, of course, of the bales of blankets, clothing and boots, or of any of the Supply Stores such as biscuit, beef, etc.

Halting for the night at Geneva, we reached Kroonstad about half-past eleven on the 5th of November, and camped on our old spot below Gun Hill, where we remained no less than four days.

Volunteers had been called for to serve on the Mounted Infantry, and sixty of our men sent in their names, showing that the spirit of enterprise and adventure had not been knocked out of them by the long marching and the hardships that they had undergone; they went off by train the same evening to Pretoria, where the new bodies of Mounted Infantry were being organised.

All day on the 8th and 9th of November, troops, mostly mounted, had been coming in from the west, and on the latter date, to the great delight of everyone, eight of the enemy's guns were brought in and parked in the market square, together with a large number of prisoners, who were handed over to a guard of the troops in garrison. These were the outcome of a most successful surprise of a Boer commando carried out near Bothaville on the 6th of November.

The guns were a varied lot: there was a 12pr. belonging to U battery and lost by them at Sanna's Post, many months before; there was a 15pr. which had belonged to the 14th Field Battery; two Krupp 9prs. in splendid condition; a Vickers-Maxim, or pom-pom; a one-pounder quick-firing Krupp, a Maxim with a portable tripod stand, and a large quantity of ammunition.

The successful capture of all these guns, prisoners, ammunition and wagons was largely due to our old friend, Major Lean, of the 5th M.I., and after a good deal of questioning (for, like all good soldiers, he was reluctant to talk about his own achievements), the story of the fight was extracted from him.

It seems that Le Gallais' force of Mounted troops, mostly Mounted Infantry, with U Battery, R.H.A., were near Bothaville, when intelligence was received of the presence of a Boer laager in the neighbourhood; so Major Lean with a few men of his own corps, all dismounted, went out one night to reconnoitre. They had to ford the river, the water reaching up to their waists, and then went on for some distance, until Major Lean observed some horses hobbled close to them: thinking this very curious, he went on a little further, and then saw, behind an ant heap, what looked like the head and shoulders of a man: without an instant's hesitation he dashed forward and yelled to the man, "Hands up!"

To his astonishment several other men rose and put up their hands, and he discovered that he had inadvertently held up an entire Boer picket. Handing over the prisoners to his men, he and his party went on cautiously, and on coming to the summit of a rise in the ground saw the whole Boer laager at their feet. The party was discovered, and a heavy fire opened on them at once; but the thirty men of the Mounted Infantry spread out under cover, and devoted themselves to preventing the Boers from inspanning their oxen into the guns and wagons. Word had been sent back to Colonel Le Gallais, who came up rapidly and joined in, U battery opening fire on the Boer guns at a range of 400 yards, but from the other side of a ridge, firing by indirect laying. The Boers answered the fire from their guns, and an artillery duel was in progress for some little time. A message had been sent back to General Knox, who, however, was out of reach, and also to Colonel De Lisle, who was some eight miles away; and the latter with his men came up rapidly, travelling the whole distance without drawing rein. They moved so as to envelope the flanks, but on their approach the enemy fled, leaving a large number of killed and wounded, and a considerable number of prisoners (114 in all), twenty-eight of whom were dressed in the blue uniform of the Staats Artillerie.

Unfortunately our loss had been severe, the gallant and dashing Le Gallais, Lieut.-Colonel Ross of the Durham Light Infantry, and two other officers having been mortally wounded, and seven officers severely wounded, while eight men were killed, and twenty-six wounded; but the success was great, and the rout of the Boers complete. They left the whole of their guns, wagons and Cape carts, and fled on their horses, some not even waiting to saddle up first. The prisoners said that De Wet and Steyn had both been with the laager, but that they had fled directly the firing commenced.