Amid Shouts And Tears
French Rode Into Kimberley While His Troopers Encamped Outside The
Town.
To know how this bolt was prepared and how launched, the narrative
must go back to the beginning of the month.
At that period Methuen
and his men were still faced by Cronje and his entrenched forces,
who, in spite of occasional bombardments, held their position
between Kimberley and the relieving army. French, having handed
over the operations at Colesberg to Clements, had gone down to Cape
Town to confer with Roberts and Kitchener. Thence they all three
made their way to the Modder River, which was evidently about to be
the base of a more largely conceived series of operations than any
which had yet been undertaken.
In order to draw the Boer attention away from the thunderbolt which
was about to fall upon their left flank, a strong demonstration
ending in a brisk action was made early in February upon the
extreme right of Cronje's position. The force, consisting of the
Highland Brigade, two squadrons of the 9th Lancers, No. 7 Co. Royal
Engineers, and the 62nd Battery, was under the command of the
famous Hector Macdonald. 'Fighting Mac' as he was called by his
men, had joined his regiment as a private, and had worked through
the grades of corporal, sergeant, captain, major, and colonel,
until now, still in the prime of his manhood, he found himself
riding at the head of a brigade. A bony, craggy Scotsman, with a
square fighting head and a bulldog jaw, he had conquered the
exclusiveness and routine of the British service by the same dogged
qualities which made him formidable to Dervish and to Boer. With a
cool brain, a steady nerve, and a proud heart, he is an ideal
leader of infantry, and those who saw him manoeuvre his brigade in
the crisis of the battle of Omdurman speak of it as the one great
memory which they carried back from the engagement. On the field of
battle he turns to the speech of his childhood, the jagged,
rasping, homely words which brace the nerves of the northern
soldier. This was the man who had come from India to take the place
of poor Wauchope, and to put fresh heart into the gallant but
sorely stricken brigade.
The four regiments which composed the infantry of the force - the
Black Watch, the Argyll and Sutherlands, the Seaforths, and the
Highland Light Infantry - left Lord Methuen's camp on Saturday,
February 3rd, and halted at Fraser's Drift, passing on next day to
Koodoosberg. The day was very hot, and the going very heavy, and
many men fell out, some never to return. The drift (or ford) was
found, however, to be undefended, and was seized by Macdonald, who,
after pitching camp on the south side of the river, sent out strong
parties across the drift to seize and entrench the Koodoosberg and
some adjacent kopjes which, lying some three-quarters of a mile to
the north-west of the drift formed the key of the position.
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