CHAPTER 24.
THE SIEGE OF MAFEKING.
This small place, which sprang in the course of a few weeks from
obscurity to fame, is situated upon the long line of railway which
connects Kimberley in the south with Rhodesia in the north. In
character it resembles one of those western American townlets which
possess small present assets but immense aspirations. In its litter
of corrugated-iron roofs, and in the church and the racecourse,
which are the first-fruits everywhere of Anglo-Celtic civilisation,
one sees the seeds of the great city of the future. It is the
obvious depot for the western Transvaal upon one side, and the
starting-point for all attempts upon the Kalahari Desert upon the
other. The Transvaal border runs within a few miles.
It is not clear why the imperial authorities should desire to hold
this place, since it has no natural advantages to help the defence,
but lies exposed in a widespread plain. A glance at the map must
show that the railway line would surely be cut both to the north
and south of the town, and the garrison isolated at a point some
two hundred and fifty miles from any reinforcements. Considering
that the Boers could throw any strength of men or guns against the
place, it seemed certain that if they seriously desired to take
possession of it they could do so. Under ordinary circumstances any
force shut up there was doomed to capture. But what may have seemed
short-sighted policy became the highest wisdom, owing to the
extraordinary tenacity and resource of Baden-Powell, the officer in
command. Through his exertions the town acted as a bait to the
Boers, and occupied a considerable force in a useless siege at a
time when their presence at other seats of war might have proved
disastrous to the British cause.
Colonel Baden-Powell is a soldier of a type which is exceedingly
popular with the British public. A skilled hunter and an expert at
many games, there was always something of the sportsman in his keen
appreciation of war. In the Matabele campaign he had out-scouted
the savage scouts and found his pleasure in tracking them among
their native mountains, often alone and at night, trusting to his
skill in springing from rock to rock in his rubber-soled shoes to
save him from their pursuit. There was a brain quality in his
bravery which is rare among our officers. Full of veld craft and
resource, it was as difficult to outwit as it was to outfight him.
But there was another curious side to his complex nature. The
French have said of one of their heroes, 'Il avait cette graine de
folie dans sa bravoure que les Francais aiment,' and the words
might have been written of Powell. An impish humour broke out in
him, and the mischievous schoolboy alternated with the warrior and
the administrator. He met the Boer commandos with chaff and jokes
which were as disconcerting as his wire entanglements and his
rifle-pits. The amazing variety of his personal accomplishments was
one of his most striking characteristics. From drawing caricatures
with both hands simultaneously, or skirt dancing to leading a
forlorn hope, nothing came amiss to him; and he had that magnetic
quality by which the leader imparts something of his virtues to his
men. Such was the man who held Mafeking for the Queen.
In a very early stage, before the formal declaration of war, the
enemy had massed several commandos upon the western border, the men
being drawn from Zeerust, Rustenburg, and Lichtenburg.
Baden-Powell, with the aid of an excellent group of special
officers, who included Colonel Gould Adams, Lord Edward Cecil, the
soldier son of England's Premier, and Colonel Hore, had done all
that was possible to put the place into a state of defence. In this
he had immense assistance from Benjamin Weil, a well known South
African contractor, who had shown great energy in provisioning the
town. On the other hand, the South African Government displayed the
same stupidity or treason which had been exhibited in the case of
Kimberley, and had met all demands for guns and reinforcements with
foolish doubts as to the need of such precautions. In the endeavour
to supply these pressing wants the first small disaster of the
campaign was encountered. On October 12th, the day after the
declaration of war, an armoured train conveying two 7-pounders for
the Mafeking defences was derailed and captured by a Boer raiding
party at Kraaipan, a place forty miles south of their destination.
The enemy shelled the shattered train until after five hours
Captain Nesbitt, who was in command, and his men, some twenty in
number, surrendered. It was a small affair, but it derived
importance from being the first blood shed and the first tactical
success of the war.
The garrison of the town, whose fame will certainly live in the
history of South Africa, contained no regular soldiers at all with
the exception of the small group of excellent officers. They
consisted of irregular troops, three hundred and forty of the
Protectorate Regiment, one hundred and seventy Police, and two
hundred volunteers, made up of that singular mixture of
adventurers, younger sons, broken gentlemen, and irresponsible
sportsmen who have always been the voortrekkers of the British
Empire. These men were of the same stamp as those other admirable
bodies of natural fighters who did so well in Rhodesia, in Natal,
and in the Cape. With them there was associated in the defence the
Town Guard, who included the able-bodied shopkeepers, businessmen,
and residents, the whole amounting to about nine hundred men. Their
artillery was feeble in the extreme, two 7-pounder toy guns and six
machine guns, but the spirit of the men and the resource of their
leaders made up for every disadvantage. Colonel Vyvyan and Major
Panzera planned the defences, and the little trading town soon
began to take on the appearance of a fortress.
On October 13th the Boers appeared before Mafeking. On the same day
Colonel Baden-Powell sent two truckloads of dynamite out of the
place. They were fired into by the invaders, with the result that
they exploded. On October 14th the pickets around the town were
driven in by the Boers. On this the armoured train and a squadron
of the Protectorate Regiment went out to support the pickets and
drove the Boers before them. A body of the latter doubled back and
interposed between the British and Mafeking, but two fresh troops
with a 7-pounder throwing shrapnel drove them off. In this spirited
little action the garrison lost two killed and fourteen wounded,
but they inflicted considerable damage on the enemy. To Captain
Williams, Captain FitzClarence, and Lord Charles Bentinck great
credit is due for the way in which they handled their men; but the
whole affair was ill advised, for if a disaster had occurred
Mafeking must have fallen, being left without a garrison. No
possible results which could come from such a sortie could justify
the risk which was run.
On October 16th the siege began in earnest. On that date the Boers
brought up two 12-pounder guns, and the first of that interminable
flight of shells fell into the town. The enemy got possession of
the water supply, but the garrison had already dug wells. Before
October 20th five thousand Boers, under the formidable Cronje, had
gathered round the town. 'Surrender to avoid bloodshed' was his
message. 'When is the bloodshed going to begin?' asked Powell. When
the Boers had been shelling the town for some weeks the
lighthearted Colonel sent out to say that if they went on any
longer he should be compelled to regard it as equivalent to a
declaration of war. It is to be hoped that Cronje also possessed
some sense of humour, or else he must have been as sorely puzzled
by his eccentric opponent as the Spanish generals were by the
vagaries of Lord Peterborough.
Among the many difficulties which had to be met by the defenders of
the town the most serious was the fact that the position had a
circumference of five or six miles to be held by about one thousand
men against a force who at their own time and their own place could
at any moment attempt to gain a footing. An ingenious system of
small forts was devised to meet the situation. Each of these held
from ten to forty riflemen, and was furnished with bomb-proofs and
covered ways. The central bomb-proof was connected by telephone
with all the outlying ones, so as to save the use of orderlies. A
system of bells was arranged by which each quarter of the town was
warned when a shell was coming in time to enable the inhabitants to
scuttle off to shelter. Every detail showed the ingenuity of the
controlling mind. The armoured train, painted green and tied round
with scrub, stood unperceived among the clumps of bushes which
surrounded the town.
On October 24th a savage bombardment commenced, which lasted with
intermissions for seven months. The Boers had brought an enormous
gun across from Pretoria, throwing a 96-pound shell, and this, with
many smaller pieces, played upon the town. The result was as futile
as our own artillery fire has so often been when directed against
the Boers.
As the Mafeking guns were too weak to answer the enemy's fire, the
only possible reply lay in a sortie, and upon this Colonel Powell
decided. It was carried out with great gallantry on the evening of
October 27th, when about a hundred men under Captain FitzClarence
moved out against the Boer trenches with instructions to use the
bayonet only. The position was carried with a rush, and many of the
Boers bayoneted before they could disengage themselves from the
tarpaulins which covered them. The trenches behind fired wildly in
the darkness, and it is probable that as many of their own men as
of ours were hit by their rifle fire. The total loss in this
gallant affair was six killed, eleven wounded, and two prisoners.
The loss of the enemy, though shrouded as usual in darkness, was
certainly very much higher.
On October 31st the Boers ventured upon an attack on Cannon Kopje,
which is a small fort and eminence to the south of the town. It was
defended by Colonel Walford, of the British South African Police,
with fifty-seven of his men and three small guns. The attack was
repelled with heavy loss to the Boers. The British casualties were
six killed and five wounded.
Their experience in this attack seems to have determined the Boers
to make no further expensive attempts to rush the town, and for
some weeks the siege degenerated into a blockade. Cronje had been
recalled for more important work, and Commandant Snyman had taken
over the uncompleted task. From time to time the great gun tossed
its huge shells into the town, but boardwood walls and
corrugated-iron roofs minimise the dangers of a bombardment. On
November 3rd the garrison rushed the Brickfields, which had been
held by the enemy's sharpshooters, and on the 7th another small
sally kept the game going. On the 18th Powell sent a message to
Snyman that he could not take the town by sitting and looking at
it. At the same time he despatched a message to the Boer forces
generally, advising them to return to their homes and their
families. Some of the commandos had gone south to assist Cronje in
his stand against Methuen, and the siege languished more and more,
until it was woken up by a desperate sortie on December 26th, which
caused the greatest loss which the garrison had sustained. Once
more the lesson was to be enforced that with modern weapons and
equality of forces it is always long odds on the defence.
On this date a vigorous attack was made upon one of the Boer forts
on the north. There seems to be little doubt that the enemy had
some inkling of our intention, as the fort was found to have been
so strengthened as to be impregnable without scaling ladders. The
attacking force consisted of two squadrons of the Protectorate
Regiment and one of the Bechuanaland Rifles, backed up by three
guns. So desperate was the onslaught that of the actual attacking
party--a forlorn hope, if ever there was one--fifty-three out of
eighty were killed and wounded, twenty-five of the former and
twenty-eight of the latter. Several of that gallant band of
officers who had been the soul of the defence were among the
injured. Captain FitzClarence was wounded, Vernon, Sandford, and
Paton were killed, all at the very muzzles of the enemy's guns. It
must have been one of the bitterest moments of Baden-Powell's life
when he shut his field-glass and said, 'Let the ambulance go out!'
Even this heavy blow did not damp the spirits nor diminish the
energies of the defence, though it must have warned Baden-Powell
that he could not afford to drain his small force by any more
expensive attempts at the offensive, and that from then onwards he
must content himself by holding grimly on until Plumer from the
north or Methuen from the south should at last be able to stretch
out to him a helping hand. Vigilant and indomitable, throwing away
no possible point in the game which he was playing, the new year
found him and his hardy garrison sternly determined to keep the
flag flying.
January and February offer in their records that monotony of
excitement which is the fate of every besieged town. On one day the
shelling was a little more, on another a little less. Sometimes
they escaped scatheless, sometimes the garrison found itself the
poorer by the loss of Captain Girdwood or Trooper Webb or some
other gallant soldier. Occasionally they had their little triumph
when a too curious Dutchman, peering for an instant from his cover
to see the effect of his shot, was carried back in the ambulance to
the laager. On Sunday a truce was usually observed, and the snipers
who had exchanged rifle-shots all the week met occasionally on that
day with good-humoured chaff. Snyman, the Boer General, showed none
of that chivalry at Mafeking which distinguished the gallant old
Joubert at Ladysmith. Not only was there no neutral camp for women
or sick, but it is beyond all doubt or question that the Boer guns
were deliberately turned upon the women's quarters inside Mafeking
in order to bring pressure upon the inhabitants. Many women and
children were sacrificed to this brutal policy, which must in
fairness be set to the account of the savage leader, and not of the
rough but kindly folk with whom we were fighting. In every race
there are individual ruffians, and it would be a political mistake
to allow our action to be influenced or our feelings permanently
embittered by their crimes. It is from the man himself, and not
from his country, that an account should be exacted.
The garrison, in the face of increasing losses and decreasing food,
lost none of the high spirits which it reflected from its
commander. The programme of a single day of jubilee--Heaven only
knows what they had to hold jubilee over--shows a cricket match in
the morning, sports in the afternoon, a concert in the evening, and
a dance, given by the bachelor officers, to wind up. Baden-Powell
himself seems to have descended from the eyrie from which, like a
captain on the bridge, he rang bells and telephoned orders, to
bring the house down with a comic song and a humorous recitation.
The ball went admirably, save that there was an interval to repel
an attack which disarranged the programme. Sports were zealously
cultivated, and the grimy inhabitants of casemates and trenches
were pitted against each other at cricket or football. [Footnote:
Sunday cricket so shocked Snyman that he threatened to fire upon it
if it were continued.] The monotony was broken by the occasional
visits of a postman, who appeared or vanished from the vast barren
lands to the west of the town, which could not all be guarded by
the besiegers. Sometimes a few words from home came to cheer the
hearts of the exiles, and could be returned by the same uncertain
and expensive means. The documents which found their way up were
not always of an essential or even of a welcome character. At least
one man received an unpaid bill from an angry tailor.
In one particular Mafeking had, with much smaller resources,
rivalled Kimberley. An ordnance factory had been started, formed in
the railway workshops, and conducted by Connely and Cloughlan, of
the Locomotive Department. Daniels, of the police, supplemented
their efforts by making both powder and fuses. The factory turned
out shells, and eventually constructed a 5.5-inch smooth-bore gun,
which threw a round shell with great accuracy to a considerable
range. April found the garrison, in spite of all losses, as
efficient and as resolute as it had been in October. So close were
the advanced trenches upon either side that both parties had
recourse to the old-fashioned hand grenades, thrown by the Boers,
and cast on a fishing-line by ingenious Sergeant Page, of the
Protectorate Regiment. Sometimes the besiegers and the number of
guns diminished, forces being detached to prevent the advance of
Plumer's relieving column from the north; but as those who remained
held their forts, which it was beyond the power of the British to
storm, the garrison was now much the better for the alleviation.
Putting Mafeking for Ladysmith and Plumer for Buller, the situation
was not unlike that which had existed in Natal.
At this point some account might be given of the doings of that
northern force whose situation was so remote that even the
ubiquitous correspondent hardly appears to have reached it. No
doubt the book will eventually make up for the neglect of the
journal, but some short facts may be given here of the Rhodesian
column. Their action did not affect the course of the war, but they
clung like bulldogs to a most difficult task, and eventually, when
strengthened by the relieving column, made their way to Mafeking.
The force was originally raised for the purpose of defending
Rhodesia, and it consisted of fine material pioneers, farmers, and
miners from the great new land which had been added through the
energy of Mr. Rhodes to the British Empire. Many of the men were
veterans of the native wars, and all were imbued with a hardy and
adventurous spirit. On the other hand, the men of the northern and
western Transvaal, whom they were called upon to face the burghers
of Watersberg and Zoutpansberg, were tough frontiersmen living in a
land where a dinner was shot, not bought. Shaggy, hairy,
half-savage men, handling a rifle as a mediaeval Englishman handled
a bow, and skilled in every wile of veld craft, they were as
formidable opponents as the world could show.
On the war breaking out the first thought of the leaders in
Rhodesia was to save as much of the line which was their connection
through Mafeking with the south as was possible. For this purpose
an armoured train was despatched only three days after the
expiration of the ultimatum to the point four hundred miles south
of Bulawayo, where the frontiers of the Transvaal and of
Bechuanaland join. Colonel Holdsworth commanded the small British
force. The Boers, a thousand or so in number, had descended upon
the railway, and an action followed in which the train appears to
have had better luck than has usually attended these ill-fated
contrivances. The Boer commando was driven back and a number were
killed. It was probably news of this affair, and not anything which
had occurred at Mafeking, which caused those rumours of gloom at
Pretoria very shortly after the outbreak of hostilities. An agency
telegraphed that women were weeping in the streets of the Boer
capital. We had not then realised how soon and how often we should
see the same sight in Pall Mall.
The adventurous armoured train pressed on as far as Lobatsi, where
it found the bridges destroyed; so it returned to its original
position, having another brush with the Boer commandos, and again,
in some marvellous way, escaping its obvious fate. From then until
the new year the line was kept open by an admirable system of
patrolling to within a hundred miles or so of Mafeking. An
aggressive spirit and a power of dashing initiative were shown in
the British operations at this side of the scene of war such as
have too often been absent elsewhere. At Sekwani, on November 24th,
a considerable success was gained by a surprise planned and carried
out by Colonel Holdsworth. The Boer laager was approached and
attacked in the early morning by a force of one hundred and twenty
frontiersmen, and so effective was their fire that the Boers
estimated their numbers at several thousand. Thirty Boers were
killed or wounded, and the rest scattered.
While the railway line was held in this way there had been some
skirmishing also on the northern frontier of the Transvaal. Shortly
after the outbreak of the war the gallant Blackburn, scouting with
six comrades in thick bush, found himself in the presence of a
considerable commando. The British concealed themselves by the
path, but Blackburn's foot was seen by a keen-eyed Kaffir, who
pointed it out to his masters. A sudden volley riddled Blackburn
with bullets; but his men stayed by him and drove off the enemy.
Blackburn dictated an official report of the action, and then died.
In the same region a small force under Captain Hare was cut off by
a body of Boers. Of the twenty men most got away, but the chaplain
J.W. Leary, Lieutenant Haserick (who behaved with admirable
gallantry), and six men were taken. [Footnote: Mr. Leary was
wounded in the foot by a shell. The German artillerist entered the
hut in which he lay. 'Here's a bit of your work!' said Leary
good-humouredly. 'I wish it had been worse,' said the amiable
German gunner.] The commando which attacked this party, and on the
same day Colonel Spreckley's force, was a powerful one, with
several guns. No doubt it was organised because there were fears
among the Boers that they would be invaded from the north. When it
was understood that the British intended no large aggressive
movement in that quarter, these burghers joined other commandos.
Sarel Eloff, who was one of the leaders of this northern force, was
afterwards taken at Mafeking.
Colonel Plumer had taken command of the small army which was now
operating from the north along the railway line with Mafeking for
its objective. Plumer is an officer of considerable experience in
African warfare, a small, quiet, resolute man, with a knack of
gently enforcing discipline upon the very rough material with which
he had to deal. With his weak force--which never exceeded a
thousand men, and was usually from six to seven hundred--he had to
keep the long line behind him open, build up the ruined railway in
front of him, and gradually creep onwards in face of a formidable
and enterprising enemy. For a long time Gaberones, which is eighty
miles north of Mafeking, remained his headquarters, and thence he
kept up precarious communications with the besieged garrison. In
the middle of March he advanced as far south as Lobatsi, which is
less than fifty miles from Mafeking; but the enemy proved to be too
strong, and Plumer had to drop back again with some loss to his
original position at Gaberones. Sticking doggedly to his task,
Plumer again came south, and this time made his way as far as
Ramathlabama, within a day's march of Mafeking. He had with him,
however, only three hundred and fifty men, and had he pushed
through the effect might have been an addition of hungry men to the
garrison. The relieving force was fiercely attacked, however, by
the Boers and driven back on to their camp with a loss of twelve
killed, twenty-six wounded, and fourteen missing. Some of the
British were dismounted men, and it says much for Plumer's conduct
of the fight that he was able to extricate these safely from the
midst of an aggressive mounted enemy. Personally he set an
admirable example, sending away his own horse, and walking with his
rearmost soldiers. Captain Crewe Robertson and Lieutenant Milligan,
the famous Yorkshire cricketer, were killed, and Rolt, Jarvis,
Maclaren, and Plumer himself were wounded. The Rhodesian force
withdrew again to near Lobatsi, and collected itself for yet
another effort.
In the meantime Mafeking--abandoned, as it seemed, to its fate--was
still as formidable as a wounded lion. Far from weakening in its
defence it became more aggressive, and so persistent and skilful
were its riflemen that the big Boer gun had again and again to be
moved further from the town. Six months of trenches and rifle-pits
had turned every inhabitant into a veteran. Now and then words of
praise and encouragement came to them from without. Once it was a
special message from the Queen, once a promise of relief from Lord
Roberts. But the rails which led to England were overgrown with
grass, and their brave hearts yearned for the sight of their
countrymen and for the sound of their voices. 'How long, O Lord,
how long?' was the cry which was wrung from them in their solitude.
But the flag was still held high.
April was a trying month for the defence. They knew that Methuen,
who had advanced as far as Fourteen Streams upon the Vaal River,
had retired again upon Kimberley. They knew also that Plumer's
force had been weakened by the repulse at Ramathlabama, and that
many of his men were down with fever. Six weary months had this
village withstood the pitiless pelt of rifle bullet and shell. Help
seemed as far away from them as ever. But if troubles may be
allayed by sympathy, then theirs should have lain lightly. The
attention of the whole empire had centred upon them, and even the
advance of Roberts's army became secondary to the fate of this
gallant struggling handful of men who had upheld the flag so long.
On the Continent also their resistance attracted the utmost
interest, and the numerous journals there who find the imaginative
writer cheaper than the war correspondent announced their capture
periodically as they had once done that of Ladysmith. From a mere
tin-roofed village Mafeking had become a prize of victory, a stake
which should be the visible sign of the predominating manhood of
one or other of the great white races of South Africa. Unconscious
of the keenness of the emotions which they had aroused, the
garrison manufactured brawn from horsehide, and captured locusts as
a relish for their luncheons, while in the shot-torn billiard-room
of the club an open tournament was started to fill in their hours
off duty. But their vigilance, and that of the hawk-eyed man up in
the Conning Tower, never relaxed. The besiegers had increased in
number, and their guns were more numerous than before. A less acute
man than Baden-Powell might have reasoned that at least one
desperate effort would be made by them to carry the town before
relief could come.
On Saturday, May 12th, the attack was made at the favourite hour of
the Boer--the first grey of the morning. It was gallantly delivered
by about three hundred volunteers under the command of Eloff, who
had crept round to the west of the town--the side furthest from the
lines of the besiegers. At the first rush they penetrated into the
native quarter, which was at once set on fire by them. The first
building of any size upon that side is the barracks of the
Protectorate Regiment, which was held by Colonel Hore and about
twenty of his officers and men. This was carried by the enemy, who
sent an exultant message along the telephone to Baden-Powell to
tell him that they had got it. Two other positions within the
lines, one a stone kraal and the other a hill, were held by the
Boers, but their supports were slow in coming on, and the movements
of the defenders were so prompt and energetic that all three found
themselves isolated and cut off from their own lines. They had
penetrated the town, but they were as far as ever from having taken
it. All day the British forces drew their cordon closer and closer
round the Boer positions, making no attempt to rush them, but
ringing them round in such a way that there could be no escape for
them. A few burghers slipped away in twos and threes, but the main
body found that they had rushed into a prison from which the only
egress was swept with rifle fire. At seven o'clock in the evening
they recognised that their position was hopeless, and Eloff with
117 men laid down their arms. Their losses had been ten killed and
nineteen wounded. For some reason, either of lethargy, cowardice,
or treachery, Snyman had not brought up the supports which might
conceivably have altered the result. It was a gallant attack
gallantly met, and for once the greater wiliness in fight was shown
by the British. The end was characteristic. 'Good evening,
Commandant,' said Powell to Eloff; 'won't you come in and have some
dinner?' The prisoners--burghers, Hollanders, Germans, and
Frenchmen--were treated to as good a supper as the destitute
larders of the town could furnish.
So in a small blaze of glory ended the historic siege of Mafeking,
for Eloff's attack was the last, though by no means the worst of
the trials which the garrison had to face. Six killed and ten
wounded were the British losses in this admirably managed affair.
On May 17th, five days after the fight, the relieving force
arrived, the besiegers were scattered, and the long-imprisoned
garrison were free men once more. Many who had looked at their maps
and saw this post isolated in the very heart of Africa had
despaired of ever reaching their heroic fellow-countrymen, and now
one universal outbreak of joybells and bonfires from Toronto to
Melbourne proclaimed that there is no spot so inaccessible that the
long arm of the empire cannot reach it when her children are in
peril.
Colonel Mahon, a young Irish officer who had made his reputation as
a cavalry leader in Egypt, had started early in May from Kimberley
with a small but mobile force consisting of the Imperial Light
Horse (brought round from Natal for the purpose), the Kimberley
Mounted Corps, the Diamond Fields Horse, some Imperial Yeomanry, a
detachment of the Cape Police, and 100 volunteers from the Fusilier
brigade, with M battery R.H.A. and pom-poms, twelve hundred men in
all. Whilst Hunter was fighting his action at Rooidam on May 4th,
Mahon with his men struck round the western flank of the Boers and
moved rapidly to the northwards. On May 11th they had left Vryburg,
the halfway house, behind them, having done one hundred and twenty
miles in five days. They pushed on, encountering no opposition save
that of nature, though they knew that they were being closely
watched by the enemy. At Koodoosrand it was found that a Boer force
was in position in front, but Mahon avoided them by turning
somewhat to the westward. His detour took him, however, into a
bushy country, and here the enemy headed him off, opening fire at
short range upon the ubiquitous Imperial Light Horse, who led the
column. A short engagement ensued, in which the casualties amounted
to thirty killed and wounded, but which ended in the defeat and
dispersal of the Boers, whose force was certainly very much weaker
than the British. On May 15th the relieving column arrived without
further opposition at Masibi Stadt, twenty miles to the west of
Mafeking.
In the meantime Plumer's force upon the north had been strengthened
by the addition of C battery of four 12-pounder guns of the
Canadian Artillery under Major Eudon and a body of Queenslanders.
These forces had been part of the small army which had come with
General Carrington through Beira, and after a detour of thousands
of miles, through their own wonderful energy they had arrived in
time to form portion of the relieving column. Foreign military
critics, whose experience of warfare is to move troops across a
frontier, should think of what the Empire has to do before her men
go into battle. These contingents had been assembled by long
railway journeys, conveyed across thousands of miles of ocean to
Cape Town, brought round another two thousand or so to Beira,
transferred by a narrow-gauge railway to Bamboo Creek, changed to a
broader gauge to Marandellas, sent on in coaches for hundreds of
miles to Bulawayo, transferred to trains for another four or five
hundred miles to Ootsi, and had finally a forced march of a hundred
miles, which brought them up a few hours before their presence was
urgently needed upon the field. Their advance, which averaged
twenty-five miles a day on foot for four consecutive days over
deplorable roads, was one of the finest performances of the war.
With these high-spirited reinforcements and with his own hardy
Rhodesians Plumer pushed on, and the two columns reached the hamlet
of Masibi Stadt within an hour of each other. Their united strength
was far superior to anything which Snyman's force could place
against them.
But the gallant and tenacious Boers would not abandon their prey
without a last effort. As the little army advanced upon Mafeking
they found the enemy waiting in a strong position. For some hours
the Boers gallantly held their ground, and their artillery fire
was, as usual, most accurate. But our own guns were more numerous
and equally well served, and the position was soon made untenable.
The Boers retired past Mafeking and took refuge in the trenches
upon the eastern side, but Baden-Powell with his war-hardened
garrison sallied out, and, supported by the artillery fire of the
relieving column, drove them from their shelter. With their usual
admirable tactics their larger guns had been removed, but one small
cannon was secured as a souvenir by the townsfolk, together with a
number of wagons and a considerable quantity of supplies. A long
rolling trail of dust upon the eastern horizon told that the famous
siege of Mafeking had at last come to an end.
So ended a singular incident, the defence of an open town which
contained no regular soldiers and a most inadequate artillery
against a numerous and enterprising enemy with very heavy guns. All
honour to the towns folk who bore their trial so long and so
bravely--and to the indomitable men who lined the trenches for
seven weary months. Their constancy was of enormous value to the
empire. In the all-important early month at least four or five
thousand Boers were detained by them when their presence elsewhere
would have been fatal. During all the rest of the war, two thousand
men and eight guns (including one of the four big Creusots) had
been held there. It prevented the invasion of Rhodesia, and it gave
a rallying-point for loyal whites and natives in the huge stretch
of country from Kimberley to Bulawayo. All this had, at a cost of
two hundred lives, been done by this one devoted band of men, who
killed, wounded, or took no fewer than one thousand of their
opponents. Critics may say that the enthusiasm in the empire was
excessive, but at least it was expended over worthy men and a fine
deed of arms.
