It is hard to say whether De Wet or Broadwood was in the greater danger at 9 a.m. on March 31. The former had, it is true, just obtained a dramatic and most encouraging success. He laid a trap for a convoy and found himself in action with a force numerically equal to his own. He had made many prisoners, and almost without striking a blow had captured not only Broadwood's convoy but also six of Broadwood's guns. His force, however, was divided. The portion of it under his own command could not be effectively supported by his brother's command, and was confined in a spruit out of which he could not move, and which was commanded in rear by higher ground.
Broadwood had been outwitted by De Wet and very roughly handled. With a crippled and maimed force he was lying between the jaws of a vice which might at any moment close and crush him. The loss of the convoy was, from a tactical point of view, not an unmixed evil, as he gained thereby greater freedom of action, but the loss of half his guns was for the time being irremediable. The careless and haphazard scouting from the Waterworks and Boesman's Kop, in which he complacently trusted, had lured him on.[40] When it was reported to him that the spruit was in possession of the enemy, he could scarcely believe it possible. Whether he or the officers in command of the artillery and the mounted escort were responsible for the extraordinary omission to send out ground scouts in advance of the column is not known, but the guns and wagons would not have been lost had this simple and customary precaution been taken.
Broadwood, who had no information that Colvile and Martyr were approaching from the west, and that the latter was actually at Boesman's Kop, acted in the belief that he would have to deal with the situation unaided. He ordered the mounted infantry under Alderson to hold P. De Wet's force on the Modder, while the cavalry, supported by fire from Q Battery at the station buildings and working south and west of the Korn Spruit Drift, endeavoured to turn C. De Wet's precarious position. Neither of these operations was successful. Alderson could barely hold his own; the turning movement, although aided by a few companies of Martyr's force, was frustrated by small parties of marksmen whom C. De Wet had posted on the ridge in rear; and Q Battery was losing heavily.
At 10 a.m. Broadwood ordered a general retirement. No attempt seems to have been made to communicate with him by heliograph, and he was still unaware that Martyr had been on Boesman's Kop for three hours, and was actually assisting in the turning movement; and that Colvile was hurrying forward to the sound of the firing with the IXth Division. As the battle had begun in the Fog of War, so also therein did it end.
With the utmost difficulty Q Battery, which had been fighting in the open until only Phipps-Hornby and less than a dozen gunners were left to work five guns, was withdrawn. The enemy's fire was so heavy that the teams could not be brought up to the guns, four of which were run back by hand to the station buildings, which afforded some cover. The fifth gun was abandoned, but by the heroic efforts of Phipps-Hornby and a handful of gunners and volunteers from the mounted infantry escort, four guns were brought away.
Meanwhile Alderson was fighting a rearguard action against P. De Wet, to cover the retirement of the guns, and when this was effected, he followed them, closely pursued as far as the Korn Spruit by P. De Wet's burghers, who crossed the Modder at the Waterworks. Before noon the remains of Broadwood's column were formed up near Boesman's Kop. He had lost seven[41] guns, seventy-three wagons and nearly a third of his strength in killed, wounded, and prisoners.
Broadwood's withdrawal gave C. De Wet the opportunity which he could hardly have dared hope would ever be offered to him. He was reinforced by his brother, and at once drew his spoils out of the spruit and easily got away with them to the right bank of the Modder, where at noon he met the advanced guard of Olivier's force. Although he was in presence not only of Broadwood's force, but also almost in touch with a division of infantry and a brigade of mounted infantry his movements were so little impeded that he was able to bring two of the captured guns back to the left bank, and to bring them into action against a detachment of mounted infantry which was holding Waterval Drift.
Martyr reached Boesman's Kop at 7 a.m., where in the course of the morning he was joined by Colvile, whose Division was also on its way to Waterval Drift. Broadwood, who was about two miles away, was ordered by Colvile to come to him, but he refused to leave his command so long as there was any chance of recovering the guns. He technically committed a breach of discipline, but Lord Roberts subsequently approved of his action. He requested Colvile to advance against the spruit, but the message was not delivered; and Colvile said that it would not have modified his dispositions. He had already refused to listen to the obvious suggestion made by his staff that he should go to Broadwood, who after waiting for two hours in the expectation that something would be done by the infantry division, gave up hope and retired towards Springfield.
Colvile's appreciation of the situation was that it would have been useless to pursue De Wet's mounted troops with infantry. He therefore carried out the letter of his instructions from Lord Roberts, and, seeing that Broadwood's column was apparently safe, went on towards Waterval Drift: whither also Martyr had already sent the greater portion of the mounted infantry. Thus the brothers De Wet gained not only an actual, but also a moral success of the greatest importance to their cause, and took away the prizes they had so unexpectedly won, under the eyes of a strong British force helplessly watching the commandos trailing away across the veld.
Waterval Drift had been indicated to Colvile and Martyr as their objective by Lord Roberts, and they considered that it was their duty to make for it. They did not, however, recognize that instructions must be read in the light of the information at the disposal of the superior officer at the moment of issue, and they adhered to them pedantically.[42] Lord Roberts could not have anticipated Broadwood's plight when he ordered Colvile and Martyr to Waterval Drift.