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Page 6
During the journey to the Free State, our guard en the train was
extremely strict. Though every possible precaution of secrecy had been
taken, we were positively told to be prepared to find the train fired
upon. But, if during such journeys preparedness was doubtless essential
in the circumstances, it always seemed to me that we, or any one so
placed, were pretty powerless to avert disaster should a properly
directed shot from the darkness find its mark.
On November 11 we detrained at Theunissen, in the Free State. It was
speedily clear that this part of the world was in the grip of
disturbance. Telegraph poles all along the line had been wrecked; an
amount of mild pillaging had been going on. The people of Theunissen
were almost in panic. The two fights--one against Conroy, at Allaman's
Kraal, the other and larger, against De Wet, at Doornberg--had been
enormously magnified. General Botha was welcomed in genuine relief. We
remained at arms in the train during the first part of the night. At 2
a.m. we were roused, and in less than half an hour were on the way
across country to Winburg.
The arrival at the little railhead dorp of Winburg was remarkable.
Scarcely were we halted and hand put to loosen girth before the
loyalist leaders came running out in the morning sunshine to meet us.
De Wet had left the place two hours before, disappearing with his
following over the first kopje. He had caused absolute panic. His
forces had cut the inhabitants off from all touch with the outer world.
De Wet had commandeered all food supplies worth having. Houses had been
looted and speeches were made in the marketplace. His followers had
assured the people that the Empire was tottering, Germany had defeated
Britain on land and sea, a hundred thousand were marching on Pretoria,
and that Botha and his Government were defeated and disgraced. And
these statements were to a large extent believed.
It was but natural. Cut off the wire and rail communication of a South
African veld town and you have isolation in the most thorough sense. In
such a place at such a time mere statement may seem quite possibly the
truth.
Towards evening we got news of the rebels, and a night-march was
ordered. As we left the town the loyal people lined the streets, the
fellows in the columns whistled "Tipperary," and we got a rousing
farewell.
[Illustration: Group of Rebel Leaders]
[Illustration: Rebels rounded up after the capture of De Wet]
General Botha is celebrated amongst fighting men for many things, and
his night-marching is one of them. He appears to believe to the fullest
extent in night-marching. He had located De Wet at a place called
Mushroom Valley, and parts of the Commander-in-Chief's forces had been
sent to make a surrounding movement. During the all-night trek from
Winburg to Mushroom Valley I had a first thorough experience of the
true horrors of sleep-fighting. It was bitterly cold--cold as the Free
State night on the veld knows how to be. And we could not smoke, could
not talk above a faint murmur, and nodded in our saddles. The clear
stars danced fantastically in the sky ahead of us, and the ground
seemed to be falling away from us into vast hollows, then rising to our
horses' noses ready to smash into us like an impalpable wall. After
midnight, outspanning in a piercing wind, we formed square; main guard
was posted over the General's car, and those lucky enough to escape
turn of duty huddled together under cloaks and dozed fitfully until
two-thirty. From two-thirty till sunrise we trekked on. Suddenly, just
after good daylight, the Staff halted the column, glasses were put up,
and away we swung half right into the veld. Up came the artillery and
opened fire on a cluster of ant-sized figures four thousand yards ahead
beneath the shoulder of a kopje. Had the thing not contained the very
germ of tragedy it would have been laughable to see the way those
figures scattered over the red veld. It was De Wet's commandos caught
napping. Just before the shell fire our burghers had gone out ahead
hell-for-leather on either flank. The whole column then advanced. After
two hours' pretty hot work the action was over. We lost six killed
against the rebels' twenty-two, and with twenty wounded on our side the
rebel losses were proportionate. We took upwards of three hundred
prisoners, De Wet himself escaping by the merest fluke. He lost all his
transport, and generally ceased after the action to be a serious
menace.
During the operations against De Wet I watched, when possible, the
demeanour of the quiet South African patriot with whom fate had placed
me in the field. I had last seen him many years before, gravely bowing
from under a silk hat to a crowd that swayed and cheered as he drove
through the streets of Manchester. And now duty found him in the field
against an old comrade-in-arms. There was a sadness, there was a
profound pathos about it. No wonder if to me it seemed that General
Botha looked downcast indeed, if stern as well, during the Rebellion.
Life, surely, was not dealing too fairly by him.
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