was then closely besieged by about thirteen thousand Boers under General Joubert, being in a perilous position, his communications with the outside world being cut off in every direction by the Boers, who for some time bombarded the town daily, the British making a vigorous defense by means of naval guns. Disaster at Nicholson's Nek. In Northern Cape Colony operations were also in progress. The Kimberley and Boers were repulsed near Mafeking in the meantime; while Kimberley Mafeking. was closely besieged by Boers under General Cronje, who proclaimed the annexation of that part of Cape Colony to the Orange Free State. While the Boer force under General Joubert was investing Lady- British smith, some of the Boer commandos were cutting communications between Ladysmith and Pietermaritzburg, the capital of Natal. On October 28th a captive balloon was raised over the beleaguered town, thus enabling General White to locate the besiegers' works. General White detailed two brigade divisions of the Royal Artillery, with five infantry battalions and General French's cavalry, to attack a position in which the Boers had mounted cannon on the 22d. It was discovered that the Boers had since evacuated that position, but the British detachment was assailed vigorously by a large force of Boers with many cannon. The British drove the Boers back several miles, but failed to reach the laagers. After several hours' fighting, the main body of the British detachment returned to their cantonments unmolested. But on the night of the 29th General White sent out Colonel Carlton, with a mountain battery and some of the Royal Irish Fusiliers and some troops of the Gloucester Regiment, to take up a position in the hills on his left, or southern flank, and to march up Bell's Spruit and seize Nicholson's Nek for the purpose of turning the Boers' right flank. When this British detachment was at Farquher's Farm, two miles from its objective point, two boulders were rolled down a hill and some rifle shots were fired, thus causing the mules hitched to the ammunition wagons and to the heavy batteries to stampede, with practically the entire artillery equipment and ammunition. The infantry battalions fixed bayonets and seized a hill, which they defended until 3 P. M. Their ammunition then became exhausted, and they were surrounded by the enemy and forced to surrender. The British loss were forty-two killed and one hundred and fifty wounded; the Boer loss thirty-three killed and sixty wounded. General Yule's column evacuated Dundee and joined General White at Ladysmith, the movement being executed so admirably and with such secrecy that the Boers did not discover it and go in pursuit for twenty-four hours. The Boers occupied Dundee on October 30th. In the meantime operations were being conducted vigorously in Northern Cape Colony. Vryburg had been evacuated by the British Sieges of and occupied by the Boers. On October 24th the Kimberley garrison Kimbermade a sally and had a severe engagement with a Boer force of seven ley and Mafeking. hundred men to the north of the town; the Boers being defeated and many of them killed, their commander among them, and the British loss being three killed and twenty-one wounded. The Boers closely besieged Kimberley and destroyed the railway line along the western frontier. On October 17th the Boers bombarded Mafeking four hours and killed a dog. On the 23d they bombarded the town again, but did little damage. The Boers themselves lost five hundred and thirteen men at Mafeking. Rhode sian Frontier. Canadian and Aus tralian Contingents. In the meantime there was some fighting on the Rhodesian frontier; and the British patrols retired to Tuli, as the Boers were in considerable force. Boer patrols were harrying the natives and stealing cattle. General Sir Redvers Henry Buller arrived at Cape Town on October 31st. The departure of the Canadian contingent from Quebec was the occasion for a great popular demonstration of Canadian loyalty to the British Empire; and stirring speeches were made by Lord Minto, the Viceroy of Canada, and Sir Wilfred Laurier, the Canadian Prime Minister. The French Canadians were as loyal to Great Britain as were the English Canadians in this emergency. The contingents from Victoria and Tasmania embarked at Melbourne for South Africa on October 28th, amid great popular enthusiasm. The troops were addressed by Lord Brassey before they started. On the same day the first portion of the New South Wales contingent sailed from Sydney. The Queensland contingent also sailed. The Emperor William II. of Germany, who is Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Dragoons, sent to the Lieutenant-Colonel the following telegram: "Bid my farewell to the regiment. May you all return safe and well." Lord Lord Rosebery, the leader of the Liberal party, in a speech at Bath Roseon October 27th, said that in time of war all British subjects, of whatbery's Speeches. ever party, should trust the man at the helm and present a united front to the enemy; that the Transvaal question was not a complicated one; that it was the effort of a nation or a community to put back the hands of the clock. In a speech at Edinburgh on November 1st Lord Rosebery again referred to the war in South Africa. European Ladysmith having been invested by the Boers, and telegraphic communication therefore interrupted, there was for some days a virtual absence of authentic news from the field in Natal. In the absence of trustworthy news the manufacture of false intelligence proceeded actively on the Continent of Europe, where the feeling against Great Birtain was as hostile as it was to the United States during the Spanish'American War. At one time it was said that Ladysmith had surrendered to the Boers. At another time it was said that General White had made a sortie and suffered an annihilating defeat. A Berlin dispatch in the Paris Liberte announced the capture of Mafeking by the Boers and asserted that General White was mortally wounded. On Sunday, November 5th, General Sir Redvers Henry Buller received a message from General White by pigeon-post, dated two days before, reporting that on the 2d there was a successful reconnoissance and that on the 3d a British detachment under General Brocklehurst engaged the Boers south-west of Ladysmith for several hours with a small British loss. Fuller accounts of these actions were received afterwards. In the British sortie from Ladysmith on November 2d the Fifth Lancers, with a large field battery, found an Orange Free State laager at Tatham's Farm and shelled it vigorously, driving out the Boers and capturing their camp equipage, the Boers being cut to pieces by the British cavalry. In the action between Ladysmith and Dewdrop, on the 3d, General Brocklehurst, with the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Hussars, the volunteer cavalry, the mounted infantry and a battery, found the Boers in force, holding a laager, with cannon. After being reinforced by the Fifth Dragoon Guards, Royston's Horse and two batteries, General Brocklehurst drove the Boers from all their positions and shelled three guns into silence. The Imperial Light Horse pressed too far into a gulley and were extricated by the Fifth Dragoon Guards. The British loss was small. The Boers fell back toward Colenso, which the British had evacuated. In these engage ments near Ladysmith the Boers lost heavily, their losses being estimated at eight hundred, at one thousand and even two thousand. There also was fighting near Bulwana and at Bester's Station. The Boers continued to bombard Ladysmith without much effect. Lieutenant Egerton, of the British warship Powerful, died of a shell wound. The Boers proclaimed the Upper Tugela division of Natal to be annexed to the Orange Free State, and they invaded Zululand, hoisting their flag. The Boers also invaded Cape Colony from Bethulie, occupied Colesberg and held Norval's Pont and Philippolis bridges over the Orange River, November 4th. The British concentrated troops at De Aar Junction to repel the Boers invasion of Cape Colony. The British military authorities proclaimed martial law in the district occupied by the British troops between the Orange River railway bridge and the De Aar. On November 9th the Boers blew up two railroad bridges-Vanzyl bridge, seven miles from Norval's Pont, and Atchtertang railway bridge and cut telegraph wires. Defenses In the meantime Kimberley and Mafeking were as closely besieged of Kimas was Ladysmith. The Boer forces investing Kimberley were being reinforced constantly and frequently bombarded the town. The Boers Mateking. and Skirmish at Belmont. Bombard ment and Invest Lady smith. blew up the dynamite stores of the De Beers Company, seven miles from Kimberley. The garrisons of both Kimberley and Mafeking were making as heroic defenses against the besieging Boer forces as was Ladysmith. On November 9th the Boers captured part of Kimberley's food. The diamond mines at Kimberley were said to have been injured by the bombardment. At Mafeking the British garrison, under the able leadership of Colonel Baden-Powell, was making daily sorties, always repulsing the Boers. Colonel Baden-Powell captured a number of horses and mules from the Boers. In a sortie from Mafeking on November 13th Captain Fitz-Clarence, of the Third Royal Fusiliers, and Lieutenant Swinton were killed. There was activity in other quarters. On the Rhodesian frontier there was more skirmishing. The railway in the Orange Free State was wrecked completely. On November 11th there was a skirmish at Belmont, near the Orange River, in which Colonel C. E. Keith-Falconer, of the Northumberland Fusiliers, was killed and Lieutenants F. Beven, H. C. Hall and C. C. Wood and two privates of the North Lancashire Regiment were wounded. 66 In the meantime the Boers pressed the siege of Ladysmith with vigor and fiercely bombarded the city daily. Great heroism was manifested ment of by the gunners on both sides. The British garrison repulsed the besieging Boers in a number of brilliant sorties. After the evacuation of Colenso by the British, on November 4th, the Boers held possession of the Colenso and Durban Railroad and the bridge over the Tugela River, thus cutting off White's retreat from Ladysmith. White was surrounded and could communicate with General Buller at Durban only by means of carrier pigeons. Buller's orders to White were: Hold Ladysmith till the last man drops." The Boers moved a siege train on Ladysmith and were preparing for a desperate assault on the beleaguered town. They were strengthened constantly by the arrival of fresh reinforcements and were straining every nerve to capture the town and garrison. On November 14th the Boers were repulsed in an attempt to make a closer investment of the town, being driven from their guns with the loss of five killed and two wounded, while there were no casualties on the British side. The Boer shells did no damage to the town. The British batteries on both the north and south sides of Ladysmith vigorously shelled the Boer batteries, which as vigorously returned the fire. Severe fighting occurred at Ladysmith on November 15th and 16th, the Boers losing heavily, while the British loss was small. In the fight of the 15th the Boers attempted to reach the north of Ladysmith with a large force, but were unable to make any headway against a well-sustained fire of the British riflemen and Maxims. A British detachment afterward moved around the Boer flank, thus Boer Repulses. causing the Boers to retire under a deadly fusilade with very heavy losses, large numbers of their dead and wounded being said to have been left on the field and a number of prisoners being captured. The British losses were very small. Train On November 16th an armored train from Colenso was ambushed Armored and derailed by the Boers, and one hundred and fifty British troops were missing. On the same day Lieutenant Winston Churchill, son of the late distinguished Lord Randolph Churchill, was taken prisoner by the Boers. Estcourt. In the meantime the Boers were also investing Estcourt, south of Defense of Ladysmith, and were preparing to besiege that town, which was defended by a strong garrison of British troops. The Boers assailed the town on November 18th, but the British naval guns soon compelled them to fall back. The next day a detachment of British infantry under Major Thorneycroft made a sortie from the town, but without any material result. The Boers now had over fifty thousand troops in the field. Transports were constantly sailing from various British ports with troops for the seat of war, and by the middle of November forty thousand had arrived in South Africa and over ten thousand had landed at Durban. Large Boer forces marched southward to check the British advance all along the line under Generals Lord Methuen, Clery, Hildyard and Gatacre. many In the meantime the Boers overran Natal and threatened important points. The British advance was impeded by the lack of cavalry, and the Boers were fortifying many strong positions. Large Boer forces were investing Estcourt and other places and menacing Pietermaritzburg, the capital of Natal. The Boers held the railroad from Escourt to the Mooi River and occupied Belmont, Colesberg and Highlands Station in force. They were reinforced by large numbers of disaffected Dutch from Cape Colony, who occupied the town of Lady Grey and other places. They cut off two portions of the Ladysmith relieving force from their base of supplies and were occasioning constant surprises. On November 22d and 23d the Boers shelled the British camp at the Mooi River, in Natal, and heavy artillery duels were in progress there those two days. In Northern Cape Colony they bombarded Kimberley daily. On November 22d detachments of British cavalry, with two Maxims and two field guns, under Major Scott Turner and Captain May, together with the townguard of Beaconsfield, opposite Kimberley, made a reconnaissance and were attacked by two hundred and fifty Boers in a kloof on Alexander's Fontein farm, Captain Bodley being wounded and two horses being killed. British Rein force ments. Boer Move ments. Operations at Mooi River and Kimber ley. |