Never was there such a
field for a mobile and competent guerilla leader. And, as luck
would have it, such a man was at hand, ready to take full advantage
of his opportunities.
CHAPTER 27.
THE LINES OF COMMUNICATION.
Christian de Wet, the elder of two brothers of that name, was at
this time in the prime of life, a little over forty years of age.
He was a burly middle-sized bearded man, poorly educated, but
endowed with much energy and common-sense. His military experience
dated back to Majuba Hill, and he had a large share of that curious
race hatred which is intelligible in the case of the Transvaal, but
inexplicable in a Freestater who has received no injury from the
British Empire. Some weakness of his sight compels the use of
tinted spectacles, and he had now turned these, with a pair of
particularly observant eyes behind them, upon the scattered British
forces and the long exposed line of railway.
De Wet's force was an offshoot from the army of Freestaters under
De Villiers, Olivier, and Prinsloo, which lay in the mountainous
north-east of the State. To him were committed five guns, fifteen
hundred men, and the best of the horses. Well armed, well mounted,
and operating in a country which consisted of rolling plains with
occasional fortress kopjes, his little force had everything in its
favour. There were so many tempting objects of attack lying before
him that he must have had some difficulty in knowing where to
begin. The tinted spectacles were turned first upon the isolated
town of Lindley.
Colvile with the Highland Brigade had come up from Ventersburg with
instructions to move onward to Heilbron, pacifying the country as
he passed. The country, however, refused to be pacified, and his
march from Ventersburg to Lindley was harassed by snipers every
mile of the way. Finding that De Wet and his men were close upon
him, he did not linger at Lindley, but passed on to his
destination, his entire march of 126 miles costing him sixty-three
casualties, of which nine were fatal. It was a difficult and
dangerous march, especially for the handful of Eastern Province
Horse, upon whom fell all the mounted work. By evil fortune a force
of five hundred Yeomanry, the 18th battalion, including the Duke of
Cambridge's Own and the Irish companies, had been sent from
Kroonstad to join Colvile at Lindley. Colonel Spragge was in
command. On May 27th this body of horsemen reached their
destination only to find that Colvile had already abandoned it.
They appear to have determined to halt for a day in Lindley, and
then follow Colvile to Heilbron. Within a few hours of their
entering the town they were fiercely attacked by De Wet.
Colonel Spragge seems to have acted for the best. Under a heavy
fire he caused his troopers to fall back upon his transport, which
had been left at a point a few miles out upon the Kroonstad Road,
where three defensible kopjes sheltered a valley in which the
cattle and horses could be herded. A stream ran through it. There
were all the materials there for a stand which would have brought
glory to the British arms. The men were of peculiarly fine quality,
many of them from the public schools and from the universities, and
if any would fight to the death these with their sporting spirit
and their high sense of honour might have been expected to do so.
They had the stronger motive for holding out, as they had taken
steps to convey word of their difficulty to Colvile and to Methuen.
The former continued his march to Heilbron, and it is hard to blame
him for doing so, but Methuen on hearing the message, which was
conveyed to him at great personal peril by Corporal Hankey of the
Yeomanry, pushed on instantly with the utmost energy, though he
arrived too late to prevent, or even to repair, a disaster. It must
be remembered that Colvile was under orders to reach Heilbron on a
certain date, that he was himself fighting his way, and that the
force which he was asked to relieve was much more mobile than his
own. His cavalry at that date consisted of 100 men of the Eastern
Province Horse.
Colonel Spragge's men had held their own for the first three days
of their investment, during which they had been simply exposed to a
long-range rifle fire which inflicted no very serious loss upon
them. Their principal defence consisted of a stone kraal about
twenty yards square, which sheltered them from rifle bullets, but
must obviously be a perfect death-trap in the not improbable event
of the Boers sending for artillery. The spirit of the troopers was
admirable. Several dashing sorties were carried out under the
leadership of Captain Humby and Lord Longford. The latter was a
particularly dashing business, ending in a bayonet charge which
cleared a neighbouring ridge. Early in the siege the gallant Keith
met his end. On the fourth day the Boers brought up five guns. One
would have thought that during so long a time as three days it
would have been possible for the officer in command to make such
preparations against this obvious possibility as were so
successfully taken at a later stage of the war by the handful who
garrisoned Ladybrand. Surely in this period, even without
engineers, it would not have been hard to construct such trenches
as the Boers have again and again opposed to our own artillery. But
the preparations which were made proved to be quite inadequate. One
of the two smaller kopjes was carried, and the garrison fled to the
other. This also was compelled to surrender, and finally the main
kopje also hoisted the white flag.
