Some Seventy Killed And
Wounded, Many Of Them Terribly Mutilated, Were Found On The Scene
Of The Disaster.
It is certainly a singular coincidence that at
distant points of the seat of war two of the crack irregular corps
should have suffered so severely within three days of each other.
In each case, however, their prestige was enhanced rather than
lowered by the result.
These incidents tend, however, to shake the
belief that scouting is better performed in the Colonial than in
the regular forces.
Of the Boer attacks upon British posts to which allusion has been
made, that upon Belfast, in the early morning of January 7th,
appears to have been very gallantly and even desperately pushed. On
the same date a number of smaller attacks, which may have been
meant simply as diversions, were made upon Wonderfontein,
Nooitgedacht, Wildfontein, Pan, Dalmanutha, and Machadodorp. These
seven separate attacks, occurring simultaneously over sixty miles,
show that the Boer forces were still organised and under one
effective control. The general object of the operations was
undoubtedly to cut Lord Roberts's communications upon that side and
to destroy a considerable section of the railway.
The town of Belfast was strongly held by Smith-Dorrien, with 1750
men, of which 1300 were infantry belonging to the Royal Irish, the
Shropshires, and the Gordons. The perimeter of defence, however,
was fifteen miles, and each little fort too far from its neighbour
for mutual support, though connected with headquarters by
telephone. It is probable that the leaders and burghers engaged in
this very gallant attack were in part the same as those concerned
in the successful attempt at Helvetia upon December 29th, for the
assault was delivered in the same way, at the same hour, and
apparently with the same primary object.
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