An attempt had been made to rally some of the flying troopers at a
neighbouring kraal, and a small body of Cape Police and Yeomanry
under the command of Major Paris held out there for some hours. A
hundred of the Lancashire Infantry aided them in their stout
defence. But the guns taken by the Boers from Von Donop's convoy
had free play now that the British guns were out of action, and
they were brought to bear with crushing effect upon both the kraal
and the wagons. Further resistance meant a useless slaughter, and
orders were given for a surrender. Convoy, ammunition, guns,
horses - nothing was saved except the honour of the infantry and the
gunners. The losses, 68 killed and 121 wounded, fell chiefly upon
these two branches of the service. There were 205 unwounded
prisoners.
This, the last Boer victory in the war, reflected equal credit upon
their valour and humanity, qualities which had not always gone hand
in hand in our experience of them. Courtesy and attention were
extended to the British wounded, and Lord Methuen was sent under
charge of his chief medical officer, Colonel Townsend (the doctor
as severely wounded as the patient), into Klerksdorp. In De la Rey
we have always found an opponent who was as chivalrous as he was
formidable. The remainder of the force reached the Kimberley to
Mafeking railway line in the direction of Kraaipan, the spot where
the first bloodshed of the war had occurred some twenty-nine months
before.
On Lord Methuen himself no blame can rest for this unsuccessful
action. If the workman's tool snaps in his hand he cannot be held
responsible for the failure of his task. The troops who misbehaved
were none of his training. 'If you hear anyone slang him,' says one
of his men, 'you are to tell them that he is the finest General and
the truest gentleman that ever fought in this war.' Such was the
tone of his own troopers, and such also that of the spokesmen of
the nation when they commented upon the disaster in the Houses of
Parliament. It was a fine example of British justice and sense of
fair play, even in that bitter moment, that to hear his eulogy one
would have thought that the occasion had been one when thanks were
being returned for a victory. It is a generous public with fine
instincts, and Paul Methuen, wounded and broken, still remained in
their eyes the heroic soldier and the chivalrous man of honour.
The De Wet country had been pretty well cleared by the series of
drives which have already been described, and Louis Botha's force
in the Eastern Transvaal had been much diminished by the tactics of
Bruce Hamilton and Wools-Sampson.
