Never Has Scotland Had A More
Grievous Day Than This Of Magersfontein.
She has always given her
best blood with lavish generosity for the Empire, but it may be
doubted if any single battle has ever put so many families of high
and low into mourning from the Tweed to the Caithness shore.
There
is a legend that when sorrow comes upon Scotland the old Edinburgh
Castle is lit by ghostly lights and gleams white at every window in
the mirk of midnight. If ever the watcher could have seen so
sinister a sight, it should have been on this, the fatal night of
December 11, 1899. As to the Boer loss it is impossible to
determine it. Their official returns stated it to be seventy killed
and two hundred and fifty wounded, but the reports of prisoners and
deserters placed it at a very much higher figure. One unit, the
Scandinavian corps, was placed in an advanced position at
Spytfontein, and was overwhelmed by the Seaforths, who killed,
wounded, or took the eighty men of whom it was composed. The
stories of prisoners and of deserters all speak of losses very much
higher than those which have been officially acknowledged.
In his comments upon the battle next day Lord Methuen was said to
have given offence to the Highland Brigade, and the report was
allowed to go uncontradicted until it became generally accepted. It
arose, however, from a complete misunderstanding of the purport of
Lord Methuen's remarks, in which he praised them, as he well might,
for their bravery, and condoled with them over the wreck of their
splendid regiments.
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