Three Years War | Page 7

marched past me four deep I counted eight
hundred and seventeen.
In addition to the prisoners we also captured two Maxim and two
mountain guns. They, however, were out of order, and had not been
used by the English. The prisoners told us that parts of their big guns
had been lost in the night, owing to a stampede of the mules which
carried them, and consequently that the guns were incomplete when
they reached the mountain. Shortly afterwards we found the mules with
the missing parts of the guns.
It was very lucky for us that the English were deprived of the use of
their guns, for it placed them on the same footing as ourselves, as it
compelled them to rely entirely on their rifles. Still they had the
advantage of position, not to mention the fact that they out-numbered
us by four to one.
The guns did not comprise the whole of our capture: we also seized a
thousand Lee-Metford rifles, twenty cases of cartridges, and some
baggage mules and horses.
The fighting had continued without intermission from nine o'clock in
the morning until two in the afternoon. The day was exceedingly hot,
and as there was no water to be obtained nearer than a mile from the
berg,[12] we suffered greatly from thirst. The condition of the wounded
touched my heart deeply. It was pitiable to hear them cry, "Water!
water!"

I ordered my burghers to carry these unfortunate creatures to some
thorn-bushes, which afforded shelter from the scorching rays of the sun,
and where their doctors could attend to them. Other burghers I told off
to fetch water from our prisoners' canteens, to supply our own
wounded.
As soon as the wounded were safe under the shelter of the trees I
despatched a message to Sir George White asking him to send his
ambulance to fetch them, and also to make arrangements for the burial
of his dead. For some unexplained reason, the English ambulance did
not arrive till the following morning.
We stayed on the mountain until sunset, and then went down to the
laager. I ordered my brother, Piet de Wet, with fifty men of the
Bethlehem commando, to remain behind and guard the kop.
We reached camp at eight o'clock, and as the men had been without
food during the whole day it can be imagined with what delight each
watched his bout span frizzling on the spit. This, with a couple of
stormjagers and a tin of coffee, made up the meal, and speedily
restored them. They were exempted from sentry duty that night, and
greatly enjoyed their well-earned rest.
To complete my narrative of the day's work, I have only to add that the
Transvaal burghers were engaged at various points some eight miles
from Nicholson's Nek, and succeeded in taking four hundred prisoners.
We placed our sentries that evening with the greatest care. They were
stationed not only at a distance from the camp, as Brandwachten,[13]
but also close round the laager itself. We were especially careful, as it
was rumoured that the English had armed the Zulus of Natal. Had this
been true, it would have been necessary to exercise the utmost
vigilance to guard against these barbarians.
Since the very beginning of our existence as a nation--in 1836--our
people had been acquainted with black races, and bitter had been their
experience. All that our voortrekkers[14] had suffered was indelibly
stamped on our memory. We well knew what the Zulus could do under

cover of darkness--their sanguinary night attacks were not easily
forgotten. Their name of "night-wolves" had been well earned. Also we
Free-Staters had endured much from the Basutos, in the wars of 1865
and 1867.
History had thus taught us to place Brandwachten round our laagers at
night, and to reconnoitre during the hours of darkness as well as in the
day-time.
Perhaps I shall be able to give later on a fuller account in these
pages--or, it may be, in another book--of the way we were accustomed
to reconnoitre, and of the reasons why the scouting of the British so
frequently ended in disaster. But I cannot resist saying here that the
English only learnt the art of scouting during the latter part of the war,
when they made use of the Boer deserters--the "Hands-uppers."
These deserters were our undoing. I shall have a good deal more to say
about them before I finally lay down my pen, and I shall not hesitate to
call them by their true name--the name with which they will be for ever
branded before all the nations of the world.
[Footnote 10: About nine miles: distance reckoned by average pace of
ridden horse--six miles an hour.]
[Footnote 11: Clear off.]
[Footnote 12: Hill.]
[Footnote 13: Literally, watch-fire men. They were the