The farm was reached after a difficult march, but the
enemy were found to have been forewarned, and to be in much greater
strength than was anticipated.
A furious fire was opened on the
advancing troops, who were clearly visible in the light of a full
moon. Sir Thomas Fowler was killed and several men of the Yeomanry
were hit. The British charged up to the very walls, but were unable
to effect an entrance, as the place was barricaded and loopholed.
Captain Blackwood, of the Staffords, was killed in the attack.
Finding that the place was impregnable, and that the enemy
outnumbered him, Colonel Perceval gave the order to retire, a
movement which was only successfully carried out because the
greater part of the Boer horses had been shot. By morning the small
British force had extricated itself, from its perilous position
with a total loss of six killed, nineteen wounded, and six missing.
The whole affair was undoubtedly a cleverly planned Boer ambush,
and the small force was most fortunate in escaping destruction.
One other isolated incident may be mentioned here, though it
occurred far away in the Vryheid district of the Transvaal. This
was the unfortunate encounter between Zulus and Boers by which the
latter lost over fifty of their numbers under deplorable
circumstances. This portion of the Transvaal has only recently been
annexed, and is inhabited by warlike Zulus, who are very different
from the debased Kaffirs of the rest of the country. These men had
a blood-feud against the Boers, which was embittered by the fact
that they had lost heavily through Boer depredations. Knowing that
a party of fifty-nine men were sleeping in a farmhouse, the Zulus
crept on to it and slaughtered every man of the inmates. Such an
incident is much to be regretted, and yet, looking back upon the
long course of the war, and remembering the turbulent tribes who
surrounded the combatants - Swazis, Basutos, and Zulus - we may well
congratulate ourselves that we have been able to restrain those
black warriors, and to escape the brutalities and the bitter
memories of a barbarian invasion.
CHAPTER 38.
DE LA REY'S CAMPAIGN OF 1902.
IT will be remembered that at the close of 1901 Lord Methuen and
Colonel Kekewich had both come across to the eastern side of their
district and made their base at the railway line in the Klerksdorp
section. Their position was strengthened by the fact that a
blockhouse cordon now ran from Klerksdorp to Ventersdorp, and from
Ventersdorp to Potchefstroom, so that this triangle could be
effectively controlled. There remained, however, a huge tract of
difficult country which was practically in the occupation of the
enemy. Several thousand stalwarts were known to be riding with De
la Rey and his energetic lieutenant Kemp. The strenuous operations
of the British in the Eastern Transvaal and in the Orange River
Colony had caused this district to be comparatively neglected, and
so everything was in favour of an aggressive movement of the Boers.
There was a long lull after the unsuccessful attack upon Kekewich's
camp at Moedwill, but close observers of the war distrusted this
ominous calm and expected a storm to follow.
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