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Mafeking.
From: Volume II. Chapter VII. The Break Up of the Army Corps
(Background for the Siege of Mafeking).
L. S. Amery, editor, The Times History of the South African War (1902).
Mafeking, Cronje and Baden-Powell.
The first objective of the Boer forces on the western border was Mafeking.
Within a few hours ride of the little township lay nearly eight thousand Boers,
with ten guns, under Cronje. No Boer general was more popular among his
countrymen than swarthy Piet Cronje. The Young Afrikanders were never tired of
contrasting his fearlessness, his truculent and stubborn energy, and his dour
patriotism, with the timidity, the hesitation, and the pro-Uitlander tendencies
of the Commandant-General. Twice already—at Potchefstroom in 1881, and at
Doornkop in 1896—Cronje had seen the hated "rooinek" hoist the white flag in
token of submission to his forces, and neither he nor his burghers doubted but
that a few days would see a third submission added to the list. They had still
to try conclusions with a certain lieutenant-colonel of dragoons, whose name
had not yet become a household word wherever the English tongue is spoken, but
who had already travelled and fought in many countries, and knew South Africa
from Zululand to the Zambesi. The force Baden-Powell had with him was a mere
handful—irregular mounted infantry, just learning to hold on to their saddles,
Cape, Rhodesian, and Protectorate police, and a scratch selection of volunteers
and town guard, with half-a-dozen antiquated little muzzleloaders for
artillery—but animated with a spirit of confidence in themselves, and in the
courage and resourcefulness of their leader, that was to prove of more worth
than numbers or training, or batteries of field artillery, and to frustrate
Cronje's hopes and the whole Boer plan of campaign in the west.
Baden-Powell’s Preparations.
The history of the siege of Mafeking forms an episode by itself. For the present
it is only necessary to touch on as much of it as bears on the general military
situation. In the short time available after the concentration of his force at
Mafeking, Baden-Powell had set to
work to
construct a series of intrenchments, which, though only partially completed
when the siege began, proved sufficient to check the first Boer advance. These
incipient field-works were supplemented by an elaborate system of mines, mostly
imaginary, which served to frighten off the Boers from any attempt to rush the
village, while the real defences were being worked at under fire. Armoured
trains had been secretly constructed in the railway works, and one of these, the
Mosquito, under Lieutenant Nesbitt, with twenty men of the Protectorate Regiment
and a Maxim, was sent down to Vryburg to fetch a couple of 5-inch Howitzers that
Baden-Powell hoped to be sent up from Cape Town. As a matter of fact, all that
Cape Town had to offer were two antiquated muzzle-loading 7-pounders, that had
been fished up out of the recesses of the ordnance stores. The Howitzers owed
their imaginary existence to some error in the sending or deciphering of a code
telegram. That same night, after telegraphic communication with Kekewich at
Kimberley, Baden-Powell sent down a train to fetch the detachment of seventy
Cape Police stationed at Kraaipan, thirty-three miles down the line. All women
and children who were desirous of leaving Mafeking had already been sent down in
the course of the day.
October 12. Boers cross frontier. Capture of armoured train.
These precautions were taken none too soon. Cronje was not minded to waste time
like Joubert. A large part of the commandos had already been moved forward, and
were lining the border opposite Mafeking along a front of thirty miles or more.
The ultimatum expired at five o'clock on the 11th. Soon after midnight the
burghers rode forward and crossed the border. While the main body advanced
slowly from Rooigrond directly towards Mafeking, strong contingents of the
Rustenburg and Marico burghers rode rapidly forward, tearing up the railway line
nine miles north of Mafeking,
and seizing and thoroughly sacking the old Protectorate camp at
Ramathlabama. Another strong force of Lichtenburgers under De la Rey crossed
the border twenty-five miles south of Mafeking, and made a rapid dash on
Kraaipan in order to catch the police. In this they were disappointed, but they
had not long to wait for their first success. Meanwhile they spent the day in
damaging the railway for some distance to north and south of the station. Late
in the evening the
Mosquito,
coming back from Vryburg with
the two guns and a quantity of ammunition, ran over the gap in the track and
ploughed its way to a standstill across the open veld. The Boers surrounded it,
and a desultory fight was kept up all night. But De la Rey had in the meantime
sent up for his artillery under Van der Merwe, and when it arrived in the
morning the fate of the handful of men in the train was sealed. After the first
few shells Nesbitt, who, with eight or nine of his men, was wounded, raised a
white flag and surrendered.
October 13-31. Operations around Mafeking.
On
the 13th, De la Rey's men moved northwards, destroying the line as they rode
along, while other detachments from the Rooigrond force began wrecking the line
South of Mafeking to within four miles of the town. On the same day two
truck-loads of dynamite which were discovered lying in Mafeking Station, were
for safety sent out of the town by Baden-Powell. They were fired upon at a
siding six or seven miles north of the town, whereupon the engine driver, Perry,
coolly uncoupled his engine and steamed back. A few minutes later the trucks
blew up with a terrific explosion, scattering the debris over their intending
captors. This incident only helped to intensify the fears Baden-Powell had
roused by skillfully disseminated reports as to the extent to which the country
round Mafeking was honeycombed with mines. But Baden-Powell was not inclined to
put all his trust in Boer credulity, and determined to teach the Boers a real
respect for the fighting power of his little force. Early on the 14th be sent
out an armoured train under Captain Williams, and a squadron of the Protectorate
Regiment under Captain FitzClarence (afterwards reinforced by an additional
troop and a 7-pounder, under Lord Charles Bentinck to attack the Boers who were
breaking up the line a few miles north of the town. A stiff fight followed,
lasting for about four hours, but although the Boers brought up a 7-pounder and
a "pom-pom," and largely outnumbered the British, they had decidedly the worst
of the engagement.*
[ * The British casualties were 2 killed and 16 wounded. As regards the Boer losses, Baden-Powell seems to have been informed that he killed 53 and wounded a proportionate number. The diary of an English doctor who was present acquiesces in the Boer official reckoning of 2 killed and 6 wounded, while a correspondent of the Standard and Diggers' News puts the total at 60 casualties].
This sudden, vicious "kick" on Baden-Powell's part came as a considerable surprise to the Boers, who were quite unprepared for such a reception, and had a lasting moral effect. One result of it was that the remaining 6-inch siege gun at Pretoria was immediately telegraphed for. But the odds against Baden-Powell were too great to allow him to attempt to check the advance of the main Boer force. On the morning of the 16th the Rustenburg and Marico burghers began shelling the town from the north-east, and pushed on to within 2500 yards of the defences without drawing a reply from the garrison. By nightfall the Boers had pitched their laagers close to Mafeking on every side and the siege began. An invitation to surrender, which had already been sent in that day, was formally repeated by Cronje the next morning and politely rejected. During the next week Mafeking was busy intrenching itself and burrowing into the ground for shelter, while the Boers, who showed no spirit for attack, contented themselves with occasional skirmishes, and pushed up their trenches somewhat closer. On the 23rd the "Long Tom" from Pretoria arrived, and for the next two days the town was steadily shelled by the whole of the Boer guns. But the preparations made had been thoroughly effectual, and the great 94-pounder shells which had just been proving so terrifying in Dundee could do nothing to the securely sheltered little garrison. A half-hearted attack on the native "stad" which accompanied the bombardment of the 25th was easily checked. On the night of the 27th, Mafeking replied by a vigorous sortie against the advanced Boer trenches, which were cleared at the point of the bayonet. On the 31st the Boers made an attempt to capture Cannon Kopje, a hillock 2000 yards south of the town and the key of the whole defence, but were driven back with loss. Altogether, as a result of nearly three weeks of war, the main body of the Boers found itself sitting down to a regular investment of a village which they had calculated would not delay their movements for more than a few days.
Fighting along Western Frontier north of Mafeking during October.
North of Mafeking, the Boer forces had meanwhile been kept well occupied. On
October 15th, Commandant P. D. Swart, with the "bushveld" contingent of the
Marico burghers, seized Lobatsi. Reinforced by a detachment of Rustenburgers
under Piet Kruger, the Boers, 300 to 400 strong, moved north towards Crocodile
Pools, about sixty-five miles north of Mafeking, to meet the armoured train
which patrolled the line from Buluwayo. They had not long to wait. On the 18th,
the Powerful under Captain Llewellyn, with a total crew of forty-seven men and
carrying a 7-pounder and a Maxim, came up to the Pools and repulsed them,
inflicting some thirty casualties. On receipt of the news of this engagement
Cronje at once decided to detach a further strong commando with guns under
Snyman to meet this formidable attack from the north. But before Snyman arrived,
the Powerful found time to engage Piet Krueger again near the Pools with equally
successful results. On the 23rd, the train fell back before Snyman to Gaberones
and subsequently to Mochudi, the "stad" of the powerful native chief Linchwe,
and to Magadapye. On the 26th, Snyman occupied Gaberones. A few days later,
having gradually realised the insignificance of the force opposed to him, he
returned to Mafeking. After his departure, the Boers, on the 31st, wrecked a
culvert north of Mochudi, and for a few days held the place till driven out by
reinforcements under Colonel Holdsworth, aided by Linchwe's Kaffirs. Piet
Kruger, who had made his headquarters at Deerdeport east of Gaberones, occupied
his men with occasional skirmishes against the armoured train, and with the
looting of Linchwe's cattle.
Operations in Limpopo in October.
On
October 11th, the only force at Tuli consisted of 20 police with one 12½-pounder
and one 7-pounder. But the Rhodesia Regiment was on its way, and by the 16th,
Colonel Plumer had four squadrons stationed on the Limpopo in the vicinity of
Rhodes' Drift, and another in reserve at Tuli. For the next few days there were
constant skirmishes between patrols and watering parties, in which the British,
in spite of their numerical inferiority, held their own, and even patrolled some
distance into the Transvaal. A more serious skirmish took place on the 21st, in
which Captain Blackburn, commanding D squadron, was mortally wounded. This and
other signs that the Boer force was being strengthened, induced Colonel Plumer
to withdraw his men to Tuli the next day, sending one squadron right back to
Macloutsie on the railway in case the Boers at Baines' Drift and Selika's should
attempt to invade Rhodesia through Khama's country. As it happened the Boers
fell back almost simultaneously. Field-cornet Briel had been so thoroughly
alarmed by the activity of the Rhodesian troopers that he had sent urgent
requests for reinforcement to Pretoria, in order to prevent an imminent invasion
of the Transvaal from the north. A commando 250 strong, organised in
Johannesburg by Sarel Eloff, President Kruger's grandson, accompanied by several
guns under Freiherr von Dalwag,* was hurriedly sent up from Pretoria, and
pending its arrival Briel remained inactive.
[ * A German officer in the Boer service who played a part of some importance in the Boer military councils before the outbreak of war].
Discovering this, Plumer moved two squadrons down to the Limpopo again on the 27th. The usual skirmishing followed, but it was not till November 2nd that the Boers, whose guns had now come up, ventured to attack in force. They crossed the river and captured a small convoy of wagons at Bryce's Store, near Rhodes' Drift, taking a dozen prisoners. A simultaneous attack by Commandant Du Preez and Fieldcornet Kelly on the squadron at the Drift was less successful. Colonel Spreckley held his own against very heavy odds all day, and withdrew through the bush to Tuli after nightfall. For the rest of the month Plumer's men remained concentrated at Tuli, keeping in touch with the Boers by constant patrols.
Disloyal Vryburg. Suicide of Major Scott. Vryburg occupied
October 18.
South of Mafeking, the next place of any importance along the border was Vryburg.
A small detachment of Cape Police under Assistant-Commissioner Scott was
stationed here, and, combined with the local volunteer corps, might, perhaps,
have attempted to make some sort of defence. But the population of the little
town was Dutch, and in close touch with the commandos over the border, while the
disloyal element was strengthened by the presence of a large number of farmers
who had come in from the surrounding country to celebrate "Nachtmaal," or Holy
Communion. The resident magistrate was weak and incapable, and could think of
nothing better than to send imploring telegrams to Kimberley, asking that
Vryburg should not be defended. On the afternoon of the 14th, De Beer's Bloemhof
Commando destroyed the railway and telegraph at two points between Vrybuug and
Taungs, thus cutting off Vryburg from communication with the outer world. On
the morning, of the 15th, a number of the more influential citizens called a
public meeting to demand the surrender of the town, and approached members of
the Police and volunteers individually, urging them to refuse to fight if
called upon. In spite of this attitude on the part of the inhabitants, and of
the opposition of the magistrate, Major Scott paraded the men and, after
addressing them, asked for volunteers for the defence of the town. Six men
responded. Seeing that resistance was useless, Major Scott retired with his
handful of police upon Geluk, and there, in the bitterness of his
disillusionment at the disloyalty of men who had sworn to fight for the Queen,
took his own life that same evening. His men made their way to Barkly West. It
was not till the 18th that Vryburg was formally occupied by a force of some 1300
men under De la Rey, who had moved south from Mafeking. Amid the loud applause
of the registered voters of a free British town, the Transvaal general now
declared in theatrical words, reading almost like an echo of Lord Wolseley's
famous declaration at Pretoria in 1879, that the Republican flag was flying over
all the land north of the Orange River, and would continue to fly there for
ever.
Line occupied along whole Western Border. Boer attitude in
occupied territory. Their proclamations.
Meanwhile, on the 15th, the Bloemhof and Christiana burghers moving south,
occupied Taungs and Fourteen Streams, from which the small detachments of Cape
Police made their way back to Barkly West. At Fourteen Streams the important
railway bridge over the Vaal was partially destroyed. Here the Transvaalers were
joined on the 17th by a small contingent of the Boshof Free Staters, whose, main
body, under Du Plessis, had destroyed the line between Windsorton and Riverton
Station on the night of the 14th, and occupied Riverton Station on the morning
of the 15th, chasing for some miles a small body of police whom Kekewich had
sent out to bring in the dozen policemen at the Station. South of Kimberley, the
Free Staters crossed the border on the evening of the 14th and broke up the
railway and cut the telegraph wires near Spytfontein and Modder River. Kekewich
had received instructions to send a detachment of infantry to guard the bridge,
but had prudently put off taking a step which could only have resulted in the
loss of part of his already insufficient force. After several unsuccessful
attempts the railway bridge at Modder River was partially destroyed by the Boers
some days afterwards. On the 19th, Van der Merwe, with 300 Fauresmith Burghers,
occupied Belmont Station. Thus, at the end of a week of war, the whole of the
railway from Orange River to Mafeking was in the hands of the Boers, with the
exception of a few miles on either side of Kimberley itself. Everywhere the
invaders met with the acquiescence, and even the active help, of the
inhabitants. The subject of the rebellion in Cape Colony and of the action of
the republics in annexing British territory is one that is, perhaps, better
treated separately. It is enough to say, for the present, that the proclamation
issued by President Steyn on October 14, and amplified by proclamations from
Wessels and other Transvaal and Free States commandants, while it did not
formally declare the annexation of the occupied territories, was in practice
treated as having done so, and wavering disloyalists were impelled to take up
arms by being told that to do so was their obligation as Transvaal or Free State
burghers. Towards those who were unwilling to take up arms for the cause of a
United Dutch South Africa, or who might even be tempted by their loyalty to help
the British troops, the Republican commandants were prepared to show no mistaken
leniency. Though their own forces consisted of
irregulars wearing no uniform* and subject to very little
discipline, and though they were themselves inciting the civilian inhabitants of
British territories to take up arms in order to attack and hamper the regular
forces of their own lawful sovereign, they had no mind to concede any such
privileges to the other side.
[ * It is to be regretted that the British Government did not at the outset declare that it would refuse to treat the un-uniformed commandos of the Boers as belligerents on British soil. The right of a population to take up arms to repel invasion of its own territory is one that the British representatives strongly urged at The Hague Conference. But the invasion and occupation of another country by bands of armed men in ordinary clothes, indistinguishable from the civilian population of the country, for whom they would frequently pass themselves off for purposes of espionage, was a very different matter. A declaration that all armed men made prisoners on British territory, and not wearing some permanent and easily recognisable uniform or badge marking them as belonging to the Republican forces, would be treated as bandits and be liable to be shot without ceremony, would have had an excellent effect and might have delayed or possibly even have altogether prevented an invasion, while it would have been in perfect harmony with The Hague Convention on the Laws and Customs of War (articles 1 and 2). That no steps at all were taken, and that in consequence British generals had to fight at a most serious disadvantage, is simply another instance of the casual and haphazard fashion in which the war was taken in hand by those in supreme authority. The British Government was not, strictly speaking, bound to observe the rules of The Hague Convention towards the Boers. But if it had announced its intention of both observing and enforcing those rules strictly, it would not only have gained European sympathy but would have derived substantial advantages, and might even have averted or kept within limits the long guerilla campaign, with all its regrettable concomitants, which followed the break up of the Boer armies. In war severity, if based on clearly defined rules, is often far more humane in the end than more easy-going contempt of one's enemy masquerading as clemency].
There can be no doubt that the attitude they took up had a useful effect in safeguarding their communications in British territory from the operations of enterprising loyalists. To quote the wording of the most important paragraph which appears in all these proclamations, whether issued in Cape Colony or Natal:
"All persons who do not constitute a portion of the British Army, and who (a) serve the enemy as spies; (b) cause the burghers and men of the South African Republic and Orange Free State to lose their way when acting as guides; (c) kill, murder, or rob persons belonging to one of the Republics, or forming part of their following and train; (d) destroy bridges or damage telegraph lines, heliographic apparatus, or railways, or in any way cause damage to parts or portions of the same, whereby the Republics may be hindered or their people or property damaged, or even they who in any way endeavour to repair or make good the damage done by the Republican forces to property or apparatus, or who set fire to the ammunition, war supplies, quarters or camps of the Republican forces, or in any way damage them; (e) take up arms against the forces of one of the said Republics shall, at the discretion of a Council of War, be punished with death or imprisonment not exceeding fifteen years."
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L. S. Amery, The
Times History of the War in South Africa (1900-1909). Volume VII, Chapter XVII. The Siege of Mafeking. |
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L. S. Amery, The
Times History of the War in South Africa (1900-1909). The Times Map of South Africa. |
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Arthur Conan
Doyle, The Great Boer War (1902) Preface and Table of Contents |
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"Events at Mafeking" is the final chapter of Howard Hensman's A History of Rhodesia. Hensman writes: "The book was mainly conceived and written before the out break of the war, but with the object of making the volume as complete as possible chapters dealing with the sieges of Kimberly and Mafeking and Colonel Plumer's Rhodesian force have been added." | |
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